Identity Documents Bill
Debate between Countess of Mar and Baroness Neville-Jones(13 years, 6 months ago)
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Baroness Neville-Jones
I take what the noble Lord says. We come back in all of this to the relationship between the Information Commissioner, the operation of these Acts and the assiduity with which the data protection provisions are applied. The Secretary of State is in discussion with the Information Commissioner about precisely these kinds of issues to ensure that there is proper internal accountability and that he is satisfied.
I was asked how we could be certain that these powers of retaining information could be properly held and used and about the power to exercise spot checks. The noble Lord, Lord Brett, also asked a question in relation to that. The other day, we debated the different powers that would be used for different parts of the operation of this Act. If I remember rightly, a procedure is laid out that applies particularly to the destruction of information that is not part of the register but connected to the applications that go to it. They are covered by a destruction process and that process would apply in this instance because it would be in connection with the application process.
The noble Lord, Lord Phillips, asked whether there could be judicial input. I understand that a requirement to attend a magistrates’ court on every occasion that a person is working for the IPS has suspicion—I am sorry, I cannot read this. What we appear to need to do is to ensure that there is operational capability to deal with suspected offenders. I am afraid that that is not an adequate answer and I will try to clarify it in a moment. I wonder whether any Members have any other comments that they want to make.
The Countess of Mar
I was going to apologise for holding up the Committee, but my intervention seems to be opportune. I am puzzled because Clause 10 is about verifying information provided with passport applications and we are provided with a whole list of people who can verify applications. Why then do we need paragraph (i)? If there has to be an order made by the Secretary of State, and if that has to be debated in both Houses of Parliament, it will take time to verify information. Surely not every one of the others listed has to verify information. Surely only one or two of those people would do so. Why go to the length of having an order debated in Parliament in order to verify information on a passport? Will it apply to the passport of one individual, or will it be a block verification order?
Identity Documents Bill
Debate between Countess of Mar and Baroness Neville-Jones(13 years, 6 months ago)
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Baroness Neville-Jones
Option 2 was the preferred option, as I have made clear. That is the option that we are discussing. I am afraid that there is an error simply on page 2. The figure of £22 million was also queried. That is the cost of decommissioning in the first year.
The Government take the view that it is not a sensible use of public money to throw further costs behind this scheme, and that the right thing to do with taxpayers’ money is to cancel this scheme but not to pay refunds. Accordingly, I invite the noble Lord to withdraw the amendment.
The Countess of Mar
My Lords, I might have got this wrong, but the Minister said every cardholder had been written to and told that the scheme will be withdrawn. Were they told “will be” or “may be”?
Baroness Neville-Jones
Every cardholder has been written to and told that the scheme will be cancelled, yes.
The Countess of Mar
In that case, is that not contempt of Parliament? Parliament has not yet decided that the scheme will be cancelled.
Baroness Neville-Jones
My Lords, it is certainly the Government’s intention to cancel it, assuming that Parliament gives its assent.
The Countess of Mar
My Lords, may I return to the report of the Joint Committee on Human Rights? It says, in relation to Clauses 4, 5 and 6:
“The practical use of these offences could engage the right to private life and we call on the Government to provide Parliament with a more detailed justification of why these offences are necessary and an explanation of what conduct is criminalised by these offences that is not already caught by existing legislation”.
I hope that the Minister will respond to that point as well.
Baroness Neville-Jones
My Lords, speaking as a non-lawyer, I hope that I may be able to give the noble Lord some comfort on this amendment. We certainly recognise that the intention of these amendments is to bring clarity to what might otherwise seem complex provisions of the Bill. As your Lordships will be aware, the provisions in Clause 4 re-enact the Identity Cards Act 2006. As the purpose of the Bill is to scrap the ID card scheme and destroy the NIR, that gives rise to questions about how we describe these offences and where we put them. However, law enforcement remains important. Last year, there were 3,000 convictions for offences under the 2006 Act. That is a significant number of successful prosecutions and the powers that are being re-enacted are being used on a daily basis by the police and other enforcement agencies and provide important operational tools to tackle fraud-related offences, so we are anxious to ensure that the law remains effective in this respect.
We do not see great benefit in considering amendments that are aimed at improving the clarity of the legislation which is successfully applied in the investigative and judicial enforcement stages of the criminal justice system. ACPO fully supports the retention of the existing powers. However—this is where I come to the next set of issues—we do not believe that everything should stand still. While re-enacting the provisions to maintain the effectiveness of tackling fraud, the coalition Government have undertaken to review the number of offences on the statute book and to consider the scope for repeal. Therefore, we are on the same track as noble Lords in wanting to ensure the appropriateness of the offences and the powers to ensure their enforcement.
Over this autumn, we will look at whether these offences should stand alone, or whether they can be accommodated within existing offences under fraud and counterfeiting legislation. I am aware that the offences in the Act derive in some part from the paper issued in 2004 by the previous Administration, entitled Fraud Law Reform: Consultation on Proposals for Legislation. We will examine the common ground, or overlap, that exists between the Identity Cards Act and other legislation to see if there is scope for simplification and rationalisation of the offences. I hope that this answers the noble Lord’s point. We will undertake that work this autumn alongside colleagues in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. It may be that in the end we decide that the offences should remain in place; but possibly they could be combined with others. Clearly there is an operational need for them, so the issue is how they are best described and where they are best placed.
While Amendments 9 and 11, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Phillips, do not change the meaning of that provision, Amendment 10 does, because the effect is to widen the scope of the offence so that it is no longer limited—here, perhaps, there is a substantive disagreement—to the use of cards to establish aspects of the person’s identity. The common factor in relation to all documents listed in Clause 7(1) is that they may be used as identity documents. It is the improper use of these documents as identity documents that the offence is targeting—nothing beyond that. Other dishonest uses to which the documents may be put are likely to be covered by other legislation. We are not neglecting the issue, but we do not see it as relevant to the Bill.
Obviously, this legislation is to get rid of the ID card system. In view of our intention to look at the law enforcement aspects and related offences, and bearing in mind in the mean time the need for these powers, I hope that the noble Lord will feel able to withdraw his amendment. I have no doubt that, in consideration of how we deal with these offences in future, his help and views will be greatly appreciated.
The Countess of Mar
My Lords, I am not normally in favour of reports being put before Parliament. We have far too many reports and most of them lie unread on dusty shelves. The argument put forward about identity fraud is a question of proportionality. I understand that a very high proportion of identity fraud—up to 90 per cent—is internet fraud, although I am not exactly sure of the figure. Identity cards would do nothing to prevent that. However, I support the call for a report to be made to Parliament in the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Phillips, and of the noble Earl, Lord Erroll, because of the human rights implications. I do not wish to detain the Committee for long, but those are my concerns.
Baroness Neville-Jones
My Lords, we are discussing two akin but not entirely identical amendments. I shall deal with them separately. The substantive point that is being made concerns the importance of combating fraud and identity fraud. I say straight away to noble Lords that the Government take fraud and identity fraud extremely seriously. The noble Lord opposite quoted something that I said relatively recently in the House. That reflects the Government’s preoccupation with organised crime generally, and particularly with fraud and identity fraud. I assure the Committee that this is being pursued with purposive intent and as speedily as possible. We need to get a good strategy together but we are hoping to publish a cybercrime strategy that goes to the heart of these issues by the end of the year. Therefore, there is no lack of purpose and attention being given to what we entirely agree is a very important issue that poses a growing threat to the prosperity of this country if it is not tackled effectively. Of course, it also has national security implications. I think that the issue which divides us is the question of whether the Bill is the right way to tackle that. I cannot see that what is proposed would greatly add to our knowledge but it would certainly add to complexity and cost.
The purpose of Amendment 12 is to hold the Government to account for something that will no longer exist. It would require resources to be committed to determining, in effect, why ID cards were not successful. However, the offences relating to identity fraud are being re-enacted; we are not letting them drop. The impact of identity fraud will continue to be monitored through the crime statistics. We are pursuing the evil of identity fraud in government policy. We therefore consider that we are on the case, but we are against the setting up of yet a further quango to monitor it. There is nothing between us on the importance of the issue but we do not think that this is the right vehicle with which to pursue it; it would add complexity but not value.
On the other amendment, we are similarly concerned about the implications because again this proposal would add to the bureaucracy on how the Government report on offences within the existing passport process. The proposals would involve the creation of a new post to oversee arrangements for the use and retention of data in connection with passport applications. I have to say that we already have the Office of the Information Commissioner. The IPS, like any other organisation, is required to comply with data protection. It is also required to comply with the provisions of the Bill when it is enacted and is subject to the rigours of government audit procedures. This Government have undertaken to report in detail to Parliament on all the processes.
Identity Documents Bill
Debate between Countess of Mar and Baroness Neville-Jones(13 years, 6 months ago)
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The Minister of State, Home Office (Baroness Neville-Jones)
My Lords, the Bill is short, and it is precise in achieving its aim of scrapping the identity card scheme and destroying the national identity register. Enactment of the Bill will meet the commitment set out in the coalition agreement and deliver the commitments made in both the Conservative and Liberal Democrat manifestos for the 2010 election. We very much welcome the opportunity for debate today and will consider the matters raised in this House together with the content of the legislative scrutiny report of the Joint Committee on Human Rights. I have not yet seen the contents of the report but I understand that it supports the Government’s approach.
A number of your Lordships will recall consideration of the Identity Cards Act 2006 and the fact that our opposition to the introduction of the scheme was focused on preventing the state from intruding unnecessarily into the private lives of individuals and wasting taxpayers’ money. We have not moved from that view, or on the inadequacy of the implementation of the 2006 Act, which has served only to confirm why we were right. The ID card scheme has not delivered the promised benefits. It has been an unjustifiable burden on the taxpayer and very poorly received by the public, with only 15,000 cards in circulation, of which some 3,000 were issued free of charge by the previous Administration.
The Countess of Mar
My Lords, I am sorry to interrupt the noble Baroness. Before we go any further, I must say that I am finding it very difficult to concentrate on what she is saying because of the conversations that are going on on the Back Bench. Could the Chief Whip, or the noble Lord who is a Whip, remind noble Lords that if they wish to have a conversation, the Companion suggests that they retreat to the Prince’s Chamber?
Baroness Neville-Jones
My Lords, I am sure that the House will take note of what has just been said.
Those are the exiguous outputs of the scheme and confirm our long-held concerns that the scheme was expensive, ill thought out and unlikely to find favour with the public. I will return to those aspects and to the issue of passport security later, but I will concentrate for a moment on our fundamental concerns, which lie in the gathering by the state of information that is neither proportionate nor necessary.
The setting up of the national identity register has meant gathering voluminous biographical and biometric personal data on the individual, on the sole criterion of having applied for an identity card. Under the 2006 Act, the individual is required by the state to notify any change in personal details—for instance, a home address—for the lifetime of the card. As things stand, any failure to do so within that period of 10 years could result in the cardholder paying up to £1,000. One has to ask what kind of big brother state that is.
The crux of our deep concern with the ID card scheme is that the purpose of gathering and retaining data was not clear either in the 2006 Act or in how the national identity register operated since its inception. There is the potential for the state to use gathered information for any purpose which it thinks fit. In effect, each cardholder has paid £30 to be photographed, fingerprinted, put on a database and tracked by the state for the following 10 years. Your Lordships may consider this an exaggerated view of the ID card scheme, but sadly it is the reality. We do not always agree with Liberty, but in this instance it is spot on. In its oral evidence in Committee in the other place, the director of Liberty said:
“One of our fundamental concerns about the national identity register was that it was a multi-purpose and non-purpose-specific database, which meant that by definition the amount of information on it would inevitably grow and by definition it was not necessary and proportionate to a particular cause”.
That view was echoed by Justice in the same Committee, and it reflects the importance of ensuring that databases are subject to openness, accountability and proportionality. In our view, the ID card scheme meets none of those key requirements. Instead we have a scheme with little or no purpose that allows the state to intrude into the life of the citizen. There was no attempt in the legislation to achieve the right balance between national security and public protection and the rights to safety and privacy of personal data. The ID cards legislation is a measure without equal in gathering large quantities of personal data from members of the public not suspected of any wrongdoing, which added insult to injury somewhat by requiring them to pay £30 for the privilege.
On cost, the previous Administration expended a total of £251 million. This went on projects to establish identity cards, passports with a second biometric feature and other related programmes. Prior to that, the Home Office spent an additional £41 million developing the policy, legislation and business case for the introduction of identity cards. Furthermore, it was estimated that a further £835 million would have to be spent on the national identity scheme by 2018. This is a huge waste at a time of financial stringency.
When promoting ID cards, the previous Government indicated that the existing and proposed spend was an investment and that the return from ID card sales would recoup taxpayers’ money, but the reality has been different; £251 million to issue 12,000 chargeable cards might be called reckless, which is why we have stopped all spending on the scheme and closed down the existing card-issuing operation, pending the outcome of parliamentary consideration of this Bill. We anticipate savings of £86 million over the next four years through cancellation.
Your Lordships will be aware from consideration of the Bill in the other place that there was a great deal of debate on the issuing of refunds or the provision of discounts or credits against future passport applications. The cost of providing refunds would be in the region of £400,000, which is not a trivial sum. We have come to the conclusion that it would not be right for the taxpayer to foot this bill and to add to the already excessive spending on the scheme.
We realise that some people who spent £30 for a card with a 10-year life expectancy will be disappointed that it will be cancelled later this year without any refund, but those who chose to buy a card did so in the full knowledge of the unambiguous statements by the coalition parties that the scheme would be scrapped if we came to office. They cannot now expect taxpayers to bail them out.
Baroness Neville-Jones
I hope that the noble Lord will acknowledge that, at the end of the day, this was not going down a bomb.
If the question of refunds is the only complaint that the Opposition can find, that shows that there is not a great deal to object to in the legislation. Several points were raised. I was asked about refunds and whether we could supply discounts against other documents or at least allow the documents to have their full-life validity. As I pointed out, full-life validity would mean keeping the system open, which would probably cost an extra £60 million to £80 million. We simply do not think that that is justified or sensible. Noble Lords have said that this would involve a small sum of money, but we believe that £400,000 can be spent to the benefit of the general public in a rather more useful fashion than on a refund of £30, which is rather less than probably most people pay for a monthly subscription to Sky. We have to have a sense of proportion about this.
One or two noble Lords said that they found the Bill unnecessarily complex. In fact, when one gets into the detail of the Bill, there are quite a large number of complexities to unwind. However, I am happy to talk to them about the issues that they have raised and, if the Bill can be simplified, I shall be most delighted to do so.
A point about fraud was raised. The National Fraud Authority and the National Fraud Intelligence Bureau have produced a strategic threat assessment of the harm impact of identity crime—a matter with which I think we in the House are all concerned. It will lead to an action plan, which will be overseen by the Home Office. We have started work on it and the first meetings have begun to take place. I am personally very interested in this subject. The House probably shares the view that identity, and its protection, is something that we have to get right. It relates to issues such as how we combat crime that takes place through cybernetworks, so I do not underestimate the importance of getting this right. As I said earlier, we do not believe that the national register is the way to tackle it. However, we have a great concern about the need to protect victims of crime relating to people’s identities having been swiped.
In conclusion, we believe that the Bill is in the public interest and we are pleased to have brought it forward this soon. We believe it is right to start getting the balance that we think should pertain between the citizen and the state more where we would like to see it, and of course other legislation is coming forward which will swing further in the direction of the liberty of the citizen. I ask the House to give the Bill a Second Reading.
The Countess of Mar
My Lords, before the Minister sits down, I asked two specific questions. If she does not have the answers to them now, will she assure me that she will write to me with them?
Baroness Neville-Jones
The noble Countess is quite right. I do indeed have some information and apologise for not having given it. I think that one of her questions related to the UKBA. She asked about provisions within Sections 5 to 15 of the 2007 Act. We comply with the EU requirements and we have complied ahead of the 2012 deadline. I realise that the noble Countess raised one or two other aspects, but I am not in a position to answer them at the moment and so shall write to her.