Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:

To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what steps he is taking to reduce postal voting fraud.

Postal voting is well established and popular with many electors, who find it a convenient way to vote. However, we need to be vigilant in ensuring that the processes are not exploited by those who would seek to deprive others of their democratic rights.

We have recently brought in a number of measures to strengthen the security of postal voting via the Elections Act 2022. These include: a requirement for identity checking, usually via National Insurance number, when applying for a postal ballot; a three-year limit on how long a postal voting arrangement can be held; and banning political campaigners from handling postal ballots, delivering our manifesto commitment to stop so-called “vote harvesting”.