Clause 1 - Registration: provision of signature and date of birth
Electoral Fraud (Northern Ireland)
12:45 pm
Mr Crispin Blunt (Reigate, Conservative)
My first point of departure about the register is that it must be as accurate as possible. To require the national insurance number on the registration document as a form of identification would allow the chief electoral officer to check it against another national database. As the Minister pointed out, there are already provisions for him to check the name against Housing Corporation records and the records of other state bodies. Everyone has a national insurance number and some of the records currently being checked are not comprehensive. Undertaking checks would be much easier.
The other amendments in the group would require the additional question, ``What is your national insurance number?'' to be asked in the polling station. I came into the Committee with an open mind about whether that was a reasonable question to ask electors in the polling station. In the light of the debate, I now believe that it is fair for the Government to point out that it will not be possible for people to remember their national insurance number in the polling station. However, if photographic identification is required, it will go a long way towards addressing the problem of personation. Other amendments in the group take account of hon. Members' remaining concerns about national insurance numbers.
Under new clause 5, people would have to sign when they received a ballot paper and there would thus be a cross-check between the signature on the registration form and the person who claims the ballot paper. That would address the personation issue because people would know that the person turning up at the polling station to claim the ballot paper could be cross-checked against the person on the registration form. That would be 100 per cent. comprehensive. Therefore, I do not think that subsequent questions about national insurance numbers, if people have satisfactorily produced photographic identification, are necessary—
It being One o'clock, The Chairman adjourned the Committee without Question put, pursuant to the Standing Order.
Adjourned till this day at half-past Four o'clock.