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Mr. Browne: The reassurances that the hon. Member for Woking requires of me are grossly premature in respect of the process. The clause comes into effect in terms of compulsion only if there has been a super-affirmative process, including the debating of the Government report by Parliament, and a super-affirmative order. In that context, there will be plenty of opportunity for the Government to explain to Parliament exactly how they are going to move from the non-compulsory stage to the compulsory stage. The groups affected and the timetable will have to be specified in the order, which will be fully debated before Parliament.
The super-affirmative process in clause 7 will ensure that a report is published and debated and made before the order itself. Depending on who is affected by the order, the Government will be required to take all reasonable steps to ensure that they are aware of the obligation. I am not therefore in a position now to answer the hon. Gentleman's question about days and time, but I am sure that he understands why. All of this will have to be dealt with in significant detail before Parliament agrees to move to compulsion. I have more sympathy with the other point that he made.
Mr. Malins: It is disappointing to be told that discussing problem issues in the Bill is premature. If the Minister accepts that there are problem issues, they should be attended to now. I do not see how a debate by Parliament in due course can or will cover the issues that I have raised—namely, the issue of without reasonable excuse, which should be in the Bill, but also that of those classes of people who, given the Bill as it stands, would offend when, in truth, no reasonable person would think that they had.
4 pm
Mr. Browne: I apologise to the hon. Gentleman if I have inadvertently misled him. I was responding to his request for details of the time scale. I am sure that he is reassured that that was premature and will have to be debated in some detail before a step can be made towards compulsion.
The hon. Gentleman rightly identifies that I have some sympathy with the other point he made. I appreciate that Members seek to raise concerns by way of amendment and of expansion on that. First, however, it would not be feasible to require the Secretary of State, before imposing a penalty, to satisfy himself that someone who had breached a requirement did so intentionally or without reasonable excuse. In practice, these penalties will be imposed in a unilateral exercise of discretion, not subsequent to some kind of hearing.
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There are two aspects of the scheme that soften the apparently strict liabilities of the penalties. First, the Secretary of State is under no obligation to impose a penalty for every breach. He has discretion as to whether a penalty should be imposed. He will, of course, exercise his discretion reasonably and as required to do so by public law. That would mean, if he was aware of a reasonable excuse for breaching an obligation, that a penalty would not be imposed.
Secondly, the objection stage would be open to a person to raise reasonable excuses. The Secretary of State would take such excuses into account and has the power to cancel or reduce penalties. The hon. Members tabling this amendment—which would introduce the qualification of ''without reasonable excuse''—seek something similar in amendment No. 117, which adds the fault element of ''intentionally'' to the civil penalties in clause 12.
I recognise that the answer thus far may not completely reassure those hon. Members, but I am aware of their optimism. I undertake to consider whether there are ways in which it can be made clear in the Bill that the Secretary of State must take into account—I quote—''reasonable excuses'' at the objection and appeal stage. I should stress, however, that such an amendment would relate to grounds of objection and of appeal. As I explained, such a requirement would not be practical at the stage at which the civil penalties are imposed. I hope that that reassures the hon. Gentlemen and allows them not to press the amendment.
Patrick Mercer: I am grateful to the Minister for his explanation. I think that my hon. Friends and I are more reassured by what he said. We will be interested to hear what comes up in clause 12 under amendment No. 117. In the light of that, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
The Chairman: May I say that, for the convenience of the Committee, I intend to suspend the Committee for a comfort break of 20 minutes at about 5 pm?
Mr. Malins: I beg to move amendment No. 130, in clause 6, page 5, line 36, leave out 'civil'.
The Chairman: With this it will be convenient to discuss the following amendments: No. 34, in clause 6, page 5, line 36, leave out '£2,500' and insert '£1,000'.
No. 82, in clause 6, page 5, line 36, leave out '£2500' and insert '£50'.
No. 35, in clause 6, page 5, line 40, leave out '£1,000' and insert '£500'.
No. 83, in clause 6, page 5, line 40, leave out '£1000' and insert '£50'.
No. 37, in clause 6, page 5, line 41, leave out subsection (6).
No. 131, in clause 6, page 5, line 44, leave out 'civil'.
No. 36, in clause 6, page 5, line 44, leave out '£2,500' and insert '£1,000'.
No. 84, in clause 6, page 5, line 44, leave out '£2,500' and insert '£50'.
No. 165, in clause 6, page 6, line 3, at end add—
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'(7) Unreasonable failure to comply with a request of the Secretary of State under this section shall be a summary offence to be heard before a magistrates' court with an appeal against a finding of guilt to the Crown Court.'.
Mr. Malins: Clause 6 is important in the Bill, because, apart from setting out obligations on individuals, it provides for individuals to be subject to a civil penalty for failure to comply.
The lead amendment is No. 130. It concerns ''civil penalty'' and would omit the word ''civil''. I am sure that the Minister will have been briefed fully that there is a particular reason why I want to omit the word ''civil''. I hope that I would have thought of it anyway, but the matter was drawn to my attention by one of those who briefed me on the Bill a little while ago. The Bill refers to a civil, not criminal, penalty. Frankly, a person in receipt of such a penalty will probably regard it very much as criminal, not civil. To most normal people, ''civil'' means something like a county court judgment for a debt, but when the state—usually through the Crown—imposes a financial penalty by way of a fine, we are much more inclined to think that it is a criminal penalty. Indeed, in most people's minds, civil penalties are akin to a fine.
Mr. Allan: The hon. Gentleman believes that a civil penalty is one that is written in moderate and polite tones, rather like the manner in which he speaks.
Mr. Malins: It is terribly kind of the hon. Gentleman to say that.
We are guided towards the Human Rights Act 1998. The Minister will know what point I am about to make. For the purposes of article 6 of the European convention on human rights—the right to a fair trial—the penalty might be considered criminal rather than civil, regardless of the label attached by the Government. European Court of Human Rights jurisprudence has established that
''for Article 6 to be held applicable, it suffices that the offence in question is by its nature to be regarded as 'criminal' from the point of view of the Convention, or that the offence made the person liable to a sanction, which, by its nature and degree of severity, belongs in general to the 'criminal' sphere''.
The sanction, by its nature and severity, would be regarded by most right-thinking people as belonging very much in the criminal sphere rather than the civil sphere. Clause 6 will apply not only to the person who absolutely refuses to have an identity card, but to anyone who does not take the chance to apply when the voluntary window of opportunity is open to them. It might also apply to individuals who have already volunteered, but fall into a designated class, based on age or status. It is well argued that the Government should reconsider the introduction of such a harsh and arbitrary penalty system and call it at the same time a civil penalty.
There are parallels in relation to civil penalties that I should be grateful for the Minister to deal with when he responds to what I hope will be a full debate. For example, I think that the Immigration (Carriers' Liability) Act 1987 has a parallel so-called civil penalty. I am now coming on to penalties and the volume of the penalties and, if the Minister could be given guidance—if not today, but during the next few
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days—I should be interested to know what total sums have been imposed by way of penalties under that Act? What total sums have been received under that Act? What sums have so far been written off?
I wish to suggest to the Minister another aspect of the use of the word ''civil''. As was pointed out to me by the group Justice, it might be sensible to remove the notion of civil penalty for non-compliance and replace it with an offence of non-compliance, with a Secretary of State's order, punishable, say, by a fine enforceable by means other than imprisonment, but levied only after a hearing before a magistrate and subject to an appeal to the Crown court. I do not support that proposition, but I put it to the Minister in the spirit of our debate on penalties.
Having dealt with why I seek to remove the word ''civil''—principally because of the Human Rights Act—I move on to deal with amendment No. 34 and subsequent amendments in this group. Without going through the amendments in detail, I am seeking, by way of probing amendments, to have the £2,500 penalty, which to most of us would be a fine, reduced to a maximum of £1,000. I am also seeking to have the £1,000 penalty on someone who makes an application and is required to attend and give biometrics but does not do so reduced to £500. In short, I am seeking a dramatic reduction in the penalties to be imposed. Amendment No. 37 makes the same point with regard to repeat penalties, which can be imposed by the Secretary of State under this clause.
We need to be realistic and consider the level of the penalties—£2,500 for the more serious, and £1,000 for the less serious. Realism involves examining the group of people in society who are most likely to fail through one reason or another and be subject to the penalties. Who will it be that day after day will walk into the magistrates and stipendiary courts in London to answer a summons or charge? A combination of the poor, the vulnerable and the dispossessed—those who lack some basic abilities in life that would otherwise enable them to get a paid job and live a life of comfort—will most likely be subject to the kind of failures that will bring them to court. They will fall victim to this penalty.
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