Identity Cards Bill

My hon. Friend makes a compelling point and I suspect that many people will renew their passports in the weeks leading up to the new compulsory deadline of 1 January 2010. Of course we recognise the extent to which the Government have been forced to climb down and to defer the imposition of covert compulsion in these amendments, but this climbdown does not pass the key test: that any move to compulsion must, under all circumstances, occur after the latest possible date of the next general election. As has been said, it is also significantly less important as a concession than Lord Armstrong’s original amendment, since it only allows people to opt out of having the cards; their details will still appear on the ID register. I have admired and agreed with almost everything that the right hon. Member for Haltemprice and Howden (David Davis) has said about this Bill, but here we part company. He is prepared to go along with the Government’s victory in ramming through compulsion during this Parliament on the basis that, in practice, things somehow will not be so straightforward. For us, second-guessing the precise timing of the next general election or predicting exactly what may or may or not occur between January and May 2010 can never be a substitute for an objection of principle. The imposition of compulsory ID cards must not under any circumstances occur before the electorate make their own views known where it counts—at the ballot box. That is why, once again, we will vote tonight—alone, if necessary—against the Government.