The state’s House of Representatives did a horrid thing Thursday.

Lawmakers passed — with no debate and no recorded vote — a bill that would make vehicle accident reports inaccessible to the general public.

To be clear, the bill closes access to reports of all accidents — minor and major — that happen on the public roads we all drive.

The bill, LD 1167, permits law enforcement officers to verbally disclose “certain” information regarding accidents, including date, time, location of the accident, names of those involved and the towns where they live, but anything an officer decides may contain personal identifying information — like a driver’s street address — would be secret.

In Lewiston, where there are multiple people with the same name, how could the public know which Jeannette Gagne or which Joseph Morin was involved in an accident?

The answer is, we can’t.

This bill invites enormous confusion, with no way for the public to recognize the difference between the accident-free George J. Gendron and the accident-prone George J. Gendron. Many times, as with accident reports, personal information is critical to actually identifying people.

Under this new legislation, if anyone needs a copy of an accident report for insurance purposes, they would have to request that the responding police department release that information to an authorized agent. That’s a lot of paperwork for vehicle owners and police for every fender-bender in the state.

“Authorized agents” do not include employers, halting the ability of every company that wants to check the accident record of a potential or current employee. How can Maine even consider adopting a measure that would ban Schneider National or Bisson Moving & Storage from checking accident records? Shouldn’t a bus company or a school district know what kind of accident history every driver has?

Absolutely. Employers need to know the driving records, which includes accidents, of people driving company vehicles or those who use their personal vehicles to conduct the company’s business. It’s a basic question of liability.

The rationale behind Naples Republican Rep. Richard Cebra’s bill is to guard personal privacy and protect drivers from potential identity theft. This, even though there has never been a single case of identity theft orchestrated through an accident report in Maine.

Never.

Not once.

There is some information contained in accident reports that could, arguably, be shielded, like a vehicle’s VIN and drivers’ insurance policy numbers, but there should be access to whether a driver carries insurance and to the details of the crash to determine fault, if it can be determined.

The bill was heard by the Legislature’s Transportation Committee, but was passed by the Judiciary Committee because it would create exceptions to Maine’s Freedom of Access Act.

Members of Judiciary saw a need to conceal VIN numbers and insurance policy numbers, but nothing else in accident reports. But, lobbying on behalf of the bill, Maine State Police asserted that redacting targeted fields from its electronic records database would be prohibitively expensive. That may be true, but blocking public access because of a sticky software problem is bad public policy.

Especially since the public has a considerable right to know the details of accidents that occur on our public roads, many of which require extensive police and rescue response. We have a compelling right to know whom among us are causing accidents, and why they are happening.

In addition to all of the arguments compelling public access to full accident reports, there’s also the issue of this bill ignoring the thoughtful advice of the respected Judiciary Committee in moving to a vote in the House.

Ignoring that work is disrespectful and is tantamount to saying Judiciary’s view on public access doesn’t matter. That the public doesn’t matter.

That’s what the House did Thursday in passing this Chicken Little bill.

When the Senate takes up the measure, it must reject the bill to protect employers’ ability to track employee driving habits and to protect the public’s access to information about accidents on the roads we all share.

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The opinions expressed in this column reflect the views of the ownership and editorial board.