Identity Documents Bill

It is a bit much to ask me to refer to a point of detail in the Act. I shall tell the noble Lord afterwards, but he need only read Hansard. I assure him that the Government did not deny that they would pay for a substantial part of the cost by commercial use and that every use of the card would register on the NIR. I think that the noble Lord, Lord Maxton, will agree with that. Let me quickly pay tribute to NO2ID and Liberty for the huge help that they gave this House in respect of that Bill. I also repeat what the noble Countess said about Lord Northesk, whom we all miss and who was of great use to the House in the course of the passage of that Bill, as was the noble Baroness, Lady Anelay, who is not in her place now. To come to the Bill, those of us who fought and fought the previous Bill welcome this one with huge enthusiasm. I believe that the Identity Cards Act 2006 would have affected fundamentally the relationship between the citizen and the state. It is as well to think of ““citizen”” rather than ““subject””, because in some respects that Act would have had a deleterious effect on that vital relationship. However, I say to my noble friend, who confirmed in opening the debate that there will be no repayment of the £30, that I think that that is a serious mistake. It seems unfair to say that people should have kept an eye on what we do in this House and should have carried in their heads the fact that the Liberal Democrats and the Conservative Party had made clear statements in the course of that Bill’s passage that they would repeal it if they came to power. Simple fairness should lead Government to repay those sums of £30—whether to old women or to rich hedge fund managers, I do not mind. It is not fair to abolish ID cards and not to repay that money. It is a modest sum in relation to the total costs already incurred. I am sad that the Bill is as complex as it is. I do not know how many noble Lords have tried to read through the Bill, but it is a nightmare, even for an old lawyer like me. In Committee, I shall table a lot of amendments to attempt to make its provisions clearer. I draw attention to just a couple of clauses. In Clause 4, ““Possession of false identity documents etc with improper intention””, the definition of improper intention in the second subsection does not say whether it is exhaustive. In addition, the reference to ““false identity documents”” is not true to the clause because it covers situations in which the documents are not false. The language of the clause is also extremely complex; I hope that we will be able to simplify it as we go along. Clause 6(1)(a) provides for an offence of possessing without reasonable excuse, "““an identity document that is false””." That does not seem to be reconcilable with an almost exactly parallel offence in Clause 4(2)(a). I hope that that is not too detailed a point for a Second Reading debate. Clause 10 desperately needs rewording, because it allows the Secretary of State to require various authorities to provide him or her with what is called ““verifying information””. At the end, there is a nasty little subsection that states that the Secretary of State may specify by order, "““any other person … for the purposes of this section””." That could take us right into the realms of private businesses, and we will need to look at that. I welcome the Bill with great enthusiasm, as have my noble friend Lady Hamwee and others. I would like to think that, by the time it leaves us, the Bill will be really fit for purpose as well as fit in intent.