Andrew Scallan | The Constitution Unit Blog

The Electoral Commission is entrusted with delivering and regulating the EU referendum. Andrew Scallan CBE, the Commission’s Director of Electoral Administration and Deputy Chief Counting Officer for the referendum, discusses this role, lessons learned from previous referendums and new challenges which may arise this time.

On 20 February 2016 the Prime Minister announced his proposal for the referendum on the UK’s membership of the European Union to be held on 23 June this year. It was the date that everyone was waiting for, not least the Electoral Commission, which is entrusted with delivering and regulating the EU referendum. When the European Union Referendum Act received royal assent in December 2015, we reported to the UK parliament that our arrangements for the delivery of a well-run referendum were progressing well, and by the time of the Prime Minister’s announcement we were in a position to report that arrangements were well-advanced.

The Electoral Commission’s role

The Electoral Commission has specific responsibilities and functions in relation to the delivery and regulation of referendums held under the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000 (PPERA). One of our responsibilities under PPERA is to advise parliament on the intelligibility of the proposed referendum question. We were pleased when our recommendation to revise the original question in line with the findings from our research with voters was quickly accepted by the government and parliament. Our other responsibilities include:

The Chair of the Electoral Commission, Jenny Watson, as Chief Counting Officer, being responsible for certifying the outcome of the referendum
Registering organisations or individuals who want to campaign in the referendum
Considering and approving applications for designation as the lead campaign group for each referendum outcome
Making grant payments to the approved designated organisations
Monitoring spending on referendum campaigning, in line with the referendum spending limits
Providing advice and guidance on the rules to campaigners
Monitoring and securing compliance with campaign donation, loan and spending controls
Monitoring spending by Counting Officers
Reporting on the administration of the referendum and referendum campaign regulation

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Individual electoral registration (IER) has been a huge project, requiring co-ordination between the Cabinet Office, Government Digital Service, Electoral Commission and electoral registration officers in local authorities. On January 25 representatives from these four bodies discussed the challenges they faced and how the project is being brought to a successful conclusion at a Constitution Unit seminar. Roberta Damiani and Laëtitia Nakache offer an overview.

Individual electoral registration (IER) has brought about a significant change in how British electors register to vote. The emphasis is on the term ‘individual’. Previously, one person in every household was responsible for registering everyone who lived at that address; now, with IER, each person is required to register individually. Designing and implementing such a system was a challenge, not only from a human point of view but also from a technological one, as it required a huge amount of data to be digitised and processed. But it also offers exciting opportunities to make citizens more engaged in the democratic process. This blog highlights the key issues debated at an event about IER hosted by The Constitution Unit on 25 January and chaired by Dr Alan Renwick.

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