Talk:Representation of the People Act 1918

Discussion
I learned today from the parliament.uk website that 19-20 year old servicemen were also given the vote. I looked up the wording of the Act at archive.org (section 5.4) "A male naval or military voter who has served or hereafter serves in or in connection with the present war shall, notwithstanding anything in this or any other Act, be entitled to be registered as a parliamentary elector if that voter at the commencement of service had attained, or during service attains, the age of nineteen years, and is otherwise qualified." (As I've only just joined Wikipedia I'm nervous about editing the page itself.)

I suspect this was also the Act that fixed general elections on one day (as opposed to being run over various days as before). Can't find a reference for this though. Morwen - Talk 12:41, 17 May 2005 (UTC)

Parliament lists this as the text of the Act of 1918. There's no mention of any set date though. Perhaps its not the full text? Typos 08:37, 19 May 2005 (UTC)


 * That is obviously not the full text, what with it starting with section 4 and everything. Morwen - Talk 16:28, 19 May 2005 (UTC)

The statement that only 10% of men were able to vote despite the previous Act of 1884 allowing 60% is doubtful, although exact quotes of this line appear elsewhere on the web. The Act as published by Sir Hugh Fraser in 1918 has an introduction with some statistics including a Home Office report on the register as of 1915. That figure gives about 39% of the male population. Fraser also mentions 50 statutes that affected voting were to be eliminated and 57 others modified, and it seems likely that these caused the loss of 21 percentage points of males of voting age from the register as allowed by the Act of 1884. I haven't found any statements of how these statutes might have prevented voting by those on the register. Rireed3 (talk) 10:43, 15 January 2010 (UTC)

Redistribution of seats
Does anyone know whether it was this Act which redistributed the constituences in 1918? I looked at the list of 1918 Acts, but I don't see any other likely candidates. However, I don't want to just assume that it's this one. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 19:48, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

Yes it was: to roughly 70,000 in each constituency (although whether that is voters or population I don't know) --86.131.76.178 17:41, 20 January 2007 (UTC)

Exact dates
Was this bill passed on 6th February or 4th March? It states February at the top of the article, but then Hansard quotes 4th March for the commons, which means the Lords must be after this date (I can't find out what date this is). However, multiple other sources state 6th February. --Matty art (talk) 09:10, 14 November 2010 (UTC)
 * According to the National Archive, it (7&8G5c64) came into law on 6th February, 1918. Representation of the People Act, 1918.--Terry Patterson (talk) 14:44, 24 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Here is the Hansard entry for it receiving the Royal Assent. DuncanHill (talk) 16:45, 24 June 2018 (UTC)

The House of Lords
I think the explanation that the House of Lords "lost heart" is very weak. Certainly the support in the country for women's suffrage was even stronger than it had been before the wra. In particular, many many people, men and women, had been surprised by the new rôles women had successfully performed during the war, from tram driving to agricultural work and munitions. Johncmullen1960 (talk) 07:10, 18 June 2011 (UTC)

Include Black People
I think we should explicitly state that black people were allowed to vote due to the Act's provisions. They were, after all (since the British nationality law included black people), but this article was a little misleading and led me to think for a bit that black people were excluded. I want group consensus on this so I don't get engaged in an edit war. — Preceding unsigned comment added by O Great Britannia (talk • contribs) 18:14, 16 June 2014 (UTC)

Women's suffrage
“short of criminally violent agitation by the likes of Emmeline Pankhurst and the WSPU.“ That is a very biased statement as well as being a gross misreprensentation of the women's suffrage movement. It should be removed. PhilomenaO&#39;M (talk) 10:26, 10 August 2015 (UTC)
 * It's a factual description of the Suffragettes around Pankhurst, as opposed to the Suffragists. Pankhurst espoused militant "direct actions" inspired by Russian Anarchists, notably bombs, which were both violent and criminal. Maikel (talk) 09:22, 25 January 2016 (UTC)

Annual elections?
Quote: Elections to be held on a decided day each year.

Elections were to be annual? Really? And what's meant by "decided day" exactly?

Someone please fix this, thanks. Maikel (talk) 09:22, 25 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Agreed; I nominate you. Graemp (talk) 11:29, 25 January 2016 (UTC)
 * I believe this means that all polls are held on the same day. Prior to the 1918 election, polls in different constituencies were held on different days; Section 21 of the Act specifies that they will all be held on one day.  I'll fix this, with a link to an explanation. Cosmogoblin (talk) 19:13, 10 April 2017 (UTC)

"Over X years-old" wording
The page suggests that this act allowed men over 21 and women over 30 to vote. I believe that men of 21 and over were allowed to vote, in which case the wording is wrong. I imagine the same mistake has been made regarding women, if it is indeed a mistake. Unfortunately the act isn't on legislation.gov.uk, and I'm not sure where else I would check. CrisH 09:26, 4 May 2017 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Cwbr77 (talk • contribs)

This article needs to be completely reworked
This article may need to be reworked because it completely ignores the fact that it also dealt with Local Government franchise The local government franchise is, if certain conditions are satisfied, conferred on women at the same age (21) and on equal terms with men.--Terry Patterson (talk) 14:19, 20 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Here is something to show what I mean. This is from THE REPRESENTATION OF THE PEOPLE ACTS. 1918 to 1921. WITH EXPLANATORY NOTES. BY Sir HUGH FRASER, LL.D., "Under the present. Act there is a uniform occupation franchise for all local government electors, which extends to lodgers in a room or rooms let to them in an unfurnished state. The local government franchise is conferred on women at the same age (21) and on equal terms with men, with the addition that a woman may be registered and vote by virtue of her husband's qualification in respect of premises in which they both reside if she has attained the age of thirty years." (Introduction xxv.)--Terry Patterson (talk) 09:54, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

Definition of franchise in lead
"and to women aged over 30 who resided in the constituency or occupied land or premises with a rateable value above £5, or whose husbands did"

This appears to me to be in error, because it does not necessitate a property qualification, which (or so I am led to believe) was a feature of the Act. One can "reside" somewhere without possessing any property, yes?

Two citations are given for the sentence. Looking at the second (BBC Newsround), I wonder whether the intended meaning is that lodgers were to be excluded from the new female franchise; however, that is solely speculation by me.

Also the first citation for the sentence (Smith's The British Women's Suffrage Campaign) cannot be correct, if Google Books is anything to go by, because there is no mention of the Representation of the People Act 1918 on page 95. (As far as the narrative of the book appears to me from that page, mention of the provisions of the Act probably came on an earlier page.) Harfarhs (talk) 19:52, 11 August 2021 (UTC)