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Identity Cards Bill

Why are Clauses 6 and 7 in the Bill? A sensible and, dare I say, honest government who were introducing a national identity scheme would want to see how it progressed. They would introduce it, perhaps on a voluntary basis, and after a period, if it proved to be successful and popular, they might consider that it should become compulsory. My noble friend talked about a mandate; let us move on a few years. After the nightmare that the Bill will cause in the next two or three years as people are required to put their names on the register if they want a passport, a driving licence or something of that nature, and the costs and the difficulties become apparent, can you imagine the Labour Party going into the next election saying, ““We want a mandate for the national identity register to become compulsory””? As the noble Lord, Lord Crickhowell, pointed out, it would be its ““poll tax””. It would not conceivably have an opportunity of winning an election if it was campaigning at the next election to bring in a compulsory register. So what do the Government do? They put it in the Bill by some trick mechanism that has been invented to try to satisfy your Lordships that we will have some power to prevent it.