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Mr. Tobias Ellwood (Bournemouth, East) (Con):
May I add to the effective point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Banbury (Tony Baldry)? There would be more consensus, not only in the House but among the public, if we could see the final price tag. Can the Home Secretary tell us how much the whole project will cost the taxpayer?
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Mr. Clarke: The hon. Gentleman may have made my point for me. We have debated costs with the House of Lords, and we accepted an amendment on the subject tabled by my right hon. Friend the Member for Holborn and St. Pancras (Frank Dobson), in the spirit of seeking agreement.
As for the point made by the hon. Member for Banbury (Tony Baldry), the NO2ID poll explicitly asked whether the card should be issued with a passport, which is what we are dealing with here.
Mr. William Cash (Stone) (Con): Would the Home Secretary continue to take the line that he is taking in the context of what the Information Commissioner has said on the subject—that the Bill would cause a sea change in the relationship between the individual and the state? Has he spoken to the Information Commissioner recently, and has he any reason to suppose that the Information Commissioner has changed his view?
Mr. Clarke: I have not spoken to the Information Commissioner recently but, as I have said, there has been considerable debate on the substance of the Bill. The hon. Gentleman speaks of the relationship between the individual and the state. A general election is a pretty important part of the relationship between the individual and the state. That is why I think that the hon. Gentleman's noble Friend Lord Strathclyde was right to say yesterday that in his view—not mine—the House of Lords should proceed only on an issue on which there was a good deal of public support for what that House was doing. My point is that there is not.
Mr. Andrew Love (Edmonton) (Lab/Co-op): Is my right hon. Friend at all concerned about the apparent drift away from the high levels of support for identity cards in the past? Does he recognise that if the identity card is introduced with a designated document, for a number of years people will be charged for an identity card without receiving any of the benefits, which will further undermine the system?
Mr. Clarke: I accept the first point, but not the second. Because of the debate about these issues and because the precise questions are different in different polling data, there is an issue concerning public support that needs to be addressed. That is a major part of the proposal, and my hon. Friend is right to raise it. Lord Strathclyde's second point was narrow, but important. It is: is there
for the House of Lords to overturn the elected House consistently on these matters? I contend that there is not.
Mr. David Heath (Somerton and Frome) (LD): Will the Home Secretary give way?
Mr. Clarke: No, I will not; I want to deal first with Lord Strathclyde's third point. He said that the House of Lords
should not proceed if there are issues to do with the Salisbury convention."—[Official Report, House of Lords, 15 March 2006; Vol.679. c. 1244–45.]
That is a very important point and it is worth recalling what the position is. First, it is absolutely clear that the introduction of ID cards is a manifesto commitment
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that has been approved twice by the elected House. I remind Members of the view of the Salisbury convention taken in January 2000 by the royal commission on the reform of the House of Lords. It was chaired by Lord Wakeham, who is not a notable Government toady, except when the Conservatives were in government. Recommendation 7 of the commission's report states:
"The principles underlying the 'Salisbury Convention' remain valid and should be maintained. A version of the 'mandate' doctrine should continue to be observed; where the electorate has chosen a party to form a Government, the elements of that party's general election manifesto should be respected by the second chamber. More generally"—
Mr. Clarke: I will complete the quotation:
"More generally, the second chamber should be cautious about challenging the clearly expressed views of the House of Commons on any public policy issue. It is not possible to reduce this to a simple formula, particularly one based on manifesto commitments."
I argue, therefore, that that doctrine exists and that it addresses the point made by Lord Strathclyde.
Mr. Clarke: I shall give way one or two times.
Mr. Heath: I am most grateful to the Home Secretary for giving way; we are familiar with his semantic acrobatics on this issue. Given that this scheme will not, if he has his way, be anything other than compulsory for anybody who wants to drive a car or to go abroad on holiday—probably nine out of 10 of the population—is not this the primary legislation to which he refers, on which we should have a proper debate on whether the scheme is compulsory or voluntary? It clearly is compulsory.
Mr. Clarke: The hon. Gentleman is completely wrong, but I regard it as characteristic for the Liberal Democrats to say explicitly that they do not care about the outcome of general elections. His colleagues in the other place have made it clear that they do not accept that the result of the election was right. Indeed, the hon. Member for North Southwark and Bermondsey (Simon Hughes) came very close to saying that explicitly when we debated this issue the other day. The Liberal Democrats must answer to the public for their contempt for them in respect of this issue.
Kali Mountford (Colne Valley) (Lab): Does the Home Secretary recall that when the Chief Secretary to the Treasury was a Home Office Minister he told this House that it was absolutely clear that ID cards would start on a voluntary basis, leading to compulsion? Indeed, such statements were made before the general election and therefore must be taken into account as part of the manifesto. Does that not make this House's position absolutely clear?
Mr. Clarke: My hon. Friend is entirely correct. Documents published in 2002 and 2003, documents and debates published in 2004, and the 2005 general election manifesto are entirely consistent and clear on this issue.
Anne Snelgrove (South Swindon) (Lab):
As my right hon. Friend knows, I was vice-chair of the Labour
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party's national policy forum in the run-up to last year's general election, and as such I took a close interest in the manifesto's development. I am pleased to remind him, and ask him to confirm, that that manifesto said that we
"would introduce ID cards, including biometric data like fingerprints, backed up by a national register and rolling out initially on a voluntary basis as people renewed their passports".
Mr. Clarke: I am very grateful for my hon. Friend's contribution. She played a major part in developing the policy, and it is clear that the position is exactly as she sets out. Indeed, as my hon. Friend the Member for Colne Valley (Kali Mountford) said a moment or two ago, the position has been clear for some time.
Mr. John Redwood (Wokingham) (Con): The hon. Member for South Swindon (Anne Snelgrove) has let the cat out of the bag—the manifesto clearly states "on a voluntary basis". Why does the Home Secretary not amend the Bill, so that people obtaining passports and driving licences who do not share his confidence in ID cards do not have to have one forced on them? Then, we would all be happy.
Mr. Clarke: I shall deal with that point in a moment, but the basic fact is that the biometric data being collected for passports on this basis are broadly the same as those that will be collected for the ID card system. It is absurd, not to mention costly, to have the double process that the Lords want.
1.45 pm
Martin Linton (Battersea) (Lab): Will my right hon. Friend confirm that name, date and place of birth, address and nationality are the only personal information required on the national identity register? All that information and more is already required for the passport application, so does he agree that the House of Lords is fighting on what is a very narrow point? The issue is simply whether identical information collected for the passport office register can or cannot be transferred to a national identity register.
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