Government defeated again over Identity Cards

3.01.00pm GMT Tue 21st Mar 2006

UK National Identity Card (Design Mock-up)

The Government was yet again been defeated in the House of Lords on its plans to make Identity Cards compulsory. Ministers propose that anyone getting a passport from 2008 should have to get an ID card and have their biometric details added to the national identity database. Peers voted by 211 to 175 votes, a majority of 36, to keep the ID card scheme voluntary until the next decade, a compromise tabled by Liberal Democrat peer Lord Philips of Sudbury under which holders of passports would be added to the register from 2011 enabling the controversial issue to be debated in the next General Election.