Identity Cards Bill

rose to move, as an amendment to Motion A, leave out from ““disagreement”” to end and insert ““and do disagree with the Commons in their Amendments Nos. 22E and 22F in lieu, but do propose Amendments Nos. 22G and 22H in lieu— 22G Page 4, line 44, after ““individual”” insert ““and is made on or before 31st December 2011, that application may, if the individual so chooses, include an application by that individual to be entered in the Register. (2A)   Where an application to be issued with a designated document is made by an individual and is made after 31st December 2011,”” 22H Page 7, line 42, leave out from ““card”” to end of line 2 on page 8 and insert ““may, if the individual so chooses, in the prescribed manner, include an application to be issued with such a card in any application made by him to be issued with a designated document, where that application is made on or before 31st December 2011. (7A)   An individual who is not already the holder of an ID card must, in the prescribed manner, include an application to be issued with such a card in any application made by him to be issued with a designated document, where that application is made after 31st December 2011.”””” The noble Lord said: My Lords, we know full well that last Wednesday we debated all this and that the Commons threw us over on Thursday. The Minister may agree with me when she talks about the long consideration given by the other place to this Bill, that they were allowed one hour precisely last Thursday and one hour on the previous occasion when they threw us over. Given the importance of this Bill I do not think that that is a satisfactory amount of time for the other place to consider the very deliberate views of this place. On Thursday the Home Secretary said:"““A general election is a pretty important part of the relationship between the individual and the state””.—[Official Report, Commons, 16/3/06; col. 1643.]" That is our point. It is not necessary to be a slave to manifestos to accord them considerable weight, especially where they concern such a basic civic issue as root-and-branch change in the law of privacy as it will be implemented in this Bill. Recommendation 7 of the Wakeham commission report, also quoted by Mr Clarke, states that the Government’s,"““general election manifesto should be respected by the second chamber””." That too is why we persist; not to wreck or undermine but to get the Government to respect their plain commitment to voluntary ID cards at the stage when passports are renewed. On Thursday Mr Clarke raised the issue of the extra cost attending our compromise amendment, which the Minister referred to today. The Home Secretary, apparently without irony, berated us for denying the public,"““the most cost-effective option in implementing a scheme””.—[Official Report, Commons, 16/3/06; col. 1646.]" Yet here is a Government who, against a barrage of criticism from all quarters—in the House and outside it—refused point blank to give us any reasonable estimates. Estimates for setting up costs and integration came there none. The excuse of commercial sensitivity was unsupported inside or, as far as I am aware, outside the House. I believe that that sensitivity was political. Constitutional proprieties cut both ways. It is fruitless to pretend that the post-1998 conventions are entirely clear. I reiterate that we, on this side of the House, do not   accept the premise that if we stick to our guns on    this    issue we are behaving improperly or in a manner destined to damage the unwritten constitution, let alone in a wrecking spirit. Rather, we say, these are exceptional circumstances and not just because we are holding the Government to their plain commitment. I am unaware of any non-governmental, non-industry body of opinion in this country that is in favour of compulsion. Liberty, NO2ID cards, and Justice are among the numerous respected bodies implacably opposed to compulsory ID cards. It is also the case that effective compulsion vis-à-vis designated passports represents a volte-face less than a year after the election—a volte-face the Government deny is happening. Furthermore, I repeat, I believe that we are striking a blow for public trust in politics. If this Government can railroad this Bill through Parliament in the manner in which they are now trying to do, replete with double-speak and denial, it will be a bad day for this House and this Parliament. But we are not just sticking to our guns; having felt a zephyr of change—if I can call it that—on the Cross Benches last time, and in a genuine spirit of compromise, we have tabled this amending Motion today to allow the political parties, particularly Labour, to go to the country at the next general election, making it absolutely clear where they stand. The delay to the end of 2011 is scarcely catastrophic, given that in any event ID cards will not be issued until 2009. Furthermore, it should enable clarification of some of the many uncertainties—the universal uncertainty, one could say—attending this grandiose project, which would be of great benefit. Not least, it would enable the public to catch up to speed with this Bill and its ramifications. If the Home Secretary himself does not understand his own Bill—and he demonstrated that again last week by continuing to pretend that the database for passports is the same as the database for ID cards—delay can do nothing but good. This is a citizens’ amendment. There will be extra costs from it—but not unacceptable ones, I suggest, as was confirmed to me over the weekend by a very senior industry expert and by the LSE Identity Project, whose members did a short ancillary report on the potential cost implications, which I will place in the Library. To give noble Lords a flavour, I shall quote from that document:"““In conclusion, the government has argued that provisions such as that in the Phillips amendment would be too costly because it would involve two databases operating at a minimal level, one for passports and one for voluntary ID cards. This issue can be resolved in a cost-effective and simple way by enrolling voluntary ID applicants onto the passport database and then issuing an ID card without the passport””." And there is a lot more where that came from. Finally, the key issues here are the sort of society and state that we want. I suggest that we heed the warnings, not only from our own Constitution Committee, but also from the Information Commissioner, our national watchdog on issues precisely such as these. This is a tipping point, and I urge noble Lords once again to stand firm behind the principle of voluntarism, albeit for a limited period of five years. I beg to move. Moved, as an amendment to Motion A, leave out from ““disagreement”” to end and insert ““and do disagree with the Commons in their Amendments Nos. 22E and 22F in lieu, but do propose Amendments Nos. 22G and 22H in lieu.—(Lord Phillips of Sudbury.)