Written evidence submitted by Mrs Amanda Edwards [ELR 001]

Advantages of the existing system of electoral registration:

●People are able to change their details online at their own convenience

●The current system is a lot cheaper for electoral budgets than the previous system

●More and more households are responding online rather than returning the paper versions- hence better for the environment

●Electoral Teams require less staff to administer the canvass as in previous years when 1,000s of forms were coming back to the office- also alleviates storage and data protection issues.

Disadvantages of the existing system of electoral registration:

●It is still an outdated and costly process, and we still have to generate a lot of paper

●When we send communication CCA (households have matched), we really have no audit way of knowing if they have read the letter and as a result may be missing electors

●We get a poor response on route 2 (those that need to respond to the form) and again there is the cost element of sending a reminder

●It is seen as bureaucracy gone mad when they complete the route two form and tell us that there are new members of the household to add and then we have to send them an Invitation to Register to Vote form or direct them to register online- this could be captured all on the same form.

●The door-to-door canvass does not work- it is not cost effective, households do not react positively to us being at their door, it is difficult to catch people in and they are wary of providing personal information at the door

●Households see the annual update of the Voters Roll as a waste of money- they often say “you know I am here as I pay my council tax”

●Despite canvassing, we still see a surge of people registering before a Parliamentary election

●Under the old system where we had to have a form back for every property- we did have a more accurate register as we could trace the information on the Register back to the form that either they completed or the canvasser at the time of canvass– this was useful at election time-often 5 months later where we could show them the evidence if they claimed we has disenfranchised someone in their household from voting, often it was them that had left “little Johnny” off. Now we have no idea how accurate our register is until at election time someone complains they are not on the register to vote, or they have been declined credit.

Individual Registration V an Automatic System of Voter Registration- Data issues:

● We rely on the individual making an application for Register of Electors, whereas it could be automated with for example when someone makes an application for a provisional licence or applies for a passport- there could be a tick box to share info with the Elections Team.

● As and when people move, they are more likely to change their name/address on their driving licence and not change their registration on the voters’ roll.

●Having an automated system would keep the register up to date, it would stop the “avalanche” of applications prior to an election, and it would be cheaper for Local Government.

Annual Canvass:

There has been an improvement in the process, however the annual cavass process is outdated and expensive. For us administrators we cannot give that assurance  that the Register of Electors is 100% accurate as we do not have forms back from many households- we are just assuming the information is correct.

For somewhere like Carmarthenshire that on the whole is pretty static, it is not necessary to carry out a yearly canvass. Local Authorities should be allowed to decide whether they carry out a canvass every 4 years or every year- depending on the status of their population.

Barriers to registering and voting-Engagement and accessibility issues:

Households today are totally disillusioned with politics. Many will not know their local councillor or their AM/MP. Hence many have no interest in voting and therefore do not see the point of registration, we often are told this on the telephone or at the door when we are trying to get people to register- until they cannot obtain credit/mortgage then they want to register. That sense of “civic duty” is dying out with this new generation.

Educating children from a young age is the key, so that when they leave school, they will understand what is required of them.

I object to the statement that there is so many inaccurate entries. Election Teams are small, and we do our best to put the tools in front of households that allow them to register. What must be addressed is that they do not want to, and they know there is no real penalties for them not doing so.

There are situations that are out of our control- for example whilst you have households claiming benefits and single council tax discount, they are not going to declare that a partner has moved in as they think that all departments are linked. We also know that couples who have two homes register separately on the register- one in the area that their more permanent home falls into and the other at their holiday home and then they both claim the single discount for each property.

There also has to be “buy” in from political parties in encouraging people to register. People must want to register for the right reasons.

Resources saved can be put into Education to ensure that children from a young age have the knowledge and interest to participate in all elections.

I think we should also look at the voting process. Voting day should be an event, we should hold voting stations at central points- i.e., Town Halls, Leisure Centres, Music halls and hold them over a weekend. We should lay on entertainment and encourage electors to bring their children. This will instil happy memories in young children who would grow up with the knowledge and sense of civic duty to vote like their parents/carers did.

January 2023