Electoral Administration Bill

To pick up the point about pilots, I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for North-East Hertfordshire (Mr. Heald) that we seem already to have had a pilot of sorts in Northern Ireland, from which we learnt some things. We should pay attention to the Electoral Commission, which recognised that there were some negative effects on registration, and advised that to tackle that we should couple a move to individual registration with other measures such as campaigning and publicity work. I am not sure how far forward the running of pilots will take us. One of two things will happen. The use of basic identifiers such as a signature and date of birth will not show a significant a drop, which I am not convinced will satisfy some Labour Members—who have already seen examples of a drop in Northern Ireland—that there will not be a problem in rolling that out across the country. Alternatively, it will show a significant drop, but the reasons for that, and the reasons why there are such barriers, will not necessarily be clear. In relation to the reasons why people do not register, the Committee chaired by the right hon. Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Mr. Beith) stated in its report on page 26:"““Most of the figures quoted are from data collected in 1991.””" It mentioned that the Government were conducting"““a qualitative piece of research trying to get into the minds of individuals who perhaps do not register actively. What puts them off from registering? That is due to be completed some time around April [2005].””" Will the Minister tell the Committee what progress has been made on that, and whether that information will be available? Clearly, if some of what seem to be relatively straightforward identifiers act as significant barriers, we need to know why they are acting as barriers. I do not see how we can get much more straightforward identifiers than signature and date of birth for most people. If the introduction of such identifiers causes a massive drop in registration, I am not sure what other sorts of identifiers would not have a similar effect. We therefore need to be clear about why a drop in registration has been caused. If a signature and date of birth is that off-putting, that either reflects levels of education among some of the groups who are not registering to vote, or, as I have said previously, the extent to which they could care less about voting. I accept the point made by the hon. Member for Aberdeen, South (Miss Begg) that for some individuals a signature might be a problem, and the Bill provides for that, but if most people are so disinterested in voting that asking them to sign a piece of paper and give their date of birth will cause a catastrophic drop in registration—as some Labour Members were saying—it strikes me that we have a more serious problem with voting and democracy in this country than is recognised. If the Minister could answer my key question about some of the research on barriers to voting, that would be helpful.