Identity Cards
12th Dec. 2004

John Robertson (Glasgow, Anniesland) (Lab): Much of what I wanted to say has already been said, but I have been taking notes, and I may be able to shed some light on the comments of others.

My hon. Friend the Member for Walthamstow (Mr. Gerrard) made great play of what would happen in the event of corrupt information or input errors. In effect, he said “Don’t do it: there should not be any kind of ID card.” If we followed his argument to its logical conclusion, however, we would not do anything about anything.

John Barrett: Surely it is not a question of not doing anything; it is a question of using the expected £3 billion cost of the scheme more effectively by improving security services and policing, for instance.

John Robertson: The hon. Gentleman seems to assume that someone can be picked up from the street and put on the beat tomorrow. That is not going to happen. The Government have brought the country to a point at which unemployment is at its lowest for 30 years, and we have almost full employment. Now the hon. Gentleman wants to put 10,000 or 20,000 policemen on the beat tomorrow. He must get real, and start to come down to planet earth from wherever he is at the moment.

The hon. Member for Cheadle (Mrs. Calton) made a great case about how my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary had said that the ID card would be the panacea for all ills, but not only did she misquote him, she deliberately misinterpreted what my right hon. Friend said. He was trying to say that ID cards will help, and that anything that can help to solve security problems or the problem of people with a lack of identity will go a long way to making people feel a lot safer.

We had a similar debate years ago on CCTV. It was said that that would be an infringement of people’s rights and that people would be spied upon while walking down the street. Now we are hearing the same arguments about ID cards. A year ago I took part in a radio discussion on CCTV, during which people demanded CCTV for their communities, and people will be demanding ID cards as well.

Andrew Bennett: Could my hon. Friend, with his enthusiasm for CCTV, just remind us how often we hear that, when a particular crime has been committed, the CCTV was not working?

John Robertson: My hon. Friend obviously has more information than I do on such matters. I can talk only of Glasgow whose city centre is the safest place to go on a Friday or Saturday night. Could that be because people feel that it is safe to walk about there? That is a city that was once known as “No mean city”. One can now walk about safely and enjoy a night’s revelling, or whatever else one might want to do.

Richard Younger-Ross (Teignbridge) (LD): The hon. Gentleman makes a good point about CCTV being very effective in reducing crime in city centres, but one of the problems that I have in my constituency is that there is not enough money to put CCTV in some of the other towns, such as Teignmouth and Dawlish. Would this £3 billion not be better spent on expanding the CCTV scheme?

John Robertson: The hon. Gentleman makes a valid point, with which I am inclined to have sympathy. But if we are considering the general good of the nation, not just England as the Opposition Front-Bench spokesman did earlier, and what will make people feel secure, ID cards will go a long way to doing that.

Great play has been made of the fact that having an ID card will not stop a terrorist, and that is a fair point. But there are people who committed terrorist acts in Spain who will not be able to do so again, because, thanks to ID cards, they are now in prison there. If that is the case, and we are under increasing threat here, what is the problem with ID cards?

I took part in a radio discussion on ID cards with the hon. Member for Angus (Mr. Weir), and a lady from the west of Scotland asked what was the problem with them. The compère started to tell her about their infringement of her rights, and that they would carry a lot of information about her, some of which she might not want others to know. She replied that she had a bus pass in her hand with her picture and name on, so those issuing the pass knew all about her, and they also knew when she took the bus because the pass told them so.

My hon. Friend the Member for Walthamstow (Mr. Gerrard) and the hon. Member for Edinburgh, West (John Barrett) were worried about the state knowing too much about them, but if my hon. Friend completes a form to obtain a loyalty card or a credit card, he will find that he will start to receive unsolicited e-mails because the information that he has provided will have been shared with others. There is more known about us than we think, and I would much rather the state had that information and was working for me instead of against me.

ID cards will help to tackle illegal working. Abuse of the immigration system is something that colleagues who encounter many asylum seekers, as I do, will know about. Glasgow is the only city in Scotland that hosts asylum seekers, so we know quite a bit about them up our way. While I try to help every single asylum seeker who comes to my surgery-I can assure the House that I see quite a lot of them-I can tell which ones are trying to pull the wool over my eyes. An ID card from wherever they entered the European Union might not be a bad thing. Indeed, when the Immigration and Asylum Act 1999 was introduced, some of us talked about having to introduce tests whose results could be included on cards when people enter a country.

I hope that the whole of Europe will take on what we are going to start to do here today, and in a big way. I hope that we will show the way to other countries. In that way, there will be a proper ID system. Not taking such action just because somebody else does not take it, however, is not the answer. It has to start somewhere, so why should it not start in this country? Why should we not protect our people to the best of our ability?

I do not think that that should depend on the money, although I still have my fears as a champion of my pensioners, of whom I represent more than my fair share-about 18,000 in an electorate of 52,000. These people cannot afford to pay £84 for a card. My right hon. Friend the Home Secretary said that he was willing to listen, and my plea to him is that he should ensure that pensioners do not pay that sort of money.

I say to my hon. Friend the Minister that I have some sympathy with what has been said by some Opposition Members about the amount of time that is being given to the Bill. Will he take a look at the Committee stage and feel free to increase the time by as much as he wants?

I hope that the House will support identity cards.

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