Identity Cards Bill

I am grateful to my noble friend for tabling the amendment, which I support. I feel that it would bring honesty into the drafting of the legislation if that word were excised. He has done us a service. At the Second Reading of the Bill in another place the Home Secretary put forward the idea that libraries might find ID cards a convenient way of tracking down borrowers who nicked their books. I find that an extraordinary response to Glenda Jackson and her inquiry at the time as to how the card might be convenient. I did not find that too impressive a justification for such a monumental scheme. I think it is a pity that the Home Secretary was not here tonight to hear that theory debunked so comprehensively by the noble Earl, Lord Erroll. To me it proves that this method cannot be convenient to the individual. I accept entirely what the noble Lord, Lord Phillips of Sudbury, said—I do not accept that he is simple; I certainly accept that he is a lawyer—that the drafting here should reflect the convenience to the individual rather than the convenience to the state. However, overall the drafting leads me to feel that the state intends it to be convenient to the Government to have this information rather than convenient to the individual. The way in which it has been introduced into this paragraph makes it sound more like a government press release than legislative drafting. That is disappointing. It would be wrong of me to go much further in underlining the case put forward, in a bravura performance, by my noble friend Lord Crickhowell. In the words of the Law Lords I can only say, ““I agree and have nothing to add””.