PARLIAMENTARY ELECTIONS (AMENDMENT) BILL

Order for Second Reading read.

6.28 p.m.

The Minister for Law and National Development (Mr E. W. Barker): Sir, I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a Second time."

Sir, the short Bill now before this House is primarily designed to ensure, as far as practicable, that electors who have changed their addresses do not go back to the electoral division according to their former addresses to cast their votes in an election.

At present, the names of electors appear in the registers of electors according to the addresses shown in their identity cards even though these addresses may have ceased to exist, e.g, as a result of clearance for urban renewal. The amendment proposed in clause 2 of the Bill will empower the Registration Officer to omit from the registers of electors the names of all persons whose addresses he has reason to believe have ceased to exist. This will ensure that electors voting at an election for a particular electoral division are the residents of that division.

The Bill will also empower the Minister to direct the Registration Officer to update the registers of electors, whenever necessary. At present, registers of electors which are prepared in respect of electoral divisions consequent on a change of electoral boundaries cannot be revised except after a General Election. Lapse of time between the certification of such registers and Polling Day may make such registers incomplete - it is estimated that there are about 10,000 people changing their addresses monthly. The updating will also enable newly qualified electors, averaging 50,000 each year, to be included in the register of electors.

Sir, I beg to move.

Question put, and agreed to.

Bill accordingly read a Second time and committed to a Committee of the whole House.

The House immediately resolved itself into a Committee on the Bill.-[Mr E. W. Barker].

Bill considered in Committee; reported without amendment; read a Third time and passed.