Representation of the People Bill (Fifth sitting)

Lewis Cocking Excerpts

Thursday 26th March 2026 Public Bill Committees

[Paul Holmes]

No. I absolutely do not take the hon. Gentleman’s comments as an insult to me. He is absolutely right; as young activists for our respective parties, and from some of our conversations at our desks, we could only be described as “odd”. I am sure that applies to pretty much all members of the Committee, as he insinuated.

Again, we have a set election period. People who want to go out and vote will know the expectations of them in the current system. Therefore, the scenario the hon. Member described would be a very minor issue. My line is that, for the integrity and safety of the system, people should know what the system expects of them and there are ways to allow them to cast their vote.

[Lewis Cocking (Broxbourne) (Con)]

The shadow Minister is making an excellent speech. He has probably seen, like I have, leaflets from all the political parties represented on this Committee that tell people what form of ID is acceptable way before we even get into the election period or the election date is just around the corner. Does he agree that there are multiple touchpoints for people to understand what forms of ID are acceptable for when they cast their vote?

[Paul Holmes]

I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend, who was even younger than me when he got into politics, and is even younger than me now, as a very young member of this House. He knew when he was expected to go out and vote. He is right that all political parties are able to put out in their literature the expectations of people and what forms of ID are available. The Government’s watering-down is disastrous for democracy and will weaken the integrity of the system.

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[Paul Holmes]

I am not sure whether the hon. Gentleman is advocating new clause 19, but it is absolutely clear that three is too many. He may be willing to accept that there were three cases that were proven—as was the 2022 case in Eastleigh—but I do not think there should be any examples of voter fraud, and I certainly do not think that any responsible Government should make it easier for that to happen. I agree that it will be harder to impersonate somebody than it would be under the system proposed by the Liberal Democrats, but photo ID shows the face and eyes of the person who is going to vote.

Allowing the use of a bank card, which can have a different form of the person’s name, and has no date of birth or address, would make it easier to impersonate somebody. I have four bank cards in my wallet—probably because I am in so much debt. On each and every one of those cards, my name is written differently: there is “P Holmes”, “Mr P. J. Holmes”, “Mr Paul Holmes”, “Mr Paul John Holmes” and “Mr Paul J. Holmes”. They are all different, and a card would be the only thing that a volunteer at the polling station would have to adjudicate.

I put it to the Committee, and I strongly put it to the Minister, as I did in the evidence session, that this is a retrograde, reckless step that will increase identity fraud and voting fraud. Every expert in the evidence session who was asked said that they had concerns about bank cards being used, and that it would water down the system. We strongly contend that that is the case, and we oppose the new clause. We obviously support amendment 30. The official Opposition think this proposal is a bad thing, and we vigorously oppose it. I urge the Minister to change her mind before we get to the final stages of the Bill.

[Lewis Cocking]

I rise in support of Opposition amendment 30, and I will make some comments new clause 19 as tabled by the Liberal Democrats. The biggest thing that puts votes at risk is to keep changing the eligible ID on the list. We have just heard from my hon. Friend the Member for Hamble Valley about the different names that can appear on a bank card. We are yet to hear from the Government what name would need to be on a bank card—would it need to be the person’s initials, their surname, their first name, or their middle initial and surname? That will make it very difficult for clerks and polling station staff to adjudicate in busy polling stations.

If guidance comes out and says, “You need your first initial and your surname. We won’t accept anything else,” that will be confusing for people. People will turn up with bank cards that are not eligible under this system. The Government are trying to make it easier for people to cast their vote by not safeguarding democracy and not requiring ID. That will create confusion.

I do not see how we have come to the conclusion that we should put bank cards on the list. It would be interesting to hear from the Minister what other forms of ID were considered when she sat down with her officials and said, “I know what we are going to do. We are going to add bank cards to this list.” What other forms of ID were considered, and what was considered not appropriate? I think that is a fair question to the Minister.

We also heard from the shadow Minister about electronic bank cards, which will be a particular issue when people turn up to the polling station and polling clerks need to check them. When I did telling at polling stations before people needed photographic ID to vote, most people turned up with ID anyway, and most people I spoke to were shocked when I told them that they did not need ID. The fact that voter ID has added integrity to the process, and that most people now think voting is more secure, is a good thing. I do not support new clause 19, which would be a step backwards in that regard.

We can all play our part in enabling people to access free voter ID. The hon. Member for Ashford suggested earlier that 16 and 17-year-olds might be put off voting if they did not have ID, so why have the Government not come forward with a programme to give out free voter ID at secondary schools when people are registering to vote? That would be a way to solve some of the problems that he thinks may come out of the Bill. The Government could be doing that.

[Katrina Murray (Cumbernauld and Kirkintilloch) (Lab)]

I hear what the hon. Gentleman says about younger people, but what about the older end of the spectrum? My mother decided that she would give up driving at the age of 84, last February. No longer being behind the wheel of a car was a sound decision for her and probably for most of the people in the local area, but it means that she has given up her form of photo identification.

My mother has voted in every election in which she has been able to; it is something that she finds particularly important. She is not particularly up on online banking or digital banking, but she has a physical bank card and is happy to use it. What advice would the hon. Gentleman give my mother, who is very wary about spending lots of time applying for passes and does not have photographic identification?

[Lewis Cocking]

We will not stray into the issue of online banking, banking hubs and high street banks, but I have some sympathy: I have family members who do not want to do online banking. The hon. Lady’s mother can get a free voter authority certificate from the council, or she could choose to vote by post, and then her signature would be checked and verified by the council. There are two options for her to pick from. I do not understand why we think this is so difficult.

As I said when intervening on my hon. Friend the shadow Minister, I have seen political leaflets from every party represented on this Committee showing what forms of identification people need. That is before we even get to the election day, and way before the deadline that the hon. Member for Welwyn Hatfield mentioned regarding the voter authority certificate. Voter ID has been in place now for a number of elections. I have been turning up at polling stations since the legislation came into place, and in all those hours I think one person did not have ID—and they came back with it later in the day.

As I said in the evidence session, I question the data that is being collected. It is not clear that we are capturing the data on whether people come back later in the day with their identification. It was also mentioned that people get turned away at the door and might not even make it to the clerk’s desk. How many of those people come back? They will not be captured in that data. Voter identification is a good thing, and I am extremely concerned that we are watering it down. As I said, the Government are putting people who work at polling stations in a very difficult position, because it is not clear what type of name—first name, initials or surnames—needs to be on the bank card. We will have more disputes under the new system that the Government are trying to introduce than we have under the system that we have now.

[Lisa Smart]

It will not surprise anybody that I am not in favour of amendment 30 and will speak in favour of new clause 19. Before I get into that, I will speak briefly in favour of clause 47 and Government amendments 10 and 11. If we have voter ID, it should be as wide and as accessible as possible, so I will not speak against those provisions.

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I was in Transport oral questions this morning: quite a lot of time was spent on how difficult it is for young people to get access to a driving test, which means that getting access to a driving licence is harder than it should be.

[Lewis Cocking]

What the hon. Lady has just outlined has no effect when it comes to a provisional licence, which is photographic ID.

[Lisa Smart]

The point I am making is about bank cards in particular. I want it to be as easy as possible for people to vote, and the Electoral Commission’s evidence was that the barriers put up by requiring photographic ID particularly impacted certain demographic groups, including young people, who often face additional barriers in terms of understanding how the world works.

The hon. Gentleman and his colleagues have talked about how they have a number of bank cards and understand the system. That is great, but they are from a demographic group for whom the modern world is built, and it is not the same for everybody. If a person rents, often changes address or does not speak English as a first language, the world is harder to navigate, but everyone who is eligible to vote should be able to vote.

Bank cards are among the most common everyday items, but amendment 30 seeks to restrict that widened category, creating a barrier to entry that mimics a credit score-based franchise. Many legitimate voters, particularly younger people, including the 16 and 17-year-olds who are to be enfranchised, and lower socioeconomic groups, use basic banking services that do not require formal credit searches. We heard in the oral evidence sessions last week from Peter Stanyon, of the Association of Electoral Administrators, who pointed out that the measure would add unnecessary complexity for polling staff, some of whom are volunteers. It would require them to understand the nuances of credit check markers on cards, which would be an impossible administrative burden.

New clause 19 would abolish the legal requirement to show photo ID when voting in person in Great Britain. Liberal Democrats were not in favour of it when it was introduced, and we remain not in favour of it today. I have heard it described repeatedly as a solution in search of a problem. Before the introduction of voter ID legislation between 2019 and 2023, out of tens of millions of votes cast, only 10 people were convicted for personation during a UK election, and yet the scheme saw 16,000 voters turned away, according to evidence from the Electoral Reform Society.

This is not a crisis that required the legislation that was brought in. The Government are now trying to extend that, and it is certainly not a crisis that justifies the Conservative amendment before us. We believe it would make things worse rather than better. Restricting bank card voter ID only to cards issued after a formal credit check would significantly narrow eligibility, and we do not support that.

We believe that voter ID requirements should be scrapped because they are a deeply unfair policy. If bank cards, which include only a name to provide verified information, are seen as acceptable forms of ID, would it not make sense to extend the provision and allow any form of personal ID to be shown at the polling booth? Partial improvements are not enough when the underlying principle and policy remain deeply flawed.

I have mentioned some of the evidence presented to us by the Electoral Commission. Further evidence from the organisation showed that the number of voters turned away was 50,000 at the last election, with 34,000 of those people returning to exercise their right to vote. Meanwhile, the University of Manchester found that almost 2 million people did not have the right ID to vote in 2024. These people are not just a statistic; they are individual citizens who were not able to exercise their democratic right.

I remember knocking on doors at the last election and speaking to somebody who was livid that she could not exercise her right to vote. She had recently been divorced, and she had changed her name as a result. That meant that a lot of her ID was in her old name and so she was unable to cast her vote, which she felt very strongly about. She talked to me about the women—the suffragettes and suffragists—who had died to ensure that we had a right to vote. I remember that conversation on polling day very clearly.

We have talked already about how these measures disproportionately affect some communities over others. Hope Not Hate reported that 6.5% of ethnic minority voters were turned away from a polling booth at least once, compared with 2.5% of white voters. Evidence from the Electoral Commission shows that those in the C2 and DE social grades were significantly more affected, with 8% of lower-income non-voters saying that they did not vote because they lacked the required ID, compared with 3% of higher-income voters. We should not be stopping people who are entitled to vote for want of the correct photo ID. This is a solution in search of a problem—and for that reason, I commend new clause 19 to the Committee.