David Norris (Independent)

Or ATMs and other such machines. It is mad to assume that machines are incapable of fallibility.

A person called Cringely — I apologise because I am not sure if it is a man or a woman, although the name could perhaps be the reason he or she concealed his or her sexual identity — said something interesting. He or she states:

We turn to technology because it supposedly eliminates human error. I suggest that we add humans to the process in order to eliminate technological errors. And we'd save a lot of money in the process.

That is the position I would adopt. Rather than eliminating the human element in favour of the machine, we should add the human element to the machine, where possible.

Electronic voting will make life more boring, even in this Chamber. I do not know why this rubbish has been produced. It is easy to fiddle the system. I have fiddled the vote in this House.