I beg to move, That the Representation of the People (Northern Ireland) Regulations, 1952, dated 16th July, 1952, a copy of which was laid before this House on 17th July, be approved. These Regulations relate to the manner of publishing electors' lists which are required for the preparation of the register for elections to this House in Northern Ireland. Most hon. Members are no doubt familiar with the process of preparing the register. This process has been on the same general lines in Northern Ireland as in Great Britain.

In the first place, provisional lists are published. These show the names proposed to be included in the forthcoming register. There is then an opportunity for claims and objections. The registration officer revises the lists in the light of the claims and objections received and forms them into the new register for publication in due course.

The manner of publishing these provisional lists, with which we are familiar in Great Britain, and which was in use for many years before the war, is that they are published in the form of three lists, A, B, and C. List A is a copy of the register in force. List B is a list of names to be added to that old register to make the new register; and List C is a list of the names to be omitted from the current register.

This is the manner of publication of the provisional lists in force in Great Britain. It is also that prescribed by Regulations made in 1950 for the publication of similar lists in Northern Ireland. There is, however, a complication and difficulty in Northern Ireland arising from the fact that the register is also required for elections to the Parliament of Northern Ireland and for local government elections there.

This complication lies in two circumstances. In the first place, under Northern Ireland legislation a new list for the Ulster Parliament and local government elections is only prepared in every third year. This year, 1952, is such a year. In 1952, therefore, the register is a combined register. In 1953 and 1954 the register will be published for the purpose of elections to this House alone. There will be no new register for the purpose of elections to the Ulster Parliament and local government elections there. Meantime the 1952 register will remain in force for internal purposes in Northern Ireland until 1955 when a new combined register will appear.

The second complication lies in the circumstance that the qualifications for voting in elections to the Parliament of Northern Ireland, and particularly for local government elections in Northern Ireland, are not the same qualifications as those for voting in elections to this House. Consequently the combined register contains a good many names of persons who are qualified to vote in Northern Ireland elections, but not in elections to this House; and also conversely, people entitled to vote in elections to this House but not in some, or all, of the Northern Ireland elections. In other words, the combined register differs substantially from a register prepared for elections to this House alone.

I think the House will appreciate the kind of difficulties which have arisen. Perhaps the most obvious is the fact that a register prepared for elections to this House alone does not make a suitable list A for the preparation of a combined register. The other two lists, B and C—additions and omissions—would be too voluminous altogether. Moreover, the combined register must show for what purpose an individual is qualified to vote, whereas the single purpose register need not. I do not think I need enlarge on the complexities involved in that.

The difficulty I have just described is covered by existing Regulations which provide that for the combined register there shall be a single electors' list in the form of a draft register. Although the difficulty is less great than that which I have described, it is nevertheless considerable in going from a combined register to a single purpose register. It is therefore desirable to provide that in the year following the publication of the combined register the electors' list should again be a single list in the form of a draft register, instead of the list A, B, and C method. That is the first thing which these Regulations do.

If that were all however, we should have the situation that in two years out of three electors' lists in Northern Ireland would be a single list in the form of a draft register, but in the third year there would be the three lists A, B and C. We feel that this would be unsatisfactory and confusing to the electors. It would be far better to have the electors' lists published in the same manner every year instead of twice the same and once different. Accordingly, these Regulations provide that in every year there will only be one electors' list which will take the form of a draft register.

These are the technical reasons, which I have tried to explain to the House as shortly as I can, leading to the change to be made by these Regulations. The change will however be helpful to the electors, because an elector who wishes to see whether his name is to be included in the forthcoming register will have to examine only one document instead of two, or sometimes even three.

The other provisions of the Regulations are consequential. There is more printing work involved in printing a draft register than in printing lists A, B and C. Under the new arrangement more time will be required for printing, and the date of publication must be postponed. Accordingly, Regulation 2 of these Regulations provides that the latest date for publication of the electors' list shall be seven days later than under the 1950 Regulations.

The effect of Regulations 3 and 5 is that the latest dates for making claims and objections will be three days later than the new dates which are thus already prescribed for the combined register; that is to say, the time allowed for claims and objections will be the same for the register for this House as for the combined register in the third year. I understand that, in practice, that time has been found sufficient by all concerned.

I hope I have made this somewhat technical matter clear to the House.