Clause 65 - Restriction on powers of arrest by
Electoral Administration Bill
3:30 pm
David Heath (Shadow Secretary of State for Constitutional Affairs & Shadow Leader of the House, Law Officers (Constitutional Affairs); Somerton and Frome, Liberal Democrat)
First, I am grateful to the Minister. I understand what he has said, but I am not sure that I agree with him. It is certainly not what the explanatory memorandum says. I would still ask him to consider the last sentence of the explanatory memorandum on this clause:
''The effect of this clause . . . is to implement the recommendation by the Electoral Commission that the existing provisions relating to personation should be extended to give the police the power of arrest at any location, not just at polling stations.''
That is transparently not what the clause does. It does the reverse. It prevents anybody else from making an arrest inside a polling station. If it is felt that the polling process should not be disturbed by an arrest, it is hard to understand why a police constable should make that arrest within a polling station.—[Interruption]. The Minister says that there is a distinction, but not in law.
If he recalls, in our debates on the Serious Organised Crime and Police Bill, the Government's proposition—not mine—was that the power of arrest should be extended to any offence, not just to a serious indictable offence, by any citizen. It was only when we defeated them on that matter that the Government changed their mind and adopted the proposition that is now in the Act. The Government's position was that anyone should be able to arrest anybody, anywhere for anything.—[Interruption.] The Minister suggests that that is a general principle and I have no difficulty in believing that that is the basis on which the Government work.
I understand why the hon. Gentleman does not want presiding officers to make an arrest, but the effect probably will be that people will not be arrested because, unfortunately, there are relatively few polling stations that have a police officer on duty as they used to. There was a time when every polling station had a constable on duty, but not now. Thus there will not be arrests for personation. I have looked again at the clause and I have become aware of something that I should have noticed in the first instance, that it would not be possible for a person to make an arrest outside the polling station because the proposal applies only
''if the offence is committed or is suspected of being committed inside a polling station.''
That is the only place where a person can commit the offence of personation, other than when filling in an application form for a postal vote. In effect, it means that a person will not be arrested for personation unless there is a police constable at the polling station. The offence will not be prosecuted unless it is possible to trace a person later without knowing who they are and why they were personating another person. If that is the Government's position, at least it is comprehensible; I am not sure I agree with it but I do not want to pursue it.