Voter non-registration remains unchanged
The number of eligible voters registering to take part in elections has remained unchanged over the past decade, according to a new report by the Electoral Commission.
Recent figures from the Office for National Statistics puts non-registration in 2000 at between eight and nine per cent, compared to between seven and nine per cent in 1991.
The reasons for this have remained similar over the past ten years, with a poll in 1991 finding a fifth of people could not be bothered and a fifth did not want to be registered.
A Mori poll conducted this winter found that these two reasons were again the most common, although the proportions were smaller for both ineligibility (29 per cent) and lack of interest in voting (14 per cent).
Despite this, the commission research finds the factors most likely to effect non-registration were situational, such as how long a person had lived at one address and whether they were related to the head of the household, who may register for them.
In addition, non-registration was higher in densely populated areas, metropolitan areas – particularly inner London – and among the unemployed and lower-income households.
Ethnicity is less of an issue than it was ten years ago, with the level of non-registration among Asian people falling “considerably” since 1991. As with other groups, non-registration was found to be more associated with mobility than anything else.
The Electoral Commission does not offer any concrete solutions to the problem of non-registration, saying that while there were “significant gaps” in people’s awareness of the registration process, many simply wanted no part in politics.
It also finds it difficult to assess changes in registration and argues that methods such as rolling registration in Northern Ireland may have made electoral rolls more accurate but have done little to improve registration rates.
However, the Conservatives held up the report as evidence the government’s efforts at electoral modernisation have failed and even undermined the political system.
Shadow constitutional affairs secretary Oliver Heald said: “The government’s obsession with electoral ‘modernisation’ has compromised Britain’s traditional reputation for free and fair elections, and undermined both the integrity of the system and public confidence in it.
“Ministers have not gone far enough to safeguard our democracy, such as by blocking individual registration and endorsing the future use of all-postal voting.
“Mainland Britain urgently requires the tried and tested Northern Ireland system of electoral registration, with the use of National Insurance numbers to verify that those on the electoral roll actually exist.”
