November 30, 2004: National Compulsory Identity Cards

The Government published its Identity Cards Bill yesterday. Consultation has been undertaken with a range of community organisations and refugee organisations to ensure that the final legislation responds to concerns, and complies with the Race Relations (Amendment) Act 2000 requirement to eliminate unlawful discrimination, promote equality of opportunity and promote good relations between people from different backgrounds.

The Home Secretary announced the Government’s intention to introduce a compulsory national identity cards scheme on 11 November 2003, when the Home Office also published a summary of the proposals, Identity Cards: The Next Steps.

According to Home Office Minister Fiona Mactaggart, speaking yesterday:

"The identity cards scheme will… provide a ‘gold standard’ to protect everyone’s identity… ID cards will also help to tackle illegal immigration and immigration abuse such as people trafficking, which wrecks lives and damages families.We are proposing:

• to extend the remit of the National Identity Scheme Commissioner to cover oversight of the whole scheme, not just issues relating to provision of information from the Register;
• to remove the bar to an individual’s information contained in the access records of the Register being made available to that registered individual;
• to extend the prohibition on requirements to produce identity cards for services so that neither production of an ID card nor a check would be lawful before Parliament agreed the necessary regulations. The absolute prohibition on making it compulsory to carry a card at all times remains;
• to amend the false documents offence in the Bill so that it does not include those who knowingly use false documentation to enter the UK to apply for asylum."

The Identity Cards Bill is available here. The Race Equality Impact Assessment of the Bill is available here.