To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, what the evidential basis is for the Government's position that individual electoral registration is the most effective method of voter registration.
Answered on
20 December 2017
Organisations such as the Electoral Commission had long advocated for the replacement of the household registration system with individual electoral registration. When the new system was introduced in 2014 this was with cross-party support.
Since the end of the transition to individual electoral registration in 2015 we have gathered considerable evidence that the system is working well, including thanks to the introduction of online registration. In July 2016, the Electoral Commission reported that the December 2015 registers were 91 per cent accurate, a statistically significant increase compared to the 2014 registers (the last compiled using household registration). Completeness was seen to be stable at around 85 per cent.
By the time of the 2017 General Election, the electoral register had grown to its largest ever size. Our registration service has seen the submission of more than 30 million applications.
We are not complacent and we will continue to make efforts to modernise the registration system and to improve access to it, including through our democratic engagement plan.