II. REGISTRATION

OBJECTIVE:

·  To increase the accuracy of the electoral register.

ACTION:

·  The collection of additional personal identifiers at registration

·  The establishment of electoral investigation teams

·  The monitoring of multiple registration

TIMING:

·  Additional identifiers will be collected from the earliest possible annual canvass of electors following the passing of legislation.

·  The first investigation teams will be identified from within the Electoral Office at the earliest possible date, subject to the Chief Electoral Officer's review of staffing.

·  Monitoring of multiple registration will be possible from the installation of new IT capacity in the Electoral Office, scheduled for introduction in 2002.

Background

  8.  The electoral register is the database upon which the Electoral Office relies. It comprises the complete lists of everyone entitled to vote at the different elections - local, parliamentary and European - and provides the basis for all electoral activity. Its accuracy is fundamental to ensuring a fair poll. The Electoral Office employs hundreds of canvassers to collect registration forms by hand during the annual canvass each autumn. As a result, the Chief Electoral Officer is of the belief that his register is 91% complete and at least 94% accurate. This compares well with other electoral registers in the UK, and confirms that the electoral register is the most comprehensive personal database in Northern Ireland.

  9.  In practice, it would not be possible to achieve 100% accuracy of the electoral register, since the movement of the population does not allow that. However, if left, certain errors in the register open up opportunities for electoral malpractice. It includes the names of people who are not qualified to vote, often because they are not actually resident at the stated address or do not fulfil the three-month residency requirement. It also allows people to be registered more than once without being identified as having been so registered. Although it is quite legal to register at more than one address, multiple registration, where it is not identified, can allow multiple voting.

The Solution: a) Personal Identifiers

  10.  The Chief Electoral Officer will in future be able to collect additional personal identifiers in the annual canvass. At present, everyone who is given a registration form (Form A) is required to respond, providing their name and address for the electoral register. Other questions that may be asked are not statutory and do not require an answer. In future, however, each voter in Northern Ireland will be required to supply their date of birth and signature as well as their name and address.

  11.  This additional data will provide the Electoral Office with a means to identify and distinguish individual voters more securely than merely by name and address. Of all personal identifiers, the date of birth and signature are the most useful. They are immediately available and memorable to the elector. This data would be stored on the register database and incorporated into procedural checks against the name of an elector in the Electoral Office.

  12.  The requirement of personal information on the registration form will change the nature of the form from one that is administered on a household basis to one that is completed individually. For efficiency, a single form will still serve for a whole household. However, each person's signature will indicate individual assent to the personal data provided. Every voter will be accountable for any inaccuracies on the registration form that have allowed fraud to take place in their name. The accuracy of the form will no longer be the responsibility of only one member of a household. Where there are household members temporarily not resident at the time of the annual canvass, they will be invited to register under the provisions of rolling registration.

The Solution: b) Investigation Teams

  13.  The Electoral Office will conduct its own investigations into the accuracy of the register. This will build upon existing procedures, using the additional identifiers. The Chief Electoral Officer relies upon the goodwill and cooperation of the political parties, who may make checks upon the register and challenge the presence there of those whom they believe do not qualify. This is a system that has proven only partially successful.

  14.  The Electoral Office's investigations will comprise three elements: the scrutiny of the whole register to identify anomalous entries, the investigation of these entries, and the subsequent challenge to individual entries on the register.

  15.  The Electoral Office will therefore have a team of investigators whose task will be to ensure the accuracy of the electoral register. The Chief Electoral Officer and his investigators would be given express authority to crosscheck the data on the electoral register database with the records of other large-scale data gatherers. The Chief Electoral Officer will be able to remove anyone from the register who, upon investigation, is unable to demonstrate his or her entitlement to entry under a certain address.

  16.  The reform of staffing and IT capabilities at the Electoral Office will allow for the establishment of investigation teams in a way that has not been possible before.

The Solution: c) Monitoring Multiple Registration

  17.  In respect of the problem of an inaccurate register, there have been calls to end completely the practice of multiple registration. However, the Government believes that this would be an unnecessarily restrictive measure. The opportunity to register at more than one address at which one is resident is valuable for those with second homes, students living away from home, and so on. Such people should not be denied the right to elect their representative at one or other address.

  18.  Nevertheless, it should be possible for the Electoral Office to prevent legitimate multiple registration within Northern Ireland becoming an opportunity for multiple voting. Simple monitoring procedures would be enough to keep a check on most people tempted to use their multiple registration to vote more than once.

  19.  To this end, the Chief Electoral Officer, with the help of enhanced IT scheduled for introduction in 2002, will be able to identify those people who are registered more than once, and mark their names in the register to indicate this fact. This will be no more than an indicator to presiding officers and electoral officials conducting investigations. The Chief Electoral Officer's investigators will also be able to check the voting record of those who register twice. If there is sufficient evidence of multiple voting, the Electoral Office will pursue the case in the courts.