By Andy McCue, 16 March 2006 15:50
NEWS
The ID cards battle remains deadlocked after MPs again overturned a House of Lords amendment that would have prevented people being forced to register for an ID card when applying for a passport.
MPs voted by 292 votes to 241 votes - an increased majority of 51 - in favour of keeping the clause in the bill to make the passport a "designated document" tied in with ID cards and the National Identity Register (NIR) database.
It is the second time this week that MPs have overturned House of Lords' opposition to the ID cards bill and the parliamentary ping-pong will continue on Monday when peers vote on the legislation for the fourth time.
If the House of Lords continues to oppose what critics call the "compulsion by stealth" element of the bill then the government will be forced to invoke the Parliament Act in the next session in November to get ID cards on the Statute Book.
During the debate on Thursday Home Secretary Charles Clarke accused peers of "breaking the conventions of parliament" and ignoring "the will of the people".
He said: "It's a deliberate effort by the opposition parties to sabotage the ID card bill."
But Conservative shadow home secretary, David Davis, said the government's election manifesto - promising an initially voluntary ID card rollout - was "intended to mislead".He said: "It is ridiculous to assert that the passport is voluntary. Under this bill ID cards are not voluntary, they are clearly compulsory."
Davis also said the NIR database is the fundamental flaw in the government's ID cards plans. "It's the database behind it that's the problem. You do not need to have the NIR," he said.
Liberal Democrat home affairs spokesman, Nick Clegg, called the ID card scheme "uncosted, untested and unjustified".
Critics also rounded on the government today after the Home Office revealed that bank card-style PIN numbers - and not biometrics - would be used to verify the ID cardholder's identity in some cases.
Phil Booth, national co-ordinator of the No2ID campaign, said the Home Office's 'gold standard' of identity has now been reduced to little more than a bog standard chip and PIN card.
He said in a statement: "After all its overblown claims about the infallibility of biometrics and how highly secure its ID system will be, it turns out our identities are to be protected by nothing more than a four digit PIN. The Home Office may as well give away all our personal data to organised criminals and fraudsters, who will always target the weakest point in a system."
Comments
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1. Karen Challinor
Charles Clarke accused peers of "breaking the conventions of parliament" and ignoring "the will of the people".
WHAT?
Labour were elected by around 20% of the population, the will of the people was ignored.
There was little and extremely limited debate on the bill before it was steamrollered through the house using every tactic on the book to ensure it went through. The public weren't given a chance to comment.
The Lords have rejected the bill three times now because the labour party insists on making registration compulsory and the government is simply going to ignore the Lords by invoking the parliament act. Again the public aren't given a say
The Labour party is the one ignoring the will of the people.
2. Terry Carlin
If its just a chip and pin card surely a bank ,supermarket, almost anybody would be able to deliver this far more cheaply.
3. anonymous
Now that internet access is so widely available, it would be relatively simple and inexpensive to hold an e-referendum on such important issues as ID cards. Security could be based in the NI number as the user ID for voters, with a password or a four digit PIN as that seems to be considered sufficient.
That way we really could have democracy instead of being dictated to by a political party with an arrogant and self opinionated bigot of a leader.
4. Chris Goodman
I could agree with Charles Clarke about blocking the will of the people IF the bill was subject to a completely FREE vote in the Commons.
Otherwise it is not the will of the people (who in fact appear somewhat against it) but the will of a minority of political leaders.
But that's what the Upper House is really for - to prevent the Government steam rollering bad legislation through the Lower House.
5. Mike
The convention is that the Parliament Act is only used to push through manifesto commitments. The manifesto commitment was a voluntary ID card. This is a compulsory ID card, so it is the authoritarian Labour Government that is ignoring the conventions.
If they use the parliament act, I call on you all to petition the monarch to refuse the Royal Assent!!
Karen Challinor is right! It is sheer arrogance to say that this has popular support. Voters don't agree with every measure in a manifesto - they vote for the least worst option.
Recent history shows that Prime ministers go bad in their third term (viz Thatcher & Blair) - we should enact legislation limiting a premiership to 10 years in total over the lifetime of the premier.
6. anonymous
Seems to me the house of lords is doing exactly what it supposed to be doing. i.e. protecting the constitution and civil right of the people of this country from the whims of fly by night politicians in the lower house.
7. Jerrold Baldwin
Cards costing £300 to implement (oh yes they will!) with chip-and-pin cards’ 4-digit code, this is exactly why these politicians with tyrannical tendencies cannot be trusted with the NIR database and ID cards.
When about 80% of IT professionals (the people who know about these things) are against this project, it must be ill conceived. All of the people working in the IT industry stand to profit from ID cards, not just the multi-nations that will consume vast amounts of our hard earned taxes. Not everyone would benefit directly, but they would be knock-on effects. The scheme would create a skills shortage that would push up salaries and fees (unless, of course, the majority of the work is not to be done in the UK). This would, in turn, increase the both the direct and indirect costs of the card. Frankly, I am impressed that we, the potential beneficiaries, are resisting this potential disaster. It shows how important it is to the abandon this scheme. We should be proud of ourselves. No need for a Pastor Martin Niem?r here.
These shortages may well inhibit or delay socially beneficial governmental IT systems, such as those required by the NHS.
I accuse Home Secretary Charles Clarke and the Government of ‘breaking the conventions of parliament’ and ignoring ‘the will of the people’ in this matter.
This is because: coercion to use the scheme was not in the Government’s manifesto (in fact the opposite position was given); it is not in unforeseen circumstances, or in an emergency (if it is, they should find a faster solution); the Lords have rightly opposed it (if the Government is not going to listen to them, why not abolish them completely and save their costs?); and, in opinion polls, Her Majesty’s subjects are now against it (plus only 36% of those who voted, voted New Labour – 64% voted for parties that are opposed to the Bill).
The manifesto wording is:
“We will introduce ID cards, including biometric data like fingerprints, backed up by a national register and rolling out initially on a voluntary basis as people renew their passports.” (The Labour Party manifesto 2005 p.52).
It is clear that initially ID cards were to be on a ‘voluntary basis’. This is what the people voted upon, and from where the Government obtains its mandate. There could be no reason to overturn the Lords by the use of the Parliament Act. The Lords are trying to protect us.
8. Tim Ruggles
It seems entirely reasonable to me that the eID card should be as flexible as possible; for example, by accommodating a range of security features and applying these, as appropriate, to particular types of transactions. If ATM transactions require only a 4-digit PIN, then the card should support that. If a high-security access transaction requires biometrics, then the card should support that as well. And, by the way, if you link a specific authority or benefit to a biometric, PIN or other ID verification process, you never need to disclose or exchange personal data. Isn't that the whole point of the eID scheme? In other words, once you've verified your ID objectively (entered a PIN, submitted a finge or iris for matching) all the system needs to do is to verify that the submitted identifier is associated with an authority to exercise a particular claim.
9. Tim Ruggles
In my opinion, only two things about this ID debate are certain:
First, no one really knows, with any precision, what the proposed eID card will cost, but ID verification schemes based on technologies similar to those proposed by the Home Office and used for similar purposes have been implemented for far less than the GBP 300 quoted in your message.
Second, people should be far more concerned about how their personal data is being used currently by commercial enterprises of all kinds rather than with protecting themselves from the Government's possible misuse of such initmate secrets as birth date, addess, claimed name, etc.
Read the list of personal data items the Government proposes to collect and compare these 'secrets' to the data we are quite willing to share with the local grocer, whose loyalty card routinely collects information about the things we buy, right down to our preferences in breakfast cereal, the kinds of toilet paper we choose, the cut of meat we eat, etc. Ditto credit card companies. And we give all this data up for, what?, a rebate of a few pennies?
The big difference between the Government's collection of a few data items and the ubiquitous collection of personal data by banks, grocery chains, credit card companies, etc. is that you can vote the Government out if that data is ever misued. Just try that approach with Safeway, your favorite bank, or MasterCard.
Worried about the exposure of your personal data? That particular horse has long since fled the barn, my friend.
10. Chris Elvidge
"on a voluntary basis as people renew their passports"
Or "renewing your passport makes you a volunteer"?