Voter ID

Helen Morgan Excerpts

Thursday 27th April 2023 Commons Chamber

[Rachel Maclean]

I thank my hon. Friend for his question. When Labour Ministers introduced voter ID in Northern Ireland, they set out in great detail why the legislation was necessary. Why is it good enough for one valued part of our United Kingdom but not good enough for the electors of Great Britain?

[Helen Morgan (North Shropshire) (LD)]

As the Local Government Association indicated earlier this month, and as the hon. Member for Lancaster and Fleetwood (Cat Smith) has reiterated, there are significant practical problems for polling clerks. Meanwhile, the chief executive of the Association of Electoral Administrators has said that discussions are taking place with the police for extra resources on polling day. With a week to go, can the Minister confirm whether enough polling clerks have been recruited and whether additional police resources have been secured to support the additional burden next Thursday? What strain will this place on police services?

[Rachel Maclean]

The hon. Lady is right to highlight all the practical work that is going on, and I want to thank local authorities very much for the way they have delivered those additional measures that are going to be needed, backed by £4.75 million of central Government funding through the new burdens process. Of course, the Government will take very seriously all the lessons learned about this exercise, but I return once more to the point: when this process was introduced in Northern Ireland, under a Labour Government, none of the issues that are being raised regularly by Opposition Members were found to have turned out in practice to be the case.