European and External Relations Committee, 18 Nov 2003

Meeting date: Tuesday, November 18, 2003

Official Report 170KB pdf

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European Parliament Elections 2004

The first item on the agenda is consideration of options for postal voting for the European Parliament elections in June 2004. A fortnight ago, we took evidence from the Electoral Commission and various MEPs on proposals to use Scotland as one of the pilot regions for postal voting in the elections. We also took evidence on other issues such as funding and the number of Scottish MEPs.

As a result of that meeting, we agreed to write to Lord Falconer, the Secretary of State for Constitutional Affairs in the UK Government, to express our desire that eight Scottish MEPs should be retained. We have not yet heard back from the secretary of state. However, we also postponed until this meeting any decision about using Scotland as a pilot for postal voting, and other related issues.

I hope that members have had a chance to read the paper that is before them. There are three options: the first is that we make no further comment; the second is that we have a brief discussion, agree our response, and vote on any issue on which we cannot reach agreement; and the third is that we send a reply on the basis of consensus. I recommend that we go for the second option, which is that we discuss the issues. I think that the committee agrees on more than it disagrees on, but we will have to reach conclusions on any substantive issues on which we disagree if we are to make our response meaningful. Is the committee happy to adopt that option?

Members indicated agreement.

I have just read the letter from the Electoral Commission, which responds clearly to Alasdair Morrison's inquiry about the Electoral Commission's recommendations to the Government. The commission states that there will be no recommendation on the location of pilot schemes in 2004, and that

"the Government is under no obligation to accept our recommendations."

I am not sure whether we can reach consensus on the issue. I have huge reservations about the whole of Scotland's being used as a pilot region—and it is not to do with the use of the word "region". There is a strong case for particular regions within Scotland being considered for pilot schemes, but to use the whole of Scotland will mean that there will hardly ever be a Scottish dimension to European elections, given the time scales for postal voting. In some ways, I am quite keen that the committee vote against the proposal that the whole of Scotland be used as a pilot area. We should make that recommendation to the Executive for its consideration for the negotiations with Westminster.

We outlined our various positions when we met two weeks ago, and members raised the various delicacies that they had in relation to postal voting. I happily put on the record that I firmly favour postal voting. Many people across not only Scotland but the United Kingdom are currently able to exercise their right to vote by post, and the system has been refined and simplified so that once one registers for a postal vote, one has then to disengage positively from that process. I would go as far as the second half of option 2, which is that as a committee we simply record that we are in favour of using Scotland as an electoral region and that we also favour postal voting.

Thanks. We should discuss the issues on which we are agreed, which we will include in our response to the UK Government and other authorities, then decide on the issues on which we are not agreed. I detected at the previous meeting that the majority—if not all—of members agreed that postal voting was a valid way in which to increase electoral turnout. All committee members shared concerns about such matters as the bill to the Royal Mail and issues to do with publicity and campaigning, in the event of the pilot's going ahead. The committee was agreed on those issues. The substantive area of disagreement was whether Scotland should be used as a pilot for postal voting.

I did not agree that there should be a pilot. I said that postal voting might be worth a try, but I felt that it would be far better to do that across the whole United Kingdom for a number of reasons that are stated in the committee's last Official Report.

That is exactly what I am trying to differentiate. There were many areas that we agreed upon, should a pilot go ahead, but the substantive disagreement was whether a pilot should go ahead in Scotland as a separate region.

As I said last time, anything that increases turnout at elections must be a good thing—it broadens democracy. Comprehensive postal voting has been tried, and there is abundant evidence that it has that effect.

I accept the point that Phil Gallie, Margaret Ewing and others have made about there being a case for having a pilot scheme across the whole United Kingdom, but that does not seem to be an option at the moment. The suggestion is that the whole of Scotland as a nation could use postal votes on this occasion. That would broaden the scope of democracy for the European Parliament elections in Scotland. I cannot see the sense in opting out of an option that could increase our people's access to the democratic system; it would be perverse for the European and External Relations Committee to suggest that we should not take up such an option. I propose that we support the case for Scotland to have a postal ballot for the European Parliament elections.

I have an open mind on postal voting as a permanent arrangement. Although I do not think that it is the complete solution to the problem of people's not voting, it may be part of the solution and I therefore think that the pilot scheme is worth trying.

In previous elections to the European Parliament, voter turnout has been abysmal. There have been decreasing turnouts, both in general elections to the Westminster Parliament and to the Scottish Parliament. I welcome the pilot scheme, because assessment of the results will allow us to determine whether postal voting increases turnout for the European elections. If it succeeds in doing that, it might be worth trying in elections to this Parliament and to Westminster.

For me at least—I know that that is not the highest standard in the world—it is difficult to see what harm could be done by using the pilot as Alasdair Morrison suggests. For the reasons that Dennis Canavan mentioned, we would certainly want to assess whether it increases the whole democratic process. I would be very much in favour of a pilot scheme for postal voting because we want to find out how the system works. Not to use it simply because the whole UK will not be involved seems to be a bit like cutting off one's nose to spite one's face.

Phil Gallie wants to come back in.

I think that Margaret Ewing made a point about the importance of Europe to everyone in Scotland. The fact is that people have to be involved in the political argument on the basis of the facts as presented to them. If we go for the postal vote, it seems likely to me that we in Scotland will be recording our votes before the arguments have finished. Whether we like it or not, we are on the wavelengths of the national media and, to a large extent, the European election campaign will be fought in the national media. To a degree, people in Scotland will not have formed their opinions on the basis of all the available facts by the time they come round to having to record their postal votes.

Other factors in relation to the Electoral Commission concerned me: for example, the commission seemed not to have thought about the question that I asked about exit polling, which I think could be a significant influencing factor throughout the UK. For very good reasons, other countries manage to put blocks on such polling up to the day before polling but, to my knowledge, they do not impose blocks for some time before then, which is what would be required in the present case.

There are other concerns, such as the validity of the postal vote and the guarantees that the Royal Mail is able to provide about ensuring that people's votes reach the returning officer and are included in the ballot. I acknowledge that its being a pilot would mean that that aspect would be monitored and that, to that extent, there might be some value in the scheme. However, Royal Mail services have been disrupted recently and I do not know where we will be by the time the European elections come round. The situation could be unsettling, so the vote from Scotland could be lower than it should be.

I have two points to make. Phil Gallie has just said that the vote could be lower than it should be. The turnout in the last European election was only 24.6 per cent—that was the democratic choice. We should do anything that we can to increase participation.

The first point that Phil Gallie made was about how the media will report the campaign in such a way that the facts and the arguments will somehow bypass Scotland. Given that the pilot schemes will take place in three areas of the United Kingdom—one of which will be Scotland, I hope—and given the uniqueness of a situation in which 25 per cent of the electorate could cast their votes by post, there will be a lot of focus on what happens in Scotland. We will benefit from that.

Those issues were satisfactorily answered two weeks ago, when we heard from the Electoral Commission about the Post Office's ability to deal with the postal vote—the contingencies that would be put in place, for example, in the event of industrial action in the Post Office—and about the question of exit polling. I cannot recall the exact words that the witness from the Electoral Commission used, but I think that we heard that there would be strict guidelines on exit polling and on the publication of any data that were collated in Scotland or the other two regions in England or Wales. I was satisfied with what I heard at that meeting.

I attend the meeting as committee substitute for Irene Oldfather.

I am new to the argument, although I accept that there are respectable arguments for and against postal voting. There are also respectable arguments for and against pilot schemes. However, in the UK we have set the tone about how we introduce postal voting in the context of local government, where we have gone down the route of using pilots. As we have established the principle of piloting postal voting when that system is to be introduced in an area where people have hitherto gone to their polling station, it is probably right to operate a pilot scheme in the context of the European elections.

Concerns about the risk of a postal strike, and about the possibility that the full arguments might not be heard before the election were also expressed in the context of local government. We went down the piloting route then; it would be safer to do so again. A pilot scheme would probably help us to find out more of the sort of information that Dennis Canavan hinted at in relation to whether postal voting would significantly increase turnout. That is why the piloting route was adopted for local government. For the same reason, the approach commends itself in relation to the European elections.

I understand that there have been only three all-postal ballots in local government, so the situation is hardly uniform throughout the country. There might be a change to the voting system for the local government elections in 2007—I think that to have three different systems will cause endless confusion, but that is another story.

To run a pilot scheme in three local government areas is very different from doing so throughout Scotland. There is a strong argument for running the pilot in some parts of Scotland, but it is not right that the whole of Scotland should take part in the pilot. If we are seeking evidence, it would be interesting to run all-postal ballots in a couple of regions so that we could compare the results with those of other regions. That would give us a firmer foundation for future recommendations about how to improve turnout at elections—we might recommend the use of postal ballots.

I am in favour of getting more people to come out and cast votes—that is their democratic right. However, there is no genuine reason why Scotland should be chosen as one of the three pilot electoral regions, especially as we have a legislative Parliament. There is a huge difference between local government and parliamentary elections.

This is an interesting debate and I am happy to allow it to continue for a few more minutes.

I was not sure whether Margaret Ewing was in favour of running a pilot scheme at the European elections in different parts of Scotland, rather than across Scotland as a whole but, if that were to happen, candidates would complain that there were different rules for different areas. Some candidates might feel that they were stronger in some areas than in others and candidates and parties would complain if they were not competing on a level playing field. If we run a pilot, it must operate throughout Scotland, because Scotland is one constituency for the purposes of the European elections.

That argument must also apply south of the border, where there will be two pilot schemes. Those areas will use the same voting system as Scotland.

The pilots would run in three electoral regions, as Margaret Ewing knows. A single electoral region will have the same candidates and the same rules, irrespective of the sub-areas within that region.

There must be an all-or-nothing approach. If we go for all, a lot of monitoring and evaluation must be done to get to the bottom of whether fraudulent voting and personation have occurred and whether all the extra votes have been cast by real people who have cast valid votes. I have grave reservations about the postal ballot system. On paper, it can look secure. People say that checks can be done, signatures can be compared and so on, but how many checks are actually done?

Are you in favour of using Scotland as a pilot region?

I have reservations about using Scotland as a pilot region for the European elections, because a large number of people would be involved. The monitoring and examination that could be done with smaller groups of voters before and after the elections could not be done to ensure that the system is secure. However, if we go for it, we must use an all-or-nothing approach. The argument that bits can be picked out for use falls for the reason that Dennis Canavan gave.

If members have no further comments to make, we will return to Alasdair Morrison's original proposal and take a vote on the substantive issue. Alasdair Morrison proposed that the committee, in responding to the substantive issue, record that it is in favour of a pilot postal voting scheme and that Scotland should be viewed as a region for that purpose.

I do not support that proposal. I am usually a very consensual Ewing, but I have such major reservations about the issue that I have no alternative but not to support Alasdair Morrison's proposal. I am sorry for ruining his birthday.

It would ruin my birthday if a Ewing were consensual.

I am sure that that happens often.

Margaret Ewing has answered my next question, which was whether any member disagrees with Alasdair Morrison's proposal. We will therefore proceed to the committee's first vote this session. It has taken until our seventh meeting in the second session for the committee to have to vote, but we got there eventually. That is what debate is all about. I suggest that the vote should be simple.

The question is, does the committee support the choice of Scotland as a pilot electoral region for postal voting in the next European Parliament elections in June 2004?

No.

There will be a division.

For

Alexander, Ms Wendy (Paisley North) (Lab)
Canavan, Dennis (Falkirk West)
Home Robertson, Mr John (East Lothian) (Lab)
Jackson, Gordon (Glasgow Govan) (Lab)
Morrison, Mr Alasdair (Western Isles) (Lab)

Against

Ewing, Mrs Margaret (Moray) (SNP)
Gallie, Phil (South of Scotland) (Con)
Lochhead, Richard (North East Scotland) (SNP)
Radcliffe, Nora (Gordon) (LD)

The result of the division is: For 5, Against 4, Abstentions 0.

The proposal is agreed to. A majority of members are in favour of Scotland's being used as a pilot electoral region for postal voting, which we shall reflect in our response to the appropriate authorities. In addition, we have agreed that we will incorporate in that response the concerns that members have expressed at previous meetings, some of which have been repeated at this meeting. If the pilot proceeds, such issues should be taken into account. That was a nail-biting first vote.

On our reservations about the matter, has the committee made representations to the Electoral Commission? Is the commission duty bound to come back to us on the points that have been recorded? If not, can we ask it to do so as part of a monitoring exercise and as a comfort factor for those of us who think that a mistake is being made, as well as for those who supported the proposal?

I would be happy to do that. The only response that we have received from the Electoral Commission was to questions that were posed to its representatives at the previous meeting, but which they could not answer, and the only letter that we have sent following that evidence was on the number of MEPs that Scotland should have. We can pursue any outstanding matters that relate to the elections.

As a matter of note, convener, the briefing paper mentions the Electoral Commission's recommendation

"that Scotland should reduce its share of MEPs from seven to eight".

I spent five minutes working out what that meant.

Is that right? Can you let us know where you saw that?

It is in the briefing paper. I thought that the Europeans must do things in a funny way.

They do.

There is a comment in brackets in paragraph 2 of the briefing paper. It states:

"Scotland should reduce its share of MEPs from seven to eight".

It took me a while to work that one out.

I congratulate the member—well spotted.

The clerk takes full responsibility for the drafting of said paper.

We occasionally plant something in the papers to check whether members are reading them.