Lord Brett
Main Page: Lord Brett (Labour - Life peer)Department Debates - View all Lord Brett's debates with the Home Office
(14 years, 5 months ago)
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Baroness Neville-Jones
My Lords, I think the whole House will agree that secure passports are an extremely important part of combating terrorism. It is certainly the case that there are no exit controls at the moment but it is intended that they should come into operation as part of the e-Borders programme.
Lord Brett
My Lords, first, the noble Baroness reminded us that exit controls were removed. Can she remind us which party was in government when they were removed? Secondly, she said that we are going to strengthen the security of passports. Can she tell us how?
Baroness Neville-Jones
The existing facial biometric is a chip inside the passport, and that type of passport has been issued since 2006. It is possible, and we intend, to strengthen the security technology that surrounds that chip to decrease the ability of any forger in any way to clone it or counter its security.