UK Borders Bill

Broadly speaking, we welcome the group of amendments. It is always good to hear a Minister in this Government admit the possibility of error in a previous part of the legislative process. We called for amendment No. 2, so we are particularly pleased to see it, but I have some questions. Hopefully the Minister can provide clarification about the effects of the group of amendments. In general, we are pleased that the previous catch-all subsections have been removed. The Minister will be aware that there were objections, both in Committee and in another place, about the sweeping powers that Ministers gave themselves under a previous version of the legislation. The removal of those powers is a welcome step forward. My questions are about exactly how the biometric information documents fit into the Minister's scheme for a national identity register. One of the things that their lordships found most confusing in the explanations in the Lords was whether those documents are the identity card for foreigners. If so, do the documents contain the same biometric information that UK citizens will be expected to provide under this wretched scheme? Of course, we would scrap the scheme, but let us proceed with the legislation on the basis that it might be introduced one day. The other clarification that we require from the Minister concerns the appeal mechanisms available to people whose documents have been removed. Such an action could be disastrous for people in those circumstances, so it is fair for the House to ask whether this group of amendments entails a decent and fair appeal mechanism. On the same lines, is it correct to presume that someone whose documents have been removed for one of the reasons set out in the amendments would be immediately removed from this country? I am sure that, like me, the Minister has studied carefully the very good debates in another place, both in Grand Committee and on Report, so he will know that their lordships were genuinely confused about that matter. I hope that in this broadly welcome group of amendments he will therefore take the opportunity to clear up the remaining confusion about those issues.