Electoral Administration Bill

My hon. Friend has highlighted an issue that I wanted to deal with later, but I will do so now as he has raised it. Clearly, there was no consensus across the House in support of the move from a 5 per cent. to a 2 per cent. threshold at which the deposit is lost. The Electoral Commission made the recommendation, and along with many other such recommendations we incorporated it into the Bill. We would not want to ram the measure through if it did not enjoy support on both sides of the House, and we can revisit the issue in Committee.