The right to vote of British citizens living abroad has finally been restored by the Conservative government after a long Votes for Life campaign. From 16 January this year all British overseas residents can register to vote, potentially adding up to 2.2mn people to the electoral rolls. Until now, British citizens who had lived abroad for more than 15 years were banned from voting in any UK election.
For many years, there had been widespread support among Britons living abroad for the campaign, which was spearheaded by Harry Shindler. Shindler, a UK citizen and war veteran who lived in Rome, campaigned to extend voting rights to all foreign-based British citizens.
At the same time however, many EU nationals who had exercised their right to freedom of movement and were living and working away from their countries of birth were calling on the EU as a whole to establish the right to vote in their place of residence.
British residents in Spain, for example, were able to vote in Spain in European elections and also in local elections, but if they had lived outside the UK for more than 15 years they were effectively disenfranchised, unable to vote in general elections anywhere.
The Brexit effect
The Brexit referendum took things to a new level for many. Here was a vote whose result would directly affect more than a million people who had worked, made their homes and formed families overseas, not to mention the EU citizens who had done the same in the UK. Brexit would affect them dramatically.
It had the potential to terminate careers and break up families, but anyone who had been abroad for more than 15 years couldn’t vote. The indignation among EU residents, and opposition to Brexit, was so great that thousands travelled to the UK to take part in demonstrations there, or protested in cities where they lived.
It has been widely interpreted that despite worthy claims to be upholding democratic principles, the Conservatives backed the Votes for Life movement on the assumption that people who live and work abroad were likely to be Conservative voters, while other parties opposed it on the same grounds. Whether this belief was well-founded remains to be seen.
Party efforts to encourage registration
While groups such as Conservatives Abroad have been urging their sympathisers to register as overseas voters, and have set up an office to try to boost the turnout of the Conservative faithful, other groups representing British residents abroad have also been encouraging them to register. In the EU, many of these have some reference to Brexit in their group names. ‘Brexpats – Hear our Voice’, ‘British in Europe’, ‘Bremain in Spain’, ‘In Limbo, our Brexit testimonies group’ and several others are posting regularly online about the registration process.
The first week of registration of overseas voters saw 18,000 new applications. Those who have signed up in response to encouragement from anti-Brexit groups seem unlikely, on the face of it, to be Conservative voters.
Eligible citizens can apply for registration online. Once registered, they can also, if they wish, appoint a proxy voter rather than risk the vagaries of the postal system.
