Under new government rules, voters across Great Britain will be required to show photographic identification before being given their ballot paper at many elections. (Northern Ireland already requires voters to provide photographic ID.)
But not everyone thinks this is a good idea. Two cross-party parliamentary committees – one on human rights and another on constitutional affairs – have raised serious concerns. The Scottish and Welsh governments don’t think that voter identification is necessary (and so it will not be required for local elections in Scotland and Wales or Scottish and Welsh government elections). Campaigners have called it voter suppression.
Electoral administrators have called for the change to be postponed rather than introduced at the local elections in May 2023. Voter identification is used in many other countries but in Britain, where there is no universal national form of identification already provided, the weight of evidence is against pushing ahead. There are at least six problems with photographic id.
