Appropriate Identification
RUSSELL CRUSE
On December 7 1950, Harry Willcock was stopped in his car by PC Harold Muckle, who asked Mr Willcock to produce his National Registration Identity Card. He refused to do so.
Mr. Willcock won the subsequent court case, causing Winston Churchill to declare the result would “set the people free”. In 1952 the ID card was scrapped, and Britons have been suspicious of them ever since. We’re pretty sanguine, though, about giving personal details to anyone who has a right (endowed by ourselves or by an Act of Parliament) to request them; but equally confident in denying them to those who do not.
We accept that we need our driving licence when we drive and our passport when we travel abroad, and we acknowledge a secondary benefit in that they can be used for ID in other contexts. Furthermore, for those without passport or driving licence, there is a plethora of personal documents that can be used for identification – although often, more than one will be required. Proving who we are is not difficult.
So it may surprise you to learn that in the May elections, all voters must produce, not a Polling Card, which has been sufficient until now, but a photographic ID. Your driving licence or passport will do but none of the other usual forms of ID will be accepted. You may, though, want to ensure that your driving licence or passport bears the same name as appears on the Electoral Register – not always the case, following marriage or divorce, for example. If it doesn’t, you will be turned away.
Are you one of the 11,000,000 registered to vote, but who have neither passport nor driving licence? You can apply for a free Voter Authority Certificate; but do so by 25 April, or it will be too late.
So why are we being forced to do this; is there a massive problem with voter fraud? Actually, no.
In fact, the Electoral Reform Society has concluded that “…voting is safe and secure in Britain…” In 2019, for example, of the approximately 58,000,000 votes cast, only 34 cases of “in person” voting fraud was detected. This, I’m reliably informed, means that somewhere in the region of 0.000006% or 1 in 1,705,882 of the voting public attempted fraud at the polls!
If we accept that the incidence of voter fraud is vanishingly small, what other reason could there possibly be?
Electoral Commission research on other countries has shown that voter ‘reforms’ tend to be inspired by “partisan interests” and that “age, race, and income, significantly impact the likelihood of having appropriate identification.”
In the US, changes to voting procedure have “reduced voter participation”. The research concluded that this was “disproportionately high amongst racial and ethnic minority groups, as well as those from lower-income groups and with fewer educational qualifications”. It seems almost certain that the take-up of photo ID will be by no means universal and will be particularly low amongst certain groups of already disadvantaged voters.
One feels bound to ask, cui bono? – who benefits?
We hope you have enjoyed reading this article. The future of our volunteer led, non-profit publication would be far more secure with the aid of a small donation. You can also support local journalism by becoming a friend of HIP. It only takes a minute and we would be very grateful.
Leave a Reply