Personal Identity Cards

Lord West of Spithead Excerpts

Monday 4th December 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Young of Cookham]

I think exit checks were reintroduced in May 2015. I will correct that in writing if that is not the case. The Government want tourists to be able to visit this country and not spend a disproportionate time going through passport or visa control. The last statistics I saw a few weeks ago indicated that the average time it takes to get through passport control was coming down, but I take note of the noble Lord’s representations. I agree that we should allow people to come in without undue delay.

[Lord West of Spithead (Lab)]

My Lords, the Minister has not addressed the issue, which is that the Government are undertaking work at the moment and have tasked businesses with coming up with options to provide a means of identifying yourself online by using a card with biometrics. If you have a biometric card which identifies you, which is being used so that you can get online to all the government services we want to put online, what do you call it? It seems to me that it is an identity card. If we have one, why can we not use it more thoroughly?

[Lord Young of Cookham]

I think what you call it is a voluntary system, as opposed to a compulsory one.