Identity Cards Bill

I added my name to the majority of the amendments which have been so admirably spoken to by my noble friend. I need not go over all the ground which she has covered in detail and with great clarity. However, she made one point that is worth repeating which I believe concerned a response of the Minister to a Select Committee report that the primary job of the commissioner was to advise the Secretary of State. I do not believe that is the primary job; I think the primary job is to report to Parliament and to protect the citizen. It is extremely important that the role of the commissioner as the protector of the citizen and as the rapporteur to Parliament should be included in the Bill, and that the powers given to the commissioner should be strong and effective. We have already heard that the information commissioner reports directly to Parliament and that seems to me an admirable precedent. During our long debates we have discovered that the Government are taking remarkably wide and very considerable powers to amend the legislation by order. Against that background it is particularly important that we should have a commissioner who has absolute freedom in the widest possible sense to do his job and to present whatever information he feels is appropriate to Parliament. I have no hesitation in saying that this is one of the most important sets of amendments in the whole Bill and that I support my noble friend’s amendments. I suspect that we will not resolve the matter in this sixth day in Committee. I suspect too that we will be told, ““Ah, Clause 25 as it now stands does after all ensure that after the Secretary of State has a look at it he must lay reports before Parliament””. But that is the wrong way around. This is one of the occasions when Parliament should insist on its rights and its position as the supreme protector of these kinds of matters and should insist on the kind of amendments that my noble friend has proposed.