Identity Cards Bill
10:30 am
Tony McNulty (Minister of State (Immigration, Citizenship and Nationality), Home Office; Harrow East, Labour)
I beg to move,
That—
(1)during proceedings on the Identity Cards Bill the Standing Committee shall (in addition to its first meeting at 10.30 a.m. on Tuesday 5th July) meet—
(a)at 4.30 p.m. on Wednesday 6th July;
(b)at 9.15 a.m. and 1.00 p.m. on Thursday 7th July;
(c)at 10.30 a.m. and 4.00 p.m. on Tuesday 12th July;
(d)at 9.15 a.m. and 1.00 p.m. on Thursday 14th July;
(e)at 10.30 a.m. and 4.00 p.m. on Tuesday 19th July;
(2)the proceedings shall be taken in the following order, namely, Clauses 1 to 3, Schedule 1, Clauses 4 to 45, Schedule 2, new Clauses, new Schedules, remaining proceedings on the Bill;
(3)the proceedings shall (so far as not previously concluded) be brought to a conclusion at 7.00 p.m. on Tuesday 19th July.
I welcome you to the Chair, Mr. Gale, and I am sure that our deliberations under your chairmanship and that of Mr. Hood will be fair, completely impartial and dispatched in a convivial manner. I hope, too, that our debates will be convivial and temperate. Without remotely trying to seem patronising, I ask new hon. Members on both sides of the Committee to reserve rhetorical flourishes, brouhaha and knockabout for the Chamber downstairs. We have serious business afoot in the Room, and I am sure we shall dispatch it in good order.
I welcome the hon. and learned Member for Harborough (Mr. Garnier), who sits on the Opposition Front Bench with the hon. Member for Newark (Patrick Mercer), to whom—misquoting Bevin, I think—I wish to say, “It’s déjà vu all over again”. The hon. Gentleman and others were members of the Committee that discussed the previous Bill, so we ask their forbearance as this is essentially the same Bill that was before the House then. Some drafting changes have been made and I shall make available to the Committee a brief summary of the distinctions between the Bill as it is now and what it was last time we discussed it.
I welcome the northern wing of the Liberal Democrat party—the hon. Members for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Carmichael) and for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Tim Farron)—to the Committee. They will have a journey to travel, especially on Thursdays, so we shall try to dispatch our proceedings on that day in good order for them.
The programme motion was agreed by the Programming Sub-Committee, and our sittings on Thursdays will start at 9.15 am, not 9 o’clock. We consider that to be fine. The motion provides for 10 sittings and an out date of Tuesday 19 July. The Bill has not received excessive scrutiny—there is no such thing—but it has received plenty of scrutiny at various stages. We have deliberately avoided introducing knives and having a segmented debate, but, as I have been told by my Whip, and as an ex-Whip I listen to her, we reserve the right to introduce them should progress not be as forthcoming as we want. I hope that we shall progress without them. I offer the motion agreed in the Programming Sub-Committee in all humility and look forward to our deliberations.