Clause 31 - Observation of proceedings and - working practices
Electoral Administration Bill
1:00 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 was talking about overseas missions—missions from the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe or the Council of Europe—observing election procedures. I have served on a number of election monitoring missions, and other members of the Committee may also have done so. When we are monitoring elections elsewhere we are, of course, accredited to the overseeing organisation, whatever that may be—the equivalent of the Electoral Commission in the Bill—and one of the requirements is that we have appropriate badges and so on to show who we are, and that we have rights of access. We have interpreters so that we can ask what is happening and observe conversations between people who are in the process of voting, or at the count.
We certainly do not say in advance which polling station or count we are going to, or give forewarning that an international monitoring mission is about to descend on that place of polling, because to do so would be completely to undermine the principle of observing that elections are free and fair. We would normally be furnished with a list of polling stations in a particular district. An observation team, usually a couple of parliamentarians with accompanying staff, has the option of devising its own plan for the day and deciding how and when the team will call at polling stations, and perhaps at the count later in the day to observe the proceedings.
It is clear from the provisions in the Bill for accredited organisations and observers that such spontaneity will not be possible here. An observer who is already accredited by the Electoral Commission will have to apply separately to a specific returning officer, presiding officer or accounting official to be able to observe the conduct of the election. That would not be acceptable in an emerging democracy in eastern Europe or central Asia. Are we attempting to ensure that the proposal is compatible with what in loose terms are treaty obligations within the framework of the international organisations? We may actually be putting an unnecessary impediment in the way of observation missions.
I have not tabled amendments at this stage, because the Minister may already have had discussions with the relevant authorities on those international bodies to ensure that what is proposed is in line with their usual practice. But I suspect that it is not, and that for some reason an extra layer of bureaucracy has been interpolated, which is counter-productive to establishing, for international purposes, that our elections are free, fair and properly organised.