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Identity Cards

The hon. Lady has not been present for the whole debate, so if she will excuse me I shall not, because we have very little time left. The Home Secretary revealed the hollowness at the heart of his argument when he said that the scheme had always been intended to be voluntary, but those of us who sat through the debates do not quite remember it like that: it was clearly a scheme that the Government always intended to make compulsory. The legislation states that there has to be another vote for it to be made compulsory, but the provision is in the legislation and it was always clearly the Government's intention to move to compulsion. That was one of the last things that made it logical. What is completely illogical is the Government's position since last week. They have tried to pretend that the scheme was always meant to be voluntary, but none of its so-called benefits applies if it is to be voluntary. The Home Secretary has blown a hole in the centre of the arguments that successive Labour Prime Ministers and Home Secretaries have made. The previous Prime Minister talked about ID cards being""an essential way of tackling illegal migration and crime".—[Official Report, 18 January 2006; Vol. 441, c. 833.]" The right hon. Member for Sheffield, Brightside (Mr. Blunkett), when he was Home Secretary, talked about ID cards making "our borders more secure" And his successor but one, the right hon. Member for Airdrie and Shotts (John Reid), described identity cards as "central to measures to prevent illegal working". All sorts of claims have been made—none of which can be credibly made about the current system.