Clegg: “Deciding Who Can Stay In The UK After Brexit Will Require ID Cards”

The former deputy Prime Minister told Iain Dale that leaving the EU will produce a huge amount of red tape to determine who can stay and who can’t.

Mr Clegg suggested that the government would end up producing something similar to ID cards, which he and David Davis successfully blocked against when the last Labour government tried to introduce them.

“We were always told that leaving the EU would free us of lots of red tape, but it will take, in my view, a monstrous amount of red tape to institute the decisions we’ve taken.”

Iain suggested it could be done quite simply; just stamp people’s passports as happens in other countries.

Mr Clegg insisted it would never be that simple and that the Home Office would create a huge amount of red tape around it.

He gave an example of one of his constituents in Sheffield who had to fill out an 85-page form to prove she was living in the country. The former Lib Dem leader also feared his mother would be subject to the same scrutiny.

“My mother’s Dutch, she’s been here for more than 50 years, but she will be expected a some point to produce some great paper trail to distinguish her, and millions of people like her, from the from those from the EU who seek to come here after a certain cut off date.”