Government plans for electoral reform are a welcome start, but contain one surprising and serious error of judgement

Over the summer time, ministers revealed plans for in depth electoral reforms. The headline proposal is the discount of the voting age to 16. A raft of different measures will have an effect on voter registration, marketing campaign finance, election administration, and the position of the Electoral Fee. On this publish, Alan Renwick argues that a lot of what the federal government proposes is sweet. However the newly appointed set of ministers answerable for elections coverage might want to make additional progress on some essential issues. 

Labour’s election manifesto final yr made a sequence of pledges on electoral reform. Over the summer time, the Ministry for Housing, Communities, and Native Authorities (MHCLG) set out its concrete plans.

Lots of the proposals ought to show uncontroversial. Each the Electoral Fee and the Affiliation of Electoral Directors (AEA) have welcomed numerous comparatively technical measures, reminiscent of changes to the electoral timetable and to processes round postal voting, that are designed to ease pressures on election employees and cut back the hazard that postal voters can not return their ballots on time. A spread of adjustments to marketing campaign finance guidelines will strengthen enforcement and shut loopholes that permit in cash from exterior the UK. Gaps within the necessities for ‘imprints’ indicating who’s answerable for political commercials may also be addressed.  

Two additional measures will provoke debate, however seem to get the steadiness about proper. One in every of these will lengthen the vary of types of ID which are eligible at polling stations. The Elections Act 2022 launched a requirement for photographic ID for voters in Nice Britain that the majority specialists and campaigners seen as disproportionate, given restricted proof of fraud. Ample proof now reveals this measure excludes some would-be voters from the poll. The federal government’s proposals will permit digital types of ID all through the UK and, in Nice Britain, one extensively accessible type of non-photographic ID – specifically, financial institution playing cards. Some campaigners would really like ID necessities to be scrapped completely. However each the Electoral Fee and the AEA have expressed concern that even permitting financial institution playing cards ‘has dangers for safety and voter belief’. 

The second space the place a steadiness has been struck is within the transfer in direction of automated electoral registration (AER). The federal government has not promised full AER, however have somewhat mentioned it ‘will actively check strategies of automated registration’. Some will probably be involved that this pledge leaves an excessive amount of wiggle room. However the Electoral Fee has highlighted that AER does elevate some challenges that might have to be labored by way of rigorously earlier than any everlasting adjustments have been made. So the cautious method seems justified. 

Three remaining areas demand additional consideration. In two of those, the route of journey is constructive, however extra is required. Within the third, the federal government is making a stunning and severe error of judgement.  

Votes at 16 

The primary of those three areas is the discount of the voting age to 16. That is the aspect within the reform bundle that has acquired most media consideration, usually specializing in which of the events would possibly achieve or lose by way of the proposed change. But that could be a tough query to reply when voting behaviour is in such flux, and likewise not the criterion that must form such an essential constitutional selection. Likewise, some protection has picked up longstanding debates over the age at which we’d achieve an ethical proper to vote – an attention-grabbing query for seminar rooms, however not one that can ever be conclusively resolved.  

The important thing level, somewhat, is how introducing votes at 16 would have an effect on democracy and governance. As Dr Christine Huebner, a number one skilled, mentioned at a Unit occasion on votes at 16 earlier this yr, expertise in locations which have already lowered the franchise – together with Scotland and Wales – means that, as a minimum, the change could be most unlikely to trigger important hurt.  

Past this, the primary case for votes at 16 is that it ought to lead over time to larger electoral turnout. The argument – first developed intimately by the political scientist Mark Franklin – is that voting is behavior forming: whether or not you do it the primary time you might be entitled to strongly impacts your probability of doing it for the remainder of your life. So enfranchising individuals at an age when they’re extra possible to make use of their vote is healthier. A franchise age of 18 is maybe uniquely unhealthy: many individuals reside away from house for the primary time at that age, and could also be exterior schooling; so constructions which may help them to vote are weak. At 16, in contrast, alternatives to allow voting are a lot stronger. The proof tends to help this: supplied it’s carried out nicely, the decrease voting age does seem to spice up turnout. 

However this logic solely works if efficient schooling is supplied to help younger individuals’s understanding of and engagement with politics. The federal government’s paper recognises this, indicating that officers are working with a variety of companions to make sure ‘efficient and related democratic schooling in faculties’. But the extent of that dedication stays unclear. The paper says that MHCLG ‘will contemplate the result of the unbiased Curriculum and Evaluation Overview, which is able to report later this yr’. MHCLG shouldn’t be passively ready, however somewhat actively in search of to form that evaluation, to make sure that fostering wholesome democratic citizenship is on the coronary heart of schooling coverage. The paper additionally emphasises partnership with ‘youth and civil society teams’ – which may recommend a want to elevate citizenship schooling out of dusty textbooks, however may additionally mirror a mindset that sees such issues as add-ons to the core curriculum. The Affiliation of Citizenship Educating has emphasised in response to the paper that such issues shouldn’t be handled ‘as elective or enrichment’. The UK Democracy Fund has additionally lately revealed detailed proposals.  

Marketing campaign finance 

The federal government’s proposals on marketing campaign finance have typically been welcomed, as far as they go. For a lot of, nevertheless, they don’t go far sufficient. 

Specifically, whereas the paper proposes to tighten guidelines on international donations, it continues to argue that anybody on the electoral register ought to be capable to donate to political events with out restrict. It says, ‘This isn’t about limiting or discouraging donations to campaigners – it’s in any case essential to our democracy that they continue to be capable of fund themselves.’ 

But how permitting the wealthiest members of society to donate limitless sums will be reconciled with the precept of democratic equality is unclear. A number of august our bodies – not least, the Committee on Requirements in Public Life (CSPL) – have concluded over time in favour of caps. There may be affordable debate over the extent at which any such cap needs to be set. Transparency Worldwide final yr proposed a restrict of £10,000. However there are reputable considerations that such a low most could be possible solely with elevated state funding for political events, for which public help seems most unlikely. Dr Sam Energy has as an alternative lately advocated a cap of £1 million.  

A excessive cap reminiscent of this might hardly finish the particular privileges of the wealthy, however it could not less than provide a reputable compromise. The established order is indefensible.  

Electoral Fee Technique and Coverage Assertion 

The ultimate space considerations the Technique and Coverage Assertion (SPS) for the Electoral Fee, which was launched by the Conservative authorities by way of the Elections Act 2022. The SPS – which is written by authorities, topic to parliamentary approval – units out ministers’ ‘strategic and coverage priorities’ referring to elections and ‘the position and obligations of the Fee’ in pursuit of those. The Fee ‘will need to have regard to the assertion’ in doing its work.  

Most specialists roundly condemned the idea of an SPS when it was proposed. Our bodies which have criticised it embrace CSPL, the related Home of Commons departmental choose committee, and the Electoral Fee itself. Labour pushed in opposition to it whereas in opposition. After the present authorities entered workplace final yr, the then MHCLG minister Lord (Wajid) Khan of Burnley mentioned, ‘The existence of a technique and coverage assertion for the Electoral Fee is inconsistent with the fee’s position as an unbiased regulator.’ 

Remarkably, nevertheless, the coverage paper proposes to not abolish the SPS, however to exchange it with a brand new model. This dangers entrenching the concept in Whitehall that such an announcement is suitable.  

The federal government – like its predecessor – has proposed this transfer regardless of professing dedication to the precept of Electoral Fee independence. But – as Lord Khan rightly mentioned – the existence of the SPS itself violates that independence.  

Such independence requires not solely that the Fee needs to be operationally unbiased in fulfilling its remit, but in addition, crucially, that its remit shouldn’t be managed by any single political celebration. As a result of the Fee, not like our bodies reminiscent of Ofgem, regulates the actions of politicians and political events, its insulation from partisan strain must be particularly robust. Every aspect of its governance ought to due to this fact be cross-party and/or non-partisan. That precept is enshrined in all different facets of present preparations: the Fee itself has members from 4 political events in addition to lay members; the Speaker’s Committee on the Electoral Fee by conference doesn’t have a authorities majority in its membership; additional scrutiny is supplied by different choose committees. The Fee’s remit is about out in main laws – the Political Events, Elections and Referendums Act 2000 – which adopted a report by CSPL, in depth additional consultations (together with a 1997 briefing by the Structure Unit), and full cross-party parliamentary scrutiny. In all these methods, protections in opposition to unilateral motion by one celebration have been maintained.  

The SPS breaches these protections. Its defenders would possibly level out that the Secretary of State should seek the advice of earlier than producing a draft SPS, and such a draft can come into power solely after approval in each the Home of Commons and the Home of Lords. However there isn’t a obligation for ministers to take suggestions critically; and parliament can not amend the draft. The concept the federal government ought to be capable to dictate to the Electoral Fee manifestly violates the precept of electoral impartiality. Present ministers could view their very own intentions as benign. Even when they’re proper in that, nevertheless, retaining an SPS may facilitate a future authorities, maybe of a really completely different stripe, in undermining the integrity of the electoral course of. 

Conclusion 

The federal government’s electoral reform proposals are largely welcome. However additional work is required for them to ship the adjustments which are wanted. It is vitally encouraging to see that some authorities backbenchers are already talking out. It’s to be hoped that extra will press ministers on the factors highlighted above when the laws reaches parliament – and that the brand new set of ministers in MHCLG will themselves see the necessity for some revisions.

The Structure Unit webinar sequence returns on 24 September after its common summer time break, with a panel together with Worldwide Agreements Committee chair Lord Goldsmith KC discussing the subject, ‘How ought to the UK’s parliaments scrutinise worldwide agreements?‘. Webinars are free and all attendees are capable of submit inquiries to the panel in the course of the occasion. Register without spending a dime on the UCL web site.

Concerning the creator

Alan Renwick is Professor of Democratic Politics at UCL and Deputy Director of the Structure Unit.

Featured picture: UK Elections (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0) by European Parliament.