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Mr. Allan: It would help if the Minister could follow up on a point he made earlier about routes on to the identity database over the next few years. Will he make it clear that the only route is if somebody has applied for a passport once passports have started to be issued as registrable documents, or if they voluntarily come forward and explicitly say, ''Will you stick me on it?'' Will he assure the Committee that there will be no hoovering up of data from other sources, such as the existing passport database? Is it the case that there will be no transferences into the register, and that there will only be those very limited routes into it over the next few years?
Mr. Browne: It is not the Government's intention to allow the hoovering up of anything, and the Bill does not allow for that. The hon. Gentleman exactly describes the process that the Government envisage. I expect that we will have a debate about how voluntary that process is, and I will be happy to have it at the appropriate time.
Mr. Clifton-Brown: Will the Minister clarify what is meant by ''others''? Does it mean that every member of the public will have the right to inspect the register and establish all the 51 facts that will be punishable with a £2,500 fine if they are not given?
Mr. Browne: I can clarify that concern, which goes to the heart of the confusion. The measure we are discussing relates to private transactions. It is about people voluntarily agreeing to use the facility to prove their identity to a certain standard. ''Others'' depends on the people to whom individuals relate.
Mr. Malins: I understand that, but is there an element of compulsion? If someone approaches me when I try to conduct a normal transaction, will that person be entitled to say that I must prove all my registrable facts to them, and what recourse will I have if I say that I do not choose to do that?
Mr. Browne: The hon. Gentleman would not be in a different position after the Bill is enacted than he is now. In my normal everyday affairs, I expect people to require different levels of proof of my identity depending on the person with whom I am involved in a transaction. I would be grossly disappointed if in serious transactions people did not expect me to prove to a significant level who I am. I am sure that he shares that view.
We conduct a number of transactions in our ordinary everyday lives. We are entitled to be assured that no one will steal our identities and that those we transact with are ensuring that they are dealing with the right person. That protects our security and that of the businesses with which we are dealing.
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In addition, we have as a legislature imposed on certain authorities, agencies and businesses a requirement to satisfy themselves as to the identity of people for certain purposes, something to which we might return. The example that immediately comes to mind is legislation to prevent money laundering by imposing requirements on banks to identify people who want to open bank accounts and conduct transactions through them. That received supported from hon. Members on both sides of the House.
This part of the Bill does exactly what it says on the tin, as it were. It would provide a convenient method for people to prove whatever registrable facts needed to be proved in those circumstances, depending on their relationship. To answer the hon. Gentleman's question directly, that would depend on the degree to which, in their private or commercial relationships, a person was prepared to accede to the requirements made of them. That is what this is about and that is the situation in which we currently live.
Mr. Allan: The Minister has helpfully picked up a good example of where a change could be made: the anti-money laundering legislation. If the card is to be genuinely voluntary, an individual opening a bank account would have to be able to use either the card or some other form of documentation. If, at some point, through regulation or case law, the Government made it clear that banks would not be safe from anti-money laundering measures unless they demanded the ID card, the cards would suddenly become compulsory rather than voluntary. Many of us do not think that we have had sufficient assurances on such concerns.
Mr. Browne: I do not know how many assurances the hon. Gentleman needs. The Bill would not give the police additional powers to require registrable facts or identity cards. I have said that repeatedly in and out of the House, and repeatedly Liberal Democrat Members say that it would.
There is nothing in the Bill that would allow that sort of compulsion on banks or anyone else.However, if the Government wanted to persuade Parliament that, for the security of the movement of money or for other reasons to do with organised crime, it was necessary to compel banks or other financial agencies to require people to prove their identities at a particular level, Parliament would have to debate that, and the reasons that the Government had put forward, and make its decision.
I have said repeatedly that the Bill is about giving people the opportunity to prove their identities to the highest possible standard for their own security and for the protection of their liberties. The second provision under clause 3(1), which we shall come to, is about providing an opportunity for public services to check the identity of the person to whom they provide services, should they choose to do so. However, that of itself would require legislation to be passed by Parliament.
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Mr. Malins: The Minister tells us that the Bill would give no extra powers to the police. I shall ask him a specific question. Under clause 1(3)(b), the register would help to provide other people with information when that was
''necessary in the public interest.''
Under subsection (4)(b), something would be necessary in the public interest if it were
''for the purposes of the prevention . . . of crime''.
Does that not mean that, if they deemed it to be for the prevention of crime, the police would be given powers to access 51 registrable facts about an individual, to which they did not have access before? Would they not have more powers to access information?
Mr. Browne: To that extent, the hon. Gentleman is right, and we shall come to the detail of that. There would be limited circumstances in which the police could access the information on the national register—the database—to ascertain a person's identity. However, as for the relationship of police powers to the individual, the police would not be able to ascertain the identity of the individual in any circumstances other than those in which they are entitled to do so now, under legislation passed by Parliament. All the police could do would be to use that different method of fulfilling a power that they already have. [Interruption.] The hon. Member for Newark makes a semantic argument about whether allowing the police to do that with certainty would increase their powers, even though they are allowed to do it in any event. Presumably, they are expected to do it with some certainty under the current powers.
On the amendment, which has become somewhat secondary to the debate, its aim is to ensure that no one is asked to produce an identity card unreasonably. I can tell the hon. Member for Newark, and anyone who intends to support the amendment, that there is no reason for concern on that point. There is already a safeguard in clause 18 to ensure that no one can be required to produce an ID card as the only method of proving identity in any private transaction until it has become a requirement to register and be issued with an ID card. That, to some degree, answers the hon. Gentleman's question about timing, which I tried to answer earlier.
Once it becomes a requirement to register and to hold an ID card, it will—as I have repeatedly said—surely be a matter for personal judgment rather than Government regulation as to whether an individual decides it is reasonable, given the circumstances, to be asked to produce the card. The words suggested by the hon. Gentleman would, in any event, be difficult to enforce. In the case of private transactions, the provision could only be enforced by the individuals themselves. If it cannot be enforced externally, there is little point in including it. In any event, people will behave in a certain way, in my experience.
Mr. Allan: I am grateful for that clarification. Am I correct in taking the Minister's reference to clause 18 to mean that, until it becomes compulsory to register for an ID card, Parliament could not pass, for example, a money laundering regulation requiring
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banks to demand ID cards? In other words, does the interaction of the clauses mean that that would not be possible until the cards become compulsory, because clause 18 prohibits it?
Mr. Browne: The hon. Gentleman is quite right in that as long as clause 18 exists in law, no one can be required to produce an ID card as the only method of proving identity in any private sector transaction.
We are getting into arguments to do with the powers of Parliament. We all know that Parliament can pass primary legislation. The point is whether the Bill empowers people to demand to see an ID card, and it does not. However, I cannot say—no Member of Parliament ever can—that Parliament will not in any circumstances ever pass legislation saying the contrary. That is another assurance that people are constantly asked to give in this context, but it is a nonsense of an assurance. It cannot be given, and everybody knows that. This Parliament cannot bind its successors.
Under the scheme we are considering, our intention, and the specific legislative provision, is that no one can ask for the card as the only method of establishing identity until the card becomes compulsory. That will be prohibited.
Patrick Mercer: May I be clear about what the Minister said? Recognising all the points that he so eloquently made about lack of compulsion, is he saying that the current system for commercial transactions, which uses code words and passwords—we will all have to remember a series of them—is likely, on a voluntary basis, to give way, as the system evolves, to the use of the registrable number, and indeed the card when it comes into place? Is that how the Minister sees things developing?
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