Clause 20 - Minimum age
Electoral Administration Bill
4:30 pm
David Heath (Shadow Secretary of State for Constitutional Affairs & Shadow Leader of the House, Law Officers (Constitutional Affairs); Somerton and Frome, Liberal Democrat)
I beg to move amendment No. 4, in clause 20, page 22, line 5, leave out 'nominated as a candidate' and insert 'elected'.
We do not often have the privilege of amending an Act from 1695; it is a welcome departure. To add to the gravitas of the situation, we are also amending the Union with Scotland Act 1706, so these are momentous matters.
I seek to add a degree of consistency. There is no doubt about this matter in the Bill, which states:
''A person is disqualified for membership of the House of Commons if, on the day on which he is nominated as a candidate, he has not attained the age of 18.''
That is admirably clear, and everyone understands it. It is a change from the 1695 provision, but that is not unreasonable as times have changed. The relevant section in the Parliamentary Elections Act 1695 is entitled
''Infants not to be elected.''
Few people nowadays would describe a 20-year-old as an infant, but that was the appropriate description in 1695. I shall not attempt to reflect in my speech the spelling of the 1695 Act. It says that
''noe person hereafter shall bee capable of being elected a member to serve in this or any future Parliament who is not of the age of one and twenty yeares and every election or returne of any person under that age is hereby declared to bee null and void And if any such minor hereafter chosen shall presume to sitt or vote in Parliament hee shall incurr such penalties and forfeitures as if hee had presumed to sitt and vote in Parliament without being chosen or returned.''
The relevant wording of the Union with Scotland Act 1706—
''none shall be capable to elect or be elected''—
shows that the moment of election is the relevant time. That is also the test in the House of Commons Disqualification Act 1975. As I read it, holding an office of profit under the Crown or a position on the list of disqualifying positions—positions that prevent one from serving as a Member of Parliament—stops one not from being nominated but from assuming the position of a Member of Parliament. Such legislation stops one taking one's seat in the House.