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Representation of the People (Electoral Registration Data Schemes) Regulations 2011

My Lords, I am glad to follow the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy, because I know that he shares the commitment that we have on all sides of the House to make the electoral register as comprehensive and accurate as we can. In the debates earlier this year on the Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill, there was a great deal of discussion about under-registration. That was not the first time that the issue was raised. The noble Lord, Lord Wills, gave a great deal of attention to this in the previous Government. I recall that on a number of occasions in Grand Committee on the Political Parties and Elections Bill we had considerable discussions about the right momentum and the right progress needed to improve the level of registration. On a number of occasions, previous Administrations—like the present Government—have looked at ways in which data matching could assist this purpose. It is important to note that there was an improvement during the calendar year 2010; in the last few days there have been some interesting improvements, too, which I notice that colleagues on the other side of the House have also seen. The context of that was a very exciting general election at which, for the first time in some people’s political memory, it looked as though the outcome was not certain. In those circumstances, there was an increase, particularly—and this is encouraging—among the younger age group, which notoriously in the recent past has not registered. We should take encouragement from the fact that, if we can make politics more interesting and outcomes more indeterminate, we can increase registration. It is not only a mechanical operation but a political one to get as many of our fellow citizens engaged as possible. The integrity of the register is a question of making sure that those who should be on are on and that those who should not be on, or are there in duplicate, are not on. Therefore, accuracy and integrity are the same thing. The PPE Act, as the Bill became, set fair and square registration objectives. They are, "““to secure, so far as reasonably practicable—(a) that persons who are entitled to be registered in a register are registered in it, (b) that persons who are not entitled to be registered in a register are not registered in it, and (c) that none of the information relating to a registered person that appears in a register or other record kept by the officer is false””." Obviously, the instruments that are before the Committee today seek to build on that responsibility, which lies not only on the Government but on all of us. I appreciate the clarity with which my noble friend introduced the instruments, which I welcome. Those objectives are clearly uncontroversial and it is a matter of some puzzlement to our fellow citizens that sometimes the electoral register seems to be totally unrelated to the other information that has been gathered on behalf of local or central government. They find it peculiar; they think that we are all the same thing. They think that Parliament and the Government are the same thing, let alone local authorities and other parts of the state system. They think that we are all part of the same bureaucracy. For example, those who are accused of filing a housing benefit form inaccurately will often cite the presence of all members of their household on the electoral register as a necessary and understandable defence. Who can blame them? They think that that is an official document and therefore can be quoted as such. Those kinds of situations raise the question of whether the flow of information from government departments into councils will be a two-way process. Will it work in both directions? The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions—this is in the order—might give information on the DWP’s database to the electoral registration officer in Blackpool, but will the DWP then use the comparison data to identify potential fraud on its own books? I do not expect my noble friend to answer on behalf of the other department this afternoon, but I think that this is a subject where our fellow citizens would genuinely like to know whether there is an answer. Such an exercise is obviously a double-edged sword. For some, it is joined-up government; for others, it is the surveillance state. Getting the balance right is something that we in this House and indeed the other place must constantly take into account. No doubt Members of the Committee will take their own view as to how the balance is being addressed with this issue, but it would be good to know the facts about how information will be shared on a two-way basis. The other issue that puzzles me is how exactly the local authorities concerned were chosen. My noble friend referred to the fact that there has been one in and one out and I should be very interested to know just how this process has been undertaken. Why, for example, were Southwark and Newham chosen but not Lambeth and Lewisham? Why are Colchester and Camden going to be privy to the Student Loans Company database while the Forest of Dean and Forest Heath are not? Have councils with a particular concern about the level of registration come forward to ask for data? Was it on their initiative or on some analysis by the department that areas with a good cross-section of experience were chosen as being particularly valuable at this pilot stage? Indeed, have the authorities that have been selected been hand-picked by Whitehall or have they been volunteered by town halls? In that connection, I was interested to hear what my noble friend said just now about Peterborough coming in and Cambridge going out. I hope that I have that right. Given that information, will there be a further tranche at some stage? If so, when, or will it happen when there is a full assessment by the Electoral Commission? Most important on these general issues, information shared is information risked. The more places to which information is forwarded, the more people can put it on a USB key or laptop and then leave it on a train, in a taxi or at a station. That has happened too often in recent years for us not to take account of that risk. I know that the public are rightly concerned about these breaches, as is, it appears from its briefing, the Electoral Commission. I want to refer quickly to the Electoral Commission, as did the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy. I am obviously not a commissioner but I have been an informal adviser to the commission in a cross-party group in the past and I should declare that. Obviously it is not a pecuniary interest but it simply ensures that I try to keep an eye on what the commission has said. I echo what the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy, said about the rather tight timing that the commission has identified. On the one hand, the commission is clearly concerned that the scheme should coincide with the annual canvass. That is entirely sensible and proper, but there is a need to move at some speed to do it this year. However, more substantially, making sure that the written agreement between the local authorities and the Cabinet Office is fully worked out in a speedy and well thought-through process so that the commission and the local authorities are all well briefed well in advance of the process seems absolutely critical if the evaluation programme is to be met on time. Going for 1 March 2012 is pretty tight timing. I recognise that the clarity with which my noble friend has presented the order this afternoon is encouraging, but there are so many other stages before we get to that that I hope that we can be reassured that the commission will get the full clarity that it requests in its briefing so that it, too, can make a speedy assessment of what is involved. The safeguards that the Minister is putting in place to ensure not just that the timing problems are addressed effectively but also that the other questions about sensitive data being properly treated, properly stored and properly destroyed when not required for further analysis are extremely important. Those safeguards will have to be secured not just by the government departments concerned but by the local authorities. I hope that my noble friend will be able to reassure us all that that will be very much the case. Finally, Article 4(2) specifies that agreements between central and local government must make provision for the consequences of the failure to comply with requirements on transfer, storage, destruction and security of data. That will be incredibly important in assuring the public that we are not taking unnecessary risks with important and confidential information. What consequences does the Minister have in mind for future agreements made under this order?