---

Welfare Reform Bill

The Minister is right to say that this represents a concession on the part of the Opposition parties, which understandably had grave reservations about allowing officials to have the power to withdraw passports, rather than it being done through a judicial process. I have to say that those reservations remain, but at least we now have the promise of a review after two years, at which point the matter will return to the House. I hope that whichever Government are in power at the time will take seriously the lessons learned from that process and be willing to conclude that doing this through officials rather than through the courts is not the way to proceed, if the evidence suggests that that is the case. I hope that the pilot will be undertaken with an open mind, and a willingness to accept the argument, to which we still hold, that judicial protection for these important civil liberties should remain enshrined in practice. On the changes in regard to birth registration, I know that my hon. Friend the Member for Rochdale (Paul Rowen), who is unable to be here this evening, has taken a close interest in that issue and sought to persuade Ministers to re-examine it. I therefore welcome the fact that their lordships have tabled amendments to reflect the fact that joint registration can raise concerns, albeit in a small minority of cases, and that issues of domestic violence, among others, mean that the provisions need to be looked at again. I welcome the fact that the other place has sought to amend the Bill to take some of those concerns into account, and the amendments therefore have our support.