Electoral Register

(asked on 26th September 2019) - View Source

Question to the Cabinet Office:

To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Cabinet Office, with reference to the Electoral Commission's report entitled Accuracy and completeness of the electoral registers in Great Britain, what assessment his Department has made of the merits of additional ring-fenced funding for the purpose of increasing electoral register completeness for 18-34 year olds.


Answered by
Kevin Foster Portrait
Kevin Foster
This question was answered on 1st October 2019

Since 2013/14, the Government has provided more than £27m to fund diverse activities by EROs, civil society groups and others to promote electoral registration and democratic engagement, including with younger people.

The Government does not support ring-fenced funding for the registration of 18-34 year-olds. Under a long-standing protocol, the majority of funding provided to local authorities is not ring-fenced. Democratically elected local authorities are best placed to determine the allocation of funds within their area.

Younger people are keen users of the Government’s online register to vote service. Ahead of the General Election in June 2017 young people aged under 25 submitted over 1 million applications to register to vote - more than 35 percent of all applications received in the pre-election period.

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