Electoral Administration Bill

The hon. Gentleman appears to be speaking against the proposition that he supports. People are required to return their electoral registration form, but we do not implement that requirement, so compulsion is not the answer. However, to take up the point that he has just made, people who canvass my constituency, where more than 9,000 people are missing from the register, say that, for various reasons, it is increasingly difficult to contact electors. My electoral registration officer says that if individual voter registration is introduced, it will decimate the register. Is the hon. Gentleman prepared to accept the fact that the 9,000 people missing from my register will increase to 18,000? I suspect that the increase will be even higher in his constituency.