Contribution
My Lords, this is a very wide-ranging Bill—almost too wide-ranging—but it has some sensible proposals on electoral administration. It also has a number of proposals for which, as other noble Lords have said, there will probably be unintended consequences, and we need to go into the detail.
I want to deal with what the Government themselves said: that the Bill is all about restoring trust in our democracy. There has never been a time, as we all know, when we need to restore trust in our democracy more. Until 2020, UK democracy was very stable and secure, in that it did not matter where you lived in the United Kingdom because everyone had an equal vote. But in January 2021, we had an assault on the core of universal suffrage. Before that date, it did not matter where you lived; everyone had the same basic democratic right to elect a fellow citizen to make all the laws to which they were subject, or to stand for election for themselves, in devolution to MLAs, or to MPs. But the imposition of the protocol/Windsor Framework meant that while UK citizens can still stand for election to make all the laws to which they are subject in England, Wales and Scotland, UK citizens in Northern Ireland have had their democratic rights truncated, such that 300 areas of law—not just 300 laws but 300 areas of law—are simply imposed on us by a foreign Administration.
In the context of the political union that is the United Kingdom, this is not just an attack on democracy in one part of the country but surely an attack on the integrity of democracy across the whole country. What is more important is that it has also constituted a very specific and insensitive attack on the Belfast/Good Friday agreement. That agreement was for the purpose of trying to persuade terrorists to give up the bomb for the ballot box, so special stress was placed in it on protecting democracy. Specifically, it contained the unique commitment that the people of Northern Ireland should have
“the right to pursue democratically national and political aspirations”.
Far from being upheld by the Windsor Framework, this has been subject to a full-frontal assault, in that the right to pursue democratically national and political aspirations in relation to all the laws to which they are subject was taken from them.
There has never been a better example of a Bill whose purpose is to restore democracy being in complete denial about the existential threat to democracy that the country faces. Rather than giving votes to 16 and 17 year-olds, the Government had the opportunity to restore the full value of the vote to all UK citizens. Yet the Bill does precisely nothing to put that right. This was an opportunity. Indeed, it makes things worse by introducing discrimination where it currently does not exist. At present, the law treats 16 and 17 year-olds the same way across the whole country—except, of course, in Scotland where 16 and 17 year-olds can vote.
However, going forward, the Bill is going to tell 16 and 17 year-olds in England, Wales and Scotland that they are worthy of the right to elect a fellow citizen to make all their laws, but it tells 16 and 17 year-olds in Northern Ireland that they are worthy only of the right to elect a fellow citizen to make some of the laws to which they are subject. They are to be denied the right that this Bill extends to their peers in GB. We are seeing this at the moment with the number of statutory instruments coming through this House. There is no consultation and no say on them, just a dictated imposition. Can noble Lords imagine if this was being done to Cornwall or Yorkshire?
It also creates the absurd situation that a 16 year-old in Great Britain who has never paid any tax or put their life on the line for their country will be afforded more rights when it comes to electing a fellow citizen than a Falklands or Gulf War veteran living in Northern Ireland who has paid tax all their life and put their life on the line for their country. That just cannot be right. This Bill was an opportunity to look at it. The Minister said it was really important that people had to believe that their vote mattered and could be counted. I am afraid that is not happening in Northern Ireland.
I will add one further thing that I know noble Lords will not like. We have gone on about and attacked Reform UK so much today, but if we really care about genuine democracy we should have Reform UK Lords in this place. It is a party that actually has a possibility of being in government—who knows—and there is not a single member of Reform UK in this place. I think that is wrong.