EU: Maastricht and ID cards
01 May 1992
The meeting of the new Committee on Civil Liberties and Internal Affairs of the European Parliament (EP) on 3 March criticised the Maastricht agreement because it gave the EP virtually no new powers. The committee resolution said that important decisions on asylum and immigration policy and combatting crime were being left to "bodies which in fact can skirt national or European parliamentary control and, above all, sanctions". Mr Bangemann, for the European Commission, told the Committee that it was not trying to force the UK to adopt identity cards. This contrasts with Mr Bangemann's warning in February that the UK could face legal action by citizens if it continued to make border control checks - with the implication that the UK would have to find other means, i.e. identity card checks inside the country. It contrasts too with a speech given by Sir Leon Brittan, Vice- President of the European Commission, to Bramshill Police Training College last year in which he suggested it would be a simple step for the UK to introduce optional identity cards.
Reuters Textline/Agence Europe 3.3.92; Guardian 26.2.92; Independent 3.11.91.