---

Identity Documents Bill

My Lords, the other two amendments in this group, Amendments 14 and 16, are in my name. I reiterate what my noble friend said about the noble Earl, Lord Erroll, who has put his name to both my amendments. The purpose of Amendment 14 is to get on record—this may help those who have to interpret the statute—an explanation of the difference between Clause 6(1)(a), which my amendment would delete, and Clause 4(1)(a). If the Minister could explain the intended difference between the offences laid out in those two paragraphs, that would be extremely helpful, as they are close in wording, albeit with different conditions. Amendment 14 is truly a probing amendment. Amendment 16 relates to Clause 8, which is headed, ““Meaning of ‘personal information’””. The phrase ““personal information”” is used in Clauses 4 and 5. My amendment seeks to clarify paragraph (l) of Clause 8(1). I ask the Committee to humour my error in framing the amendment. Its first word, ““or””, is redundant and my amendment should therefore read, "““in relation to any identity documents””." The paragraph, as it stands, refers only to ““documents””, not ““identity documents””, which my amendment does. The term ““identity document”” is defined in Clause 7, but I am concerned that the paragraph could refer to, for example, a rating return, a television licence or any one of many other documents which identify the person to whom they relate and which contain numbers allocated to person A. I should be grateful if the Minister could say whether I am right or wrong in seeking to confine the personal information defined in paragraph (l) to that which relates only to identity documents, as defined in Clause 7.