Identity Documents Bill

Lord Brooke of Sutton Mandeville Excerpts

Monday 1st November 2010 Grand Committee

[Lord Brooke of Sutton Mandeville]

My Lords, the Minister has invited the mover of the amendment to withdraw it, but that still leaves the opportunity to make a brief intervention. I did not speak at Second Reading—indeed, I was not present—but I have had the considerable privilege of listening to the whole of the debate today, except the very first words that the noble Lord, Lord Brett, uttered.

I am a mildly interested party, for quite irrelevant reasons, in the way that the noble Lord, Lord Mandelson, introduced the car scrappage scheme. My car became relevant to it precisely 24 hours after the scheme ended, and I have behaved impeccably towards the noble Lord and indeed all members of the previous Government by not alluding to that fact until this very moment. I am also perhaps the only member of the Committee to be over the age of 75 and therefore entitled no longer to pay a television licence. I have always regarded that as a generous concession by the state—although you do not realise, until you have to do so, that securing it is a little like proving that you are not a money launderer.

The jury must be out on the country’s enthusiasm for the ID project. There was some reaction that the Government were wrong to suggest that it was wholly unpopular, but the fact that only 12,000 people had bought these ID cards since 2006 did not suggest an overwhelming popularity and that they would do well as a loss leader in a supermarket. I think that we can say that there is something to be said on either side of that argument.

[Lord Brett]

First, it was a phased rollout, starting in 2009 and ending in 2012-13. It was restricted to Manchester Airport, London City Airport and the area of Manchester. It would have been rolled out across the rest of the country over the period. There is also a register of applications for people in other areas who had to wait because the cards were not available, so to say that there was a take-up of only 12,000 is actually to pretend that the whole country could have applied when in fact it was very restricted.

[Lord Brooke of Sutton Mandeville]

That is an entirely fair point, which I am happy to take. The fact remains, though, that even under the provisions that the noble Lord issues, I still stand by my statement: the figure of 12,000 does not indicate overwhelming popularity for the scheme. People were not fighting in order to get their own cards.

On the fact that compensation is available for contracts but not in different languages with regard to ID cards, presumably that occurred because the original contracts allowed for what would happen in the event of the scheme in any way being interrupted. That is the way in which contracts are usually written. I have heard everything that has been said about what this Government have not done but I notice that the previous Government, in selling the ID cards, did not appear to have built in a provision in relation to compensation calculations, perhaps for the good reason that they did not want the thought to enter the public mind that they might not be returned at the next general election and that therefore the ID scheme would be interrupted.

On the same point, I have to say quietly that although, in their rush towards modernisation, the Government were keen to remove Latin entirely from public life in this country, the phrase “caveat emptor” is presumably one that still rested in their mind when they brought in the scheme in the way that they did.

[Lord Hunt of Kings Heath]

My Lords, this has been an interesting debate. There is some risk that we will return to debating the broad principle of ID cards. I will desist from doing so, save to say to the noble Baroness that, on the question of popularity, my noble friend Lord Brett was right when he spoke about rollout and the expectation that the number of people purchasing ID cards would increase over time. Secondly, there is no doubt that opinion polls have shown consistently that the public support ID cards. However, we are not here to debate that. The Opposition have accepted that this policy was contained in the manifestos of both coalition parties. That is why we do not seek to obstruct the progress of the Bill. However, as the noble Countess, Lady Mar, suggested, it is important that due process is observed before statements are issued by the Government, and the noble Baroness has graciously accepted that point.

The second point about manifestos concerns their relation to Salisbury-Addison and the Salisbury Convention. We are not quite into that territory. However, I am certain, from my reading, that no statement was made by either party that no compensation would be given to cardholders who will lose many years’ use of their ID cards. The noble Baroness is resisting coming back to the point of principle here. As far as concerns the reputation of any government, to say to the public, “It is your fault, you were silly enough to buy an ID card when some opposition parties said that they would scrap them if they got into power”, is to expect the public to take a punt on the election result. Who could have forecast that we would now have a coalition Government? It is treating ordinary people with a lack of respect.

I say to the noble Baroness, whom all noble Lords respect enormously, that she is digging a hole for herself here. If my party were still in government, the possibility of us getting some proposal like this through the House of Lords would be nil. Obviously, the circumstances of the coalition are different, but I suggest that the Minister should think very seriously between Committee and Report, because the view of the House of Lords will be that this is not the right approach, and that compensation should be offered.

I will not bore away at the issue of the impact assessment. I hope that, between Committee and Report, there will be a clarification of which option we are talking about. Secondly, the preferred option set out in the impact assessment says that the £22 million includes the cost of the refund process. I would be grateful if the Minister will write to me to confirm whether the £22 million includes the cost of refunds. With that, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Brooke of Sutton Mandeville]

My Lords, sitting between the Cross Benches and my noble friend’s Liberal Democrats, I have to confess that the difference between myself and them is that whereas they could not understand the Bill as it was originally written, I cannot understand it now that it has been rewritten by them. I grew up on childhood problems which involved Mr Black, Mr Brown, Mr Green and Mr White who lived in houses that were—but not necessarily respectively—green, white, brown and black. Then you were given a certain amount of information and you had to decide who was living in the right house. All I can say is that the Minister now constitutes my road to sanity because if she can explain what the original Bill meant and why this measure does not improve it, at least I shall sleep at night.

[Lord Rosser]

My Lords, some of the points made by the noble Lord, Lord Phillips of Sudbury, and the noble Earl, Lord Erroll, are interesting. Those are the points that I understood. Other points were made which—through my own ignorance, not their failure to explain them—I could not fully understand. I am extremely grateful that I am not left with the hapless task of having to respond to them. No doubt when we have heard the Minister’s response, we will find out the validity or otherwise of the points that have been made. For people such as myself who are not lawyers and who do not profess to understand some fairly obscure wording, will the Minister please give the reasons why she is not accepting the amendments in a layman’s terms, not a lawyer’s? If she is accepting them, presumably there is no problem in that regard.