Counter-terrorism Review
Guy Opperman Excerpts(13 years, 10 months ago)
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Mrs May
I reject the right hon. Gentleman’s description of the situation and of the balance between national security and civil liberties. Of course it is the terrorists who pose a threat to our civil liberties and to life and limb, and it is right that the Government do everything they can to ensure that they protect the public against that terrorist threat, but if legislation infringes people’s civil liberties and by its very operation reduces the public’s confidence in counter-terrorism legislation, that also has an impact. It is right that this Government should examine the measures that the previous Government introduced—which before the election both coalition parties felt had gone too far in a number of areas and, on control orders, the courts had found were too draconian—and deal with them as we are today, which will continue to protect the public.
Guy Opperman (Hexham) (Con)
I remind the House that I had a former profession as a barrister for the Attorney-General. The Home Secretary has said that the curfew element of the control order will be replaced by—
Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)
Surely the hon. Gentleman does not need to read his question if he is a barrister.
Guy Opperman
Thank you; any time you want to get it going, you can.
The Home Secretary has said that this will be replaced by an overnight residence provision. Could she tell us more about that? Will there be significant differences between the past and present situations?
Identity Documents Bill
Guy Opperman Excerpts(14 years, 2 months ago)
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Meg Hillier
I shall not rehearse all the arguments that were made in Committee, but the Opposition are concerned about the mean-spirited nature of the Bill. Some 14,000 people took up ID cards, most of which were paid for, and those individuals thought that the cards would be valid for 10 years. It was a simple transaction not just with a commercial body, but with Her Majesty’s Government and, indeed, the Identity and Passport Service, one of the most trusted public bodies in this country, as research shows. Yet if the Bill goes the way the Government wish and, similarly, through the Lords, one month after Royal Assent those individuals will lose the ability to use the card that they had thought would be valid for 10 years. We have tabled some new proposals and given the Government a choice about how to deal with the matter. There is still an opportunity for the Minister for Immigration to recognise that, in his haste to get rid of identity cards, which for him is a big ideological issue, he does not need also to be unfair to those who in good faith paid their £30.
The new clause and amendments detail two proposals. There is no money resolution attached to the Bill, so we cannot press for a refund. However, we propose that the fee that people paid be added as a credit to the passport database. The data-matching would be relatively straightforward, given that everybody who holds an identity card, including myself, has, or has recently had, a passport. Of course, there are data protection rules, and we would have to gain permission from those individuals, but I would happily give permission for my data to be transferred.
In the process, we would lose the fingerprint, because it cannot be stored—[Interruption.] I am glad to see that the Minister is listening. It cannot be stored on the passport database—[Interruption.] I am being ironic: the Minister will, I hope, be listening in a moment. It cannot be stored, because the Government, in their desire to get rid of it so quickly—[Interruption.] In their reckless desire to get rid of it quickly, I repeat for the Minister, the Government do not plan to introduce passports with fingerprints. However, that credit would give some comfort to those who paid £30, and it would represent basic fairness.
The Government make great play of fairness—they often point to their coalition agreement, which makes much of it—and, as we seem to be quoting manifestos today, each individual party spoke about fairness in its manifesto, so we ask that the proposal be considered. It would be a relatively straightforward transaction, and with another amendment we will probe the Minister on a further issue. If the Government are planning to destroy the data, they will have to handle the information and do something with it, so they might as well pass it over to the passport database.
Guy Opperman (Hexham) (Con)
Does the hon. Lady expect the repayment to be made to those persons who received that particular facility for free?
Guy Opperman
I shall not detain the House long, but the Bill has rightly been described as a long march. The previous Government’s policy began years ago as a proposal for a compulsory scheme, forcing ID cards on individuals. As a result, there was tremendous opposition. It is surely a rare day when the Conservative and Liberal coalition is supported by Justice and other individuals and organisations that promote civil liberties.
The Government, having decided that the scheme would be compulsory, indicated in the previous Parliament that the scheme would be voluntary. I confess that my vast research was not into answering the question whether schemes in other parts of Europe are compulsory rather than voluntary, which the right hon. Member for Rotherham (Mr MacShane) raised. However, the UK scheme was voluntary and people signed up it.
The 2006 Act wound its way tortuously through the House, slowly but surely, faltering at every step, like some relic of yesteryear, as the previous Government attempted to demonstrate tremendous moral fibre in some shape or form. They were in the position of having to carry the measure, and the scheme eventually became voluntary. As soon as the scheme became voluntary, the argument in favour of repayment fell away. People were not obliged to sign up for an ID card, and could instead rely on their passports, driving licences or alternative documentation.
The reality is that people voluntarily signed up to pay for an ID card. They were not forced to sign up, so the Government’s approach must be dramatically different. The decision to sign up is for the individual, and the legislation states that if they do not want to sign up, they do not have to do so. It is not incumbent on the state, at this or at any other stage, to pay compensation.
Mr MacShane
Let me ask the hon. Gentleman a question so I can get this clear: if he voluntarily buys a house and the council comes along and takes it off him, is he saying that the council does not have to pay compensation?
Guy Opperman
A variety of things could happen in that situation, not least suing the council. I can assure the right hon. Gentleman that various people who gave evidence to the Public Bill Committee indicated that they might contemplate suing the Government. People could sue the council if they were put in that position.
Pete Wishart
That is not so much the key point as the context of such decisions. When lots of people are saying, “Do not buy this because we are going scrap it,” people are making an informed decision. If they choose to buy voluntarily an ID card, that is surely up to them.
Michael Ellis
To continue the example of the house sale, an individual buying a house despite knowing that there is something wrong with it, such as subsidence, is the same as the right hon. Member for Rotherham (Mr MacShane) in respect of his ID card.
Guy Opperman
The position has been explained and I am sure that it is fully comprehended. We should not detain ourselves on the £30 any further in the House. Liberty and Justice support our point of view.
Meg Hillier
Liberty is also in favour of removing ID cards for foreign nationals, or biometric identity documents, or whatever people wish to call them. Does the hon. Gentleman agree with Liberty? Is he aware that surveys revealed that the Identity and Passport Service is one of the most trusted public bodies in the country? That trust is being breached by the Government’s decision. All we are saying to the Government is, “Be fair to those who bought an ID card.” Frankly, the idea that everybody read all the manifestos, as some hon. Members are saying, rather overrates their importance, and suggests that hon. Members are not in touch with the many people who do not follow politics and daily read manifestos .
Mr Deputy Speaker
Order. May I remind the hon. Gentleman that the debate is quite tight and that he should speak to the new clause? He should not draw Members into other areas.
Guy Opperman
I apologise, Mr Deputy Speaker, if I have in any way drawn Members into other areas.
The short answer to the hon. Lady is to ask her this question: if the ID cards satisfaction survey showed that they were so popular, why did so few people sign up? Fewer than 15,000 signed up, and several thousand did not have to pay.
Damian Green
The hon. Member for Hackney South and Shoreditch (Meg Hillier) inadvertently misled the House by saying that Liberty is against biometric residence permits. I have Liberty’s briefing for today’s debate. It states that—
Mr Deputy Speaker
Order. I do not think that the permits are part of the debate, and we are being drawn into other areas. I am sure that Mr Opperman would like to continue his speech.
Guy Opperman
I do not intend to go any further on that point. My final point is that we should not sign up to proposed new clause 2.
Steve McCabe
I, too, do not want to take too long on new clause 2 and in speaking to amendment 8. I enjoyed the contribution of the hon. Member for Perth and North Perthshire (Pete Wishart). I am going to try to find out who the 10 people in Scotland who want to join his fan club are, and I will do anything I can to put them in contact with him.
I want to acknowledge that there is one area of agreement. The Lib Dem and Conservative parties both went into the election on a promise to abolish identity cards, and we cannot really find fault with that. Of course, the Lib Dems also promised thousands of extra policemen, and I do not know where that figures in the current arrangements. However, if people are going to pray in aid that their manifesto commitment is the great justification, we need a total explanation. As far the Lib Dems are concerned, their justifications amount to nothing.
Guy Opperman
The hon. Gentleman talks about this being a dereliction of duty, but this is a scheme costing billions of pounds for barely 12,000 people that was trotted out in circumstances where there was no prospect of it being taken up.
Grahame M. Morris
The scheme is in its infancy and, essentially, it was marketed in only two areas—Manchester and London. It would have been rolled out further and then, presumably, have had much greater appeal. There is an interesting contradiction: the big corporate interests who were involved in this scheme were paid compensation, but no recompense is to be made to ordinary citizens who paid £30 for a card.
My hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North (Catherine McKinnell) mentioned the £30 figure. It may seem a trifling sum to some Members, but for a great many people, including many of my constituents, it is a considerable amount of money. There has been some discussion of why individuals on low incomes might have chosen to spend such a sum on an ID card, and whether many did so. We must consider the fact that alternative forms of identification are more expensive—for example, a provisional driving licence is an accepted form of ID commonly used by younger people as proof of age and it costs £50. There is a cost reason that led some people voluntarily to choose to buy an ID card, therefore. People on lower incomes who needed to prove their age would naturally be inclined to opt for an ID card, but whether the person who bought the card was on a low income or a millionaire is, in fact, irrelevant because the behaviour of this Government in not addressing the unfairness and injustice contained in the Bill is deplorable.
I cannot see why the cards that have already been issued cannot in some way remain valid until their expiry date. The parties in the coalition Government have only a handful of policies on which they truly agree and I accept that not continuing with the ID card is among them, but not enough care has been given to reimbursing cardholders or to making some attempt to maintain already issued cards, perhaps with some reduced functionality. There remains a database for passports, and this card could perhaps, at least in some way, remain an authenticated identification document. Did the Minister seek any advice on possible functions for the already issued cards, or was he content just to allow them to fall? There seems to me to be no reason why the cards cannot remain valid until the expiry date.
The Government are abandoning ID cards without any concern for the expenditure that has already been incurred by the taxpayer or any consideration for current ID cardholders, and with little thought for the future of British passport security and the use of biometric data. The Minister has had every opportunity to address the issues Opposition Members raised in Committee, and it is a shame that he was unable to work with us, at least to try to improve some aspects of the Bill.
Crime and Policing
Guy Opperman Excerpts(14 years, 2 months ago)
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Mr David Lammy (Tottenham) (Lab)
I want to concentrate on those constituencies that have suffered from high crime rates over different periods of time. Those high crime rates not only affect the constituents in those areas but have big implications for the rest of the country. Without doubt, my constituency has been one such area. It is good to see in her place the Minister for Equalities, the hon. Member for Hornsey and Wood Green (Lynne Featherstone), who also represents the borough of Haringey. She will be familiar with these issues.
Tottenham has a history of riots, and there has been deep concern recently about knife and gun crime. We have recently had some big debates about security, and many hon. Members will be familiar with the significant problems at the Finsbury Park mosque, which is on the edge of my constituency, four or five years ago. Because of the nature of multi-cultural Tottenham, the most significant criminal justice issue in the lead-up to the election of the Labour Government in 1997 was the murder of Stephen Lawrence.
I have come to the conclusion that crime largely comes from one thing and one thing alone: poverty. I am talking about poverty of ambition and aspiration; poverty relating to education; poverty of employment; poverty where communities break down; and, sometimes, poverty relating to parenting. The nature of today’s debate is hugely significant for people outside this place, and the resources allocated to deal with the problems, not just within the Home Office but across government, will be hugely significant over the next few years.
I am very proud that, when we look back over the past 10 years, we can see the huge progress that has been made, despite the challenges, in my constituency and in similar constituencies across the country. Many people in constituencies such as Tottenham were acutely concerned—even suspicious, frankly—of the Metropolitan police in previous decades, but they now say that, although their experience of policing is not perfect, they have moved from seeing a police force to seeing a police service.
At the forefront of that police service has been neighbourhood policing and the police community support officers. My hon. Friend the Member for Mitcham and Morden (Siobhain McDonagh) is absolutely right to say that neighbourhood policing has made a huge difference to people’s confidence in reporting crime and their ability to relate to police officers, and to our attempts to get officers on to the beat.
Alongside that sense of having a police service must be the presence of the police in the community, and that is why we have all welcomed the extra police numbers. They have been particularly manifest in the London borough of Haringey. The borough had suffered historically because it was an outer-London borough, and inner-London boroughs always had more police officers than we did. Under successive Mayors and Labour Home Secretaries, however, the outer-London boroughs benefited from more police officers. We should be very concerned indeed—and the hon. Member for Hornsey and Wood Green should also be very concerned—that the Mayor proposes to cut police numbers in London by 455 over the forthcoming period. What effect will that have on the significant issues that exist in a constituency such as mine?
When we relate this problem to the poverty of aspiration and ambition and to the issue of how we lift communities up, we must also recognise the huge amount of work done by communities, particularly on knife and gun crime. I am thinking of someone like Nims Obunge, chair of the Peace Alliance, which started in the London borough of Haringey and grew to affect much of London and now has influence in different inner-city areas across the country. It is an alliance of civil society, with people coming together to stand up and say no to violent crime—and it is having an effect. I know it is having an effect because the figures are clear. Gun crime was down by 28% in my constituency last year and knife crime down by just under 20%.
That shows the sort of effect it can have when local people take ownership and work alongside the police. What will happen to the funding for projects like that and others such as the “Value Life” project, led by young people in my constituency at the Gladesmore school? They rely on funding, which will be needed for the years ahead if the level of cuts weighed up and suggested by the Home Office come about. What will happen to the statutory services that all local authorities will have to review in this period?
We know what sort of budgets will get cut. I am particularly worried about the funding available to young people beyond school. I pay tribute to my right hon. Friend the Member for Salford and Eccles (Hazel Blears) for the work she did when she was responsible for policing. The provision of positive activities for young people, particularly during the summer period, is important, so the money we put in to support young people and ensure that they have things to do is crucial. What will happen to those funds over the coming period?
Some really significant issues of security are at stake. We should think back to those images of the Finsbury Park mosque four or five years ago. What is going to happen to the Prevent fund and to all the work that has gone into turning a mosque like that around and to support the young people and communities within it? What will it all mean for the crime statistics and for ordinary people in this country?
The Government are taking a backward step. The decision to cut the state is ideological and it will have huge consequences. The decision—failing to ensure that Home Office front-line services are protected in difficult economic times—is the wrong one, and we will all suffer as a consequence of it.
Mr Lammy
No, I will not.
I ask the Minister for Policing and Criminal Justice to think very carefully over the coming months about these issues, which are critical for constituencies like mine. Such constituencies rely on Home Office funding. They rely on supporting, not cutting, police numbers. They rely on community policing, not the diminution of such policing. They rely particularly on supporting young people who, in the absence of proper and effective community policing, are vulnerable to being seduced by various threats.
Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)
I congratulate the hon. Member for Chesterfield (Toby Perkins) on what was, as always, a sometimes political but nevertheless thoughtful contribution.
The debate has focused on a number of issues, notably accountability and cuts, but I want to talk about the situation in my constituency. I want to talk about what has gone wrong, the cost of crime and some of the solutions. I accept that great strides have been made in fighting antisocial behaviour, and that major reforms and successes have been achieved in Harlow. Recent operations have succeeded in targeting the few prolific offenders who cause the majority of the problems. Nevertheless, the town still suffers from the highest violent crime rate in Essex and from a high rate of burglaries and car thefts, and in terms of crime and disorder, some of its estates suffer from the worst 10% of deprivation in the British Isles. We also have serious problems in specific areas such as the town centre.
Although crime in those areas is not always reported to the police, I find—like other Members—that local residents often contact me about it, and mention it to me frequently in surgeries. That is why I consider this debate to be so important. We have some very effective police officers in Harlow and some good leadership in Essex, but I believe that in the wider United Kingdom there has been a breach of trust between the police and the public. The umbilical cord has been cut. Raymond Chandler, the American novelist, said:
“Crime isn't a disease, it’s a symptom.”
It has already been said that Tony Blair promised to be tough on the causes of crime, but the last Government approached prevention in a chaotic way. For example, sadly, they rewarded family breakdown by penalising couples in the welfare system, and they also failed to ban the sale of alcohol below cost price.
We see this elsewhere, too. There has been much comment in the debate about closed circuit television. I am in favour of it when it cuts crime, but the Under-Secretary, my hon. Friend the Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup (James Brokenshire), came with me a few years ago to visit a company in Harlow called Rotatest which trains people in how to use CCTV. It has shown, through using Home Office studies, that about 80 or 90% of CCTV in this country is not fit for purpose either because it does not comply with the Data Protection Act 1998 or it is not operated properly or the machinery is not working properly. In 2006 alone we spent about £250 million on CCTV that was not working in the way that it should.
Only a couple of years ago, the deputy chief inspector of the Met, Mick Neville, said the system was an “utter fiasco”, with only 3% of London’s street robberies being solved using security cameras. Although Britain now has more cameras than any other European country, he said that “no thought” had gone into how to use them. We must have CCTV, of course, but I would like us to prevent more crime so that we need fewer CCTVs. It is not that we do not want CCTV; rather, we want to prevent crime so it is not needed in the first place.
Another problem is the micro-managed target culture of the previous Government and the bureaucracy, in part driven by the right hon. Member for South Shields (David Miliband) when he was head of Tony Blair’s policy unit. The Opposition talk about cuts, but three years ago when they were in government they established a National Crime Reduction Board and then gave it no budget. They talk about cuts, but for all their spending they left England and Wales with double the crime rate of the European average. The Home Secretary said earlier that there were about 900,000 violent offences in 2009. The House of Commons Library has shown that that rose from 618,417 such offences in 1998, so there has been a huge rise in violent crime.
The Government’s reforms are urgently needed for Harlow, because there is not just the social cost of families blighted by crime, but there is also the huge cash cost, which is hurting the recovery. Labour Members have talked about cuts and expenditure, but they must accept that their policies led to crime now costing more than £3,000 for every family in the UK each year. Given that there are about 40,000 family households in my constituency, the cost to Harlow could be in the order of £120 million a year.
During the election campaign, my right hon. Friend the Minister for Policing and Criminal Justice visited with me a newsagent in Nazeing village that had been robbed three times in three weeks. This shop was just one of many whose profits were suffering because of crime. When we legally oblige police constables to spend 50% of their time on paperwork, we deny people the power to shape local policing and this is the sad result.
What are the answers? First, I would like to congratulate chief superintendent Mr Simon Williams and chief constable Mr Jim Barker-McCardle, as despite the challenging economic situation they have no plans to cut the number of front-line police officers in Harlow and intend to keep the police station in Harlow open for 24 hours a day. They are demonstrating that a smarter public sector can deliver more for less, even when it spends 80% of its budget on people. Earlier this year, before we entered government, Essex police had to cut £2.5 million from its budget, and it did so without any effect on front-line services.
We must also restore the trust between the wider public and the police, and the umbilical cord between them. That is why I am a passionate advocate of the Government’s policies to reconnect the police with the communities that they serve, which include having the direct election of a police commissioner. I cannot understand the opposition of Labour Members to making the police more accountable to the communities that they serve. We also propose reducing police paperwork and bureaucracy, so that constables can spend more time on the streets; introducing regular beat meetings, so that residents can hold the local police to account; and publishing more detailed local crime statistics.
We also propose to have more specials, and it is tragic that their number has declined by 6,000 since 1997. I completely disagree with the comments made by the right hon. Member for Don Valley (Caroline Flint) about specials. There is scope for greater community involvement in policing. For example, Essex has one of the largest forces of specials in England. In early-day motion 520, I welcomed the statement made by my right hon. Friend the Minister for Policing and Criminal Justice that there is a “huge untapped potential” for recruiting more specials, and I suggested transforming them into a Territorial Army-type force. That would enable specials to cover more policing duties and would offer excellent value for money. Specials are also a genuinely local force and a valuable source of community intelligence.
I am not asking for extra money, but rather for the Government to refocus their resources to incentivise special constables, so that they can work more hours and develop professionally. Following many tragic fatalities on the railways near Harlow, I have called, including in my early-day motion 598, for a similar volunteer force of special rail guards to be established to improve safety on train platforms. In a time of scarce resources, special constables offer a big society answer to the crime problems we face, not only in Harlow, but across the country. I am talking about having fully trained constables with real powers who give a few hours a week to their local neighbourhood. We already have 600 in Essex, and let us hope we have more soon.
Guy Opperman
Does my hon. Friend agree that there is scope to widen the training and opportunities available to the existing special constables, so that they can carry out alternative tasks on a more big society basis?
Robert Halfon
Yes, entirely, and I would like community support officers to have the chance to become specials.
To sum up, our crime policy must move away from that of the previous Government, which was about bureaucracy and the big state.
Guy Opperman (Hexham) (Con)
At the heart of this debate is a single issue: what would we all cut? How would we all approach the difficult dilemmas that we face? Police budgets are, by definition, an emotive subject, as anyone who has sat in the Chamber this afternoon can appreciate. Every one of us wants to have the maximum possible number of police. However, health, education, defence, justice and all the other matters that we have to address are also emotive. To look at the police budget on its own without considering other issues is naive and does not approach the full problem.
The simple question is this: is anyone above budgetary cuts? I do not believe that we are, or that the police are. All the police officers whom I speak to—I have done nine murder trials and spent the best part of 20 years working with officers—accept that things have to change. We do not have to explain that in terms of class or Thatcherism. Those things do not apply, because it is simply about maths. As we all explained up and down the country, if someone spends £400 but earns only £325, the maths simply does not add up. I see no problem in approaching that problem by saying, “This must change.”
Toby Perkins
Seeing as the hon. Gentleman has set up his contribution based on the economy, he might choose to reflect on the fact that there is a fundamental difference between our parties. The Labour Government proposed to reduce the deficit, but not by nearly as much as the new Conservative Government. Because they are increasing the pace at which we are repaying the deficit, they will have to cut more and there will be fewer police on the beat and more crime. That is a fundamental difference in approach.
Guy Opperman
I disagree totally, because we are tackling the deficit earlier and will not have the problems that we would have had if Labour had kept delaying the cuts and spending as though there were no tomorrow. I can assure the hon. Gentleman that 6 May was the tomorrow, and his party lost it.
In Hexham, the police have already taken a small budgetary cut. I walked the beat with them barely three weeks ago. They are doing an amazing job of looking after their area and are perfectly able to cope with the difficulties that they have had thus far. Who knows where the future will ultimately lie? However, they understand and appreciate the problems and they know that there are ways forward. As the assistant to Barack Obama put it, “We should not waste a crisis.” It is often in the difficult times that we can re-evaluate who we are, assess what we are doing and review what we are going to spend our money on in future.
I endorse the comments made by my hon. Friend the Member for Cannock Chase (Mr Burley) and by the hon. Member for Edinburgh West (Mike Crockart) in his excellent speech. The latter spoke with great eloquence, having been a police officer himself until nine years ago. He indicated, for example, that higher police numbers do not necessarily equal less crime. The example of Belgium is well known. There are very significant numbers of police—the highest numbers in Europe—yet the crime level is massively increased.
I hope that the Government will consider the fact that in a constituency such as mine, which is 1,150 square miles, the vital issue of rural crime has been treated very differently from other crime over the past 13 years, and I hope that things will improve. That point encompasses why I oppose the closure of the magistrates court in my constituency. The proposal is that we will have no magistrates court in our 1,150 square miles. I do not believe that that is the right way forward, hence my strong opposition to such a measure.
My final point is this. I ask myself why the right hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle (Alan Johnson), the shadow Home Secretary, gave the speech that he gave today—it has been mentioned this afternoon on several occasions. Some described it as an application to the post-election shadow Cabinet, but I am not sure that it was. I take the view that he expressed amazing reverence for Lord Michael Howard. He seemed to disregard all Home Secretaries between Lord Howard and himself, when we reached, as others described it, the delightful sunlit upland of “the year of Johnson”, as he called it. That was very eloquent. According to him, the world went from the “prison works” policy of Michael Howard to him, but he disregarded the ASBO age of John Reid as Home Secretary and the CRASBO—criminal antisocial behaviour order—age of Charles Clarke, and indicated that we simply arrived in the year of Johnson when everything was sunlit and perfect.
I thought that the Howard-Johnson alignment had a future, but then I remembered that that was the name of a rather dodgy hotel chain in America that provides a kind of cut-price service. Lord knows where we could go with that. I support the Government, and I urge people to reconsider their approach. I accept that there are contrary arguments—police budgets are always emotive—but the Johnson alignment is not the right way.
Identity Documents Bill
Guy Opperman Excerpts(14 years, 5 months ago)
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Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)
It is a privilege to serve under your chairmanship, Madam Deputy Speaker. Many congratulations on your elevation to that position.
Unlike me, Madam Deputy Speaker, you have not had the privilege of sitting through the entire debate. We have had the opportunity to hear from a number of colleagues who made their maiden speeches. First, the hon. Member for Gosport (Caroline Dinenage) told us that it was not Gosport but God’s Port. She told us that Portsmouth is close to Gosport, but as someone who grew up in Portsmouth and went back and forth on the Gosport ferry on Saturday afternoons, when my mother made sure she got us out of the house for recreation, I have fond memories of Gosport from a slightly different perspective.
The hon. Lady spoke in glowing terms of her constituency and spoke up strongly for the future of HMS Sultan, urging her Government to think carefully about the impact of their decision on her constituents. Like many speakers, she mentioned identity cards and I shall turn to that issue when I have congratulated other speakers on their comments.
The hon. Lady was followed by my right hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough (Mr Blunkett), who was not making his maiden speech. He was Home Secretary when the Identity Cards Bill was first published and he eloquently explained some of the original thinking behind identity cards. He highlighted the fact that the issues the identity card system was set up to deal with will not go away. He particularly bemoaned the passing of the second generation of biometric passports, which I shall touch on later in my comments.
We then heard from the hon. Member for Birmingham, Yardley (John Hemming). I would say that his criticisms applied equally to driving licences. On the basis of his comments, perhaps the Government’s next policy will be to abolish them.
My hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Erdington (Jack Dromey) made his maiden speech, but with his background and experience we can look forward to many good and knowledgeable speeches from him. He gave a spirited history of his constituency and of municipal investment in Birmingham. He spoke of the benefits of Labour investment, particularly in the decent homes programme. He also highlighted the many problems that remain to be tackled in his constituency, especially unemployment and the lack of affordable family housing. There is no doubt that in him we have a strong champion for Erdington in the Chamber.
The hon. Member for Gloucester (Richard Graham) spoke movingly about manufacturing in his constituency and his desire to see it improve. Unbeknown to me, Gloucester is famous for making health and aerospace products, but particularly for making ice cream. We look forward to hearing more from him. He has a strong commitment to his constituency—even the shirt on his back was made by his constituents.
My hon. Friend the Member for Clwyd South (Susan Elan Jones) is a fellow Co-operative Member of Parliament. She warmly acknowledged the work of Martyn Jones, particularly his success in ensuring that money from dormant bank accounts went to good causes. Her thoughtful and moving description of life in Clwyd now and in the past will remain with me. We look forward to many eloquent speeches from her.
The hon. Member for Finchley and Golders Green (Mike Freer) rightly paid tribute to Rudi Vis. On the Labour Benches, we join the hon. Gentleman in acknowledging Rudi’s contribution to the Chamber. We pass our condolences to his family.
The hon. Gentleman spoke of another predecessor in the seat—Baroness Thatcher—about whom we may not share the same level of agreement. He then spoke about identity cards. It was heartening that, despite the fact that Members were making maiden speeches, several of them commented on identity cards.
We then heard an amusing speech from the hon. Member for Perth and North Perthshire (Pete Wishart). If I were being mean, I could talk about cheap oratory, but he talked about identity cards as being anti-civil liberties. Were he in his seat, I would ask him if he has a passport and I will touch on that. He talked about Emu and Rod Hull. I was not sure whether we were hearing from Emu or Rod Hull, but we had a good time listening nevertheless.
We heard from the hon. Member for Keighley (Kris Hopkins), who was generous in his tribute to Ann Cryer, his immediate predecessor in the seat, and he rightly highlighted her work on tackling the abuse of young women by men and on forced marriages. He also talked about the many illustrious sons of Oakworth, his home village.
We then heard from my hon. Friend the Member for Gateshead (Ian Mearns), who we thought at a number of points was about to burst into song, as he quoted from “Blaydon Races” and gave a tour of the international venues in his constituency. I have no doubt that as we go to many conferences over the years, we will remember that speech.
The hon. Member for Elmet and Rothwell (Alec Shelbrooke) is the first Conservative to represent the town of Rothwell, a constituency that apparently has had 10 boundary changes. Whether there is more to come from the Government and whether the seat will stay in anything like the same form are matters for a future debate.
We then heard from my hon. Friend the Member for Walsall North (Mr Winnick), who rightly highlighted the muddle and inconsistency of Government policy on the issue. I will touch on some of the other points that he raised.
The hon. Member for Selby and Ainsty (Nigel Adams) spoke in glowing terms about his constituency and paid warm tribute to his predecessor, John Grogan. He wondered whether his grandfather, a miner, would have been proud of his grandson becoming a Conservative MP. I am sure he would, Madam Deputy Speaker, and we look forward to hearing more from the hon. Gentleman.
We then heard a very powerful speech from my hon. Friend the Member for Ashfield (Gloria De Piero). She spoke warmly about her predecessor Geoff Hoon, a former Defence Secretary and Chief Whip. She spoke about literacy and the sporting tradition in her constituency and she was proud—quite rightly—to be the first woman to represent Ashfield. She spoke movingly of a real sense of community in her constituency and about the legacy of the mining traditions.
We then heard from the hon. Member for Cambridge (Dr Huppert), although this was not a maiden speech. It is heartening that a number of new Members are already contributing fully to debate in this House. He spoke quite a bit about the 1950s. It is worth saying that, in terms of identity cards, the 1950s were quite a long time ago. We are talking today about a very different programme that was proposed by the last Government and is being opposed by this Government. We had a number of history lessons on that but the identity card system was rather different from now, as is—I would say to the hon. Gentleman—this place is from academia. Academic debate is all very well but government, in which he now plays a part, has to deal with practical realities. We wait to see how the Government will cope with those realities on this issue and others.
My right hon. Friend the Member for Leicester East (Keith Vaz) helpfully reminded us of previous parliamentary scrutiny of identity cards, a number of points from which were taken on board by the last Government as they developed the policy over time.
We then heard from the hon. Member for South Swindon (Mr Buckland), which took me back to one of my first public meetings on the issue. He opposes ID cards on the basis that the road to hell is paved with good intentions. I suggest that the Government would do very little if it took that to its ultimate extreme. I went to South Swindon in my early days as Minister responsible for identity cards and met NO2ID. After we entered the room and found that, seemingly, there was nobody there to oppose ID cards, we looked out and realised that the three or four people outside were the demo. As a result of that meeting, the local newspaper—the redoubtable Swindon Advertiser—stopped carrying quite so many letters from that organisation. Members have praised NO2ID today; it was relatively small in number, but it was effective, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough acknowledged.
My hon. Friend the Member for Mitcham and Morden (Siobhain McDonagh) spoke movingly about the sort of freedoms that her constituents expect, including the freedom to live peacefully in their community. She felt that ID fraud was an important issue to be tackled, and that it was something that her constituents wanted to see tackled. That was one of the reasons why she has been such a strong supporter of and advocate for ID cards over the years. She is right that there is a demand still, and there will be greater demand in the future for the improved personal security that ID cards represent.
Let me make it clear to the House that we have not abandoned the policy of using fingerprints or having a proper database to back that up. The policy of our Government was clear and remains so. However, we have to recognise the reality that we did not win the general election—nor did the Conservatives, but with their friends the Liberal Democrats, they form the Government. We recognise that and the will of the people. In opposition, although we will attack, we also need to recognise when the Government have put forward a view and want to get that through. Sometimes we will not oppose just for the sake of it. I will return to some of the issues later.
We heard from the hon. Member for Monmouth (David T. C. Davies) largely what we would expect to hear from him. He is giving lessons to many new Members. The hon. Member for Esher and Walton (Mr Raab) spoke about the state being accountable to the citizen. We all agree with that, though perhaps not about the ways in which we would achieve it. The hon. Member for Dover (Charlie Elphicke) spoke about trafficking, where I would counter that fingerprints make a difference. In that regard, we may be throwing out the baby with the bathwater. The hon. Member for Aldridge-Brownhills (Mr Shepherd) gave an eloquent history lesson about civil liberties, as he sees them, and ID cards over the years. We then heard from the hon. Members for Northampton North (Michael Ellis), for Great Yarmouth (Brandon Lewis) and for West Suffolk (Matthew Hancock).
It has been interesting to listen to a debate dominated by newer Members who spoke eloquently and with enthusiasm. However, it is easy to make a speech from the Back Benches with energy and enthusiasm, but as those on the Government Front Bench, the Home Secretary and her colleagues will learn—or, in many cases, do not need to learn—the challenges of being in government are quite different. They have to examine the facts in detail and consider the problems of national security that they must deal with.
Guy Opperman (Hexham) (Con)
When the ID card was first launched last year, does the hon. Lady recall that at the launch in the north-west, the Minister forgot her own ID card? If she could forget, what chance would the rest of us lesser mortals have had in the brave new world of ID cards?
Meg Hillier
That rather proves my point. The law as it stood and still stands is that no one is required to carry their national identity card. [Hon. Members: “What is the point?”] The chorus of approval for that comment from a sedentary position suggests, perhaps, that the Government may be proposing a compulsory scheme. It is important to remember that as the law still stands, there was never a requirement to carry the card. It is easy to make cheap debating points, but that was an important part of the scheme. Like previous Home Secretaries and the most recent Home Secretary, I did not want to see a card demanded of people. That was never in the Act and would never be a requirement.
Section 14 explicitly ruled out the possibility that anyone would have to show a card to access any public service. It was important that we won the trust of the public and let them buy into the scheme if they wished, so that they could see for themselves the benefit. The British passport is not a compulsory document, yet eight out of 10 British citizens choose to have one, and it has an important resonance and role.
There were three main reasons or broad themes for introducing identity cards. It is understandable that many Members will think that there were mixed messages. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough said, that is a fair point. It seemed at different times that there were different reasons. In fact, if one goes back and reads the speeches made on two attempts to give the Bill a Second Reading—a general election interrupted—by the former Member for Norwich, South, Charles Clarke, who was then Home Secretary, terrorism was not mooted as the main reason for identity cards, but because of the events of 11 September, that question was often posed in the media. The debate was often hyped in that way.
Protecting the public was one of the reasons for introducing identity cards. It allowed people the option of locking their identity firmly to their fingerprint and thereby helped to reduce the risk of ID fraud for those who chose to take up the option, as I did and as my colleagues on the Opposition Front Bench did.