London, June 29 (IANS) The British parliament’s public bills committee Tuesday meets for the first time to consider the new coalition government’s proposal to abolish the controversial Identity Cards for all citizens and the National Identity Register.
The Cameron-Clegg government had earlier this month introduced a pubic bill to repeal the Identity Cards Act 2006, which provides the legal framework required to establish a National Identity Register and to issue Identity Cards to those on the Register.
The Act, brought in by the Labour government, had created a pubic furore over intrusion into privacy and possible misuse of people’s personal data if the Register were to fall in wrong hands, according to the parliament website.
The public bill committee, thereafter, called for evidence to consider the government bill.
Written evidence gathered from the pubic will be put before the committee at its first sitting. It has to complete its consideration by July 8 and submit its recommendations.
Home secretary Theresa May has said fewer than 15 million people had an ID card already, and she would write to them to inform them of the change the new bill proposes.
Once the bill receives Royal Assent, ID cards will no longer function as proof of identity within one month. In two months, the national identity register will cease to exist.
However, the biometric ID cards will remain for foreign nationals coming to Britain, as will the National Biometric Identity Service (NBIS), which retains the biometric details of non-EU migrants living in the country.
The reason is that the biometric residency permit for non-EU nationals is in fact an EU law, and not related to ID cards legislation.
At the time of the introduction of the new bill, home secretary May said: ‘It is un-British. We are a freedom-loving people. It’s a discomfort born of a very British revulsion of an over-intrusive government. I pay tribute to all those who campaigned so hard against the introduction of ID cards.’
(Venkata Vemuri can be contacted at venkata.v@ians.in)
