Electoral Administration Bill

moved Amendment No. 142:"Page 110, line 35, at end insert—" ““(4) In paragraph (4) for ““A candidate’s spouse or civil partner”” substitute ““One other person chosen by the candidate””.”” The noble Baroness said: My Lords, I should like to speak also to Amendments Nos. 144 and 145, 155 and 158. Those amendments change paragraphs 73 and 75 of Schedule 1, part 5. Amendments Nos. 142 and 144 change the rules specifying who a candidate can invite to the nomination proceedings and count proceedings, respectively. The amendments provide that a candidate can invite a person of their choosing. Previously, that was limited to a spouse or civil partner, but my noble friend Lady Gale, whom I am delighted to see in her place, argued at Second Reading that that was too restrictive and that a candidate should be able to invite a family member or common law partner, and so on, if they so wished. The Government have accepted that argument. My noble friend Lady Gale only mentioned attendance at the counting of votes, but when we took the matter to parliamentary counsel, they rightly pointed out that the candidate can also invite a spouse or civil partner to the nomination procedure and that that provision should also be amended for purposes of consistency. The second paragraph of Amendment No. 144 is a consequential amendment to the changes that the Government proposed to make to the observation of elections, as set out in Clause 33. It simply reflects the new language of Clause 33, which changes the observer regime from a permissive to a rights system where, as we have mentioned under earlier amendments to election proceedings, observers may turn up unannounced. Amendment No. 144 gives effect to a further change in policy relating to spouses or civil partners. It restores the discretion of returning officers to invite any person to the count who may not appear under the list of specified persons who automatically have a right to attend under electoral law. The Government originally intended to remove that discretion in the Bill, but feedback from electoral administrators suggests that that could cause problems, such as allowing for the attendance of a local mayor who is not the returning officer of a constituency in his area. Amendment No. 145 makes a further technical change necessary to restore returning officers’ discretion. Amendments Nos. 155 and 158 are consequential amendments to Schedule 2. Amendment No. 155 simply reinstates rule 44(3) of Schedule 1 to the RPA 1983, which is a returning officer’s discretion to invite people to the count. Amendment No. 158 changes the reference to the Civil Partnership Act, reflecting the fact that a candidate will now be able to be accompanied by any person of his or her choosing, rather than being restricted to a spouse or civil partner. I beg to move.