Baroness Scotland of Asthal: I reassure the noble Lord, Lord Peyton of Yeovil, that this is a Home Office Bill. I know that he always desires to have my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor by my side, but, on this one, to put it colloquially, I am sailing or flying solo. I am quite happy to carry that burden and the noble Lord should not feel that it is too great for me.

Clause 4 provides a mechanism for individuals to apply for an ID card. I know that the noble Lord, Lord Phillips of Sudbury, is antipathetic to the Bill. I know that his party would prefer the Bill not to exist. I know that he would prefer there not to be ID cards. They have been a major part of the Government's agenda for some time. As I said earlier, we have been dealing with the issue, Clause 4 being an integral part of that agenda, since 2001–02. We have been open about the policy. Indeed, the Committee will well remember that it was very much part of the case that was put to the country, with which the public seem to be in tune and which they support, not least by virtue of the fact that they voted with their hearts and their judgment by returning this Government.

Clause 4 is key to delivery of the identity cards scheme, because it provides a mechanism by which individuals can be brought into the scheme. An application for a designated document will, in effect, trigger an application for an ID card. The issuing procedures are set out in detail in Clause 8, but the designation of the document must precede any of those procedures where the ID card is issued together with, or as part of, the designated document. So a standalone card could be issued by the Secretary of State under Clause 8 without any documents being designated.

6 pm

The advantages of proceeding like this are that there are already established processes for issuing documents like passports and residence permits, which will form the basis of the work of the ID cards delivery agency. We know already that biometric data will have to be included on our passports next year, albeit that, first, the facial identifiers will primarily be used. So biometric passports are coming anyway. Rollout will be incremental as people come to apply for or renew documents or, in the case of foreign nationals, arrive to stay in the United Kingdom for more than three months. The problems associated with dealing with this introduction in any other way can be minimised by good management. This will allow us to manage it well.

As I have indicated already, we intend to provide the facility for people to apply for standalone ID cards if they do not need or want a passport—some people do not want to travel anywhere other than Europe and,
 
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therefore, would prefer to have an ID card—or if they have received a passport shortly before the scheme starts and would like an ID card as a convenient way of proving identity.

It is important to bear in mind that the Bill does not designate any documents. It gives the power to designate documents by order—a process which requires approval from both Houses subject to affirmative resolution procedure. It is also important that the only documents that can be designated are those which are issued with statutory authority or which a Minister of the Crown or Northern Ireland department is authorised or required to issue. Of course, I hear what the noble Lord, Lord Phillips of Sudbury, says in relation to the Law Society and others which have been designated.

Indeed, the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee has commented in its report on the Bill that the power to designate documents which are issued under a statutory power, but not by Ministers, is potentially very wide—a point that was also made by the noble Lord, Lord Phillips. If we limit the power to documents issued by Ministers, we would not be able to designate documents such as firearms certificates issued by chief officers of police or documents issued under a statutory power by a private agency. Having said that, I must make it clear that we have no current intention to designate those documents and we are giving very careful consideration to whether we should limit the power of designation as suggested by the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee.

I have been as clear as I can in speaking to the amendments in relation to Clause 4 so that I can assist the Committee to understand the ambit of the designated documents about which we are directly speaking. With that, I hope that Members of the Committee will feel content to allow this clause to stand part of the Bill. We will give careful consideration to the comments made by the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee.

The Earl of Onslow: The noble Baroness gave a wonderful Freudian slip. She listed a number of documents and said, "We have absolutely no power of designating them". But then she takes the power to designate them. Those of us on this side of the House who care about civil liberties find that desperately frightening and unattractive. I wish that the Government could understand that.

When the noble Baroness says that the electorate elected her, of course that is right; I do not mean the noble Baroness, nor me—but I draw her attention to the fact that I have slightly more electors than she does, arcane though they may be. I am dredging a quotation up from the back of my mind, which goes, "Those who ring the bells will wring their hands later". That is what I suspect will happen with the public over this Bill. This Government will not be here to reap the whirlwind or whatever you do from dragon's teeth. I am afraid that all one can say is that.

Lord Phillips of Sudbury: I am grateful to the noble Baroness. I am mildly pleased that the Government
 
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will consider the recommendations of the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee, which could be helpful. There is obviously a very big debate, which I tried not to have, so I will not be provoked by the noble Baroness's remarks on the manifesto commitments and all that. However, I cannot resist touching on her reference to firearms certificates. Of course, a wonderful example of a catatonic failure—if one could call it that—is the failure over many years to have a national register that gives details of all firearms certificates. If we cannot manage that—a few tens of thousands of certificates—one begins to reasonably wonder how on earth we can manage this uniquely gargantuan central state register.

The noble Baroness made a good point about passports. Why in heaven's name can we not be done with 85 per cent of the population holding passports and the other 15 per cent, if they want, having a document that carries the same information as passports and that is it? There would be no need for a central register or for £20 billion of expenditure and we would all be happy.

Clause 4 agreed to.

Clause 5 [Applications relating to entries in Register]:

[Amendment No. 103 not moved.]

[Amendment No. 104 had been withdrawn from the Marshalled List.]

The Earl of Northesk moved Amendment No. 105:

Page 5, line 19, leave out paragraph (a).

The noble Earl said: In moving Amendment No. 105, I shall speak also to Amendments Nos. 106, 168, 169 and 170. We return to the vexed issue of "convenience", which provoked a fair amount of discussion on our first day in Committee. Amendments Nos. 105 and 169 propose the deletion of the words,

"to attend at a specified place and time",

from Clauses 5 and 12 respectively. In our earlier debates, it was established via the text in Clause 1(3)(a) that the national identity register and its associated ID cards are intended to provide a convenient method whereby individuals can prove their identity. As the Minister commented, the utility of the word "convenient" is that:

"It can be used as a template or mirror against which many of the provisions will be viewed".—[Official Report, 15/11/05; col. 1059.]

If that is tested against the possible requirement for an individual,

"to attend at a specified place and time",

in order to submit his details for entry on the register, inconvenience rather than convenience comes to mind.

We all lead increasingly busy lives. Individuals have lifestyle commitments, both work-related and leisure-related, which are not always easy to work around. An obvious example would be night-shift workers. Accordingly, the current drafting implies an overly prescriptive and burdensome obligation, both physically and financially. The wider context of that is important. The manifesto states unequivocally that it is the intention
 
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that the scheme should be voluntary—at least initially. Up to a point that has been the Government's chosen mechanism for achieving public acceptance of it. But if individuals are effectively to be dragooned to turn up at an enrolment centre in a place and at a time that may be inconvenient, resentment towards the scheme could surface very quickly, which is an outcome that I am sure the Government would rather avoid.

My other amendments in the group all pursue the same theme. They aim to make it plain that the enrolment and updating processes should be designed for the convenience of the applicant for an ID card rather than for the convenience of the Government. Amendments Nos. 106 and 170 seek to insert the words printed on the Marshalled List, so that the paragraph would read,

"to attend at his convenience at a specified place and time".

Amendment No. 168 proposes that notification of changes to an individual's registrable facts on the database should be made within "a reasonable" rather than "the prescribed" period. Perhaps, ideally, the "prescribed" period—say, 30 days—should be explicitly stated in the Bill.

Nevertheless, there is a thematic point to be made. As already observed, the Government intend the scheme to be convenient for the individual. That being so, arbitrary time limits to circumscribe individual behaviour are inappropriate, the more so because of the stiff penalties for non-compliance. In those circumstances, notifications by individuals within a reasonable period would be proportionate.

I would be grateful too if, when she comes to reply, the Minister clarifies the Government's current thinking on the enrolment process. For example, is it intended that there will be dedicated enrolment centres? If so, how many? What would be their opening times? Would any of them be mobile to serve rural communities? As she commented on our first day, the word "convenient",

"emphasises the kind of value that we wish to add to these provisions".—[Official Report, 15/11/05; col. 1055.]

This implies that the Government are well seized of the necessity of ensuring that the interface between the national identity register and individual citizens should have adequate levels of flexibility to afford those applying for an ID card with appropriate degrees of convenience. I hope very much, therefore, that the Minister is in a position to demonstrate that such "added value" is at the forefront of the Government's mind so far as concerns the enrolment process. I beg to move.