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Donate to our crowdfunderPaul Blomfield: I thank the hon. Gentleman for disagreeing with me. This measure is a step in the right direction, but we will find that it will not go far enough unless we embed electoral registration seamlessly within university enrolment procedures. For many reasons, I hope we can continue to work on that together in the next Parliament. I welcome the strengthening of provisions on degree-awarding powers,...
Paul Blomfield: ...helpful from the very start in supporting the initiative with the University of Sheffield. Nevertheless, does the Minister recognise that the critical game-changer is the seamless integration of electoral registration and student enrolment? When other universities—not only Sheffield—have taken that up, they have seen levels of registration that the simple promotion of the voter...
Paul Blomfield: I beg to move amendment 165, in clause 5, page 4, line 8, at end insert— “(2A) Subject to subsection (2C), initial registration conditions of all providers under paragraph (1)(a) must include a requirement that every provider— (a) provides all eligible students with the opportunity to opt in to be added to the electoral register through the process of enrolling with that provider,...
Paul Blomfield: The importance of students’ electoral registration was recognised by the Cabinet Office in allocating welcome if belated funds to the National Union of Students to get people on the register in the run-up to the general election. Will the Minister commit to providing similar funds to boost student electoral registration at the start of the new academic year to ensure that they are...
Paul Blomfield: ...South and Finsbury (Emily Thornberry) on securing such an important debate so early in this Parliament. She has covered, very ably and in great detail, the wide range of issues involved in voter registration and the prospective boundary review, and she struck an important note by saying that we should be able to discuss these issues on a non-partisan basis. That is certainly what I hope to...
Paul Blomfield: ...so I will not. I represent more students by far than any other Member of the House—36,000 according to the latest census. They are not the only group that contributes to the enormous churn in the electoral register in my constituency, but I will concentrate my remarks on them. I am worried about their disfranchisement not simply because of the coming election, but because of the impact...
Paul Blomfield: ...—36,000. Will my hon. Friend join me in congratulating the university of Sheffield on its work—which we hope to roll out to Sheffield Hallam university next year—in seamlessly integrating electoral registration with student enrolment to encourage maximum registration? The Government have given some support. Will she encourage them to take up such a process much more vigorously,...
Paul Blomfield: To ask the hon. Member for South West Devon, representing the Speaker's Committee on the Electoral Commission, what the electoral registration figures were in each ward in the recent confirmation dry run conducted in Sheffield.
Paul Blomfield: ...would appear to be pretty similar in size. However, if we compare the population according to the 2011 census with the number of voters registered on 2 January 2013 according to the council’s electoral registration officer, we can see that the picture is completely different. Sheffield Central has 76,596 registered voters whereas Sheffield, Hallam has 71,559—the difference is just...
Paul Blomfield: ...and I represent. Although there is some evidence to endorse his point, it does not explain the enormous disparity between the two seats in Sheffield. Many of those who are excluded from the electoral register are precisely the people who form a huge proportion of my casework and I know that the situation will be the same for many Members who represent inner-city seats. More importantly,...
Paul Blomfield: ...drawn by population size, not by registered voter numbers, but that is clearly a debate for another time. Whether or not we go down that route, we need now to pause, to ensure that individual electoral registration does not further enhance inequity and does not further disempower our cities. If we do not pause, we risk creating a US-style democracy, with notorious under-registration, that...
Paul Blomfield: ...the vote in the House of Lords to postpone the next boundary review until 2018, clearly timely. I have to say that I welcome that decision. The proposed new boundaries would have benefited me electorally, but they are unfair and undermine our democracy, precisely because of the mismatch between population and registration that was so ably highlighted by my hon. Friend in his comments. I...
Paul Blomfield: ...number of people registered to vote—the basis on which we calculate boundaries—is an important issue. As it stands, the boundary review would exacerbate the problem, not simply because of under-registration, but because of the point in the electoral cycle at which that review would be conducted, with the next one being in December 2015. I worry that individual registration threatens to...
Paul Blomfield: ...during the canvass, to huge student flat complexes, in which the security arrangements make it impossible to engage by knocking on doors. That exacerbates the problem. The difficulty of under-registration is that future boundary reviews will be conducted in the first term of each academic year. The students unions of both universities in my constituency run really vigorous electoral...
Paul Blomfield: I think that that is an opportunity; there might be innovative ways to combine the registration process with other processes. However, there are certain difficulties because, as the hon. Gentleman will know, many universities now have fairly sophisticated online registration processes at the point of joining the institution, rather than the face-to-face contact to which he refers, so there...
Paul Blomfield: ...register for, such as the health service and course modules, and there are all sorts of choices to be made in their lives, and many of them are also uncertain about where they stand in relation to electoral registration. They assume that their place of registration is their family home, as indeed it is, not what is in effect their primary place of residence, where they study at university,...
Paul Blomfield: ...main place of residence. They contribute to the economy and the life of the city and they have a right for their voice to be heard in elections. At the university of Sheffield there is a block registration scheme for all eligible students in university accommodation, which will end with this legislation. The Government claim that individual electoral registration is about preventing fraud....
Paul Blomfield: ...hon. Member for Sheffield, Hallam (Mr Clegg). My constituency is at the heart of Sheffield. It is an inner-city, multicultural area with large council estates, two universities, and a high level of electoral turnover. As a result, 17% of households already have nobody on the electoral register. The Deputy Prime Minister’s constituency consists of our leafy suburbs; it is monocultural...
Paul Blomfield: ...to him—to agree, finally, to meet the representatives of students in his constituency to discuss their concerns. There is no good reason to accelerate the timetable for introducing individual electoral registration, other than to have the system in place for the 2015 boundary review in the knowledge of what impact that will have on the 2020 general election. The Minister rightly talked...
Paul Blomfield: ...’s back-pedalling on the opt-out, which I welcome, there remains substantial concern across the board about the impact of their proposals on the number of people who will be knocked off the electoral register. We know who those people are: they are those who are more mobile, younger people, those from black and minority ethnic communities, and those who are poorer. I recognise the case...