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It appears my faint optimism of yesterday was misplaced. The House of Lords has agreed a compromise on ID cards which means they will go ahead. This Reuters report makes it clear that the cards are the most ambitious such cards to be attempted in terms of the data to which they draw access.

They will prove a costly and oppressive fiasco. Perhaps that is Blair’s main legacy.

The media has minutely examined the financial affairs of the Labour Party, offsetting the silence of potential Tory hypocrisy. Yet, this is less than not very important. The man who will not contest the next election has low approval ratings and the party that his successor will battle has lost their lead in the polls. Such are the dangers of binding yourself too closely to your enemy.

The real dangers lie in the rapid erosion of our civil liberties. A message that is always worth repeating and Henry Porter in the Observer does it better than I ever could:

You may have noticed the vaguely menacing tone of recent government advertising campaigns. Here is a current example: ‘If you know a business that isn’t registered for tax, call the Revenue or HM Customs – no names needed.’ Another says: ‘Technology has made it easier to identify benefit cheats.’

Whether the campaign is about rape, TV licences or filling in your tax form, there is always a we-know-where-you-live edge to the message, a sense that this government is dividing the nation into suspects and informers.

The article is a succinct reminder of all the arguments that need to be brought to bear to offset ID cards and the database, open to all and sundry. We must remember that only totalitarian states abolish privacy: whether they are of the soft or hard variant. In Britain, this will partially be achieved by linking ID cards to the ‘chip and pin’ systems that provide universal verification for card transactions.

You will need the card when you receive prescription drugs, when you withdraw a relatively small amount of money from a bank, check into hospital, get your car unclamped, apply for a fishing licence, buy a round of drinks (if you need to prove you’re over 18), set up an internet account, fix a residents’ parking permit or take out insurance.

Every time that card is swiped, the central database logs the transaction so that an accurate plot of your life is drawn. The state will know everything that it needs to know; so will big corporations, the police, the Inland Revenue, HM Customs, MI5 and any damned official or commercial busybody that wants access to your life. The government and Home Office have presented this as an incidental benefit, but it is at the heart of their purpose.

Last week, Andrew Burnham, a junior minister at the Home Office, confirmed the anonymous email by admitting that the ID card scheme would now include chip-and-pin technology because it would be a cheaper way of checking each person’s identity. The sophisticated technology on which this bill was sold will cost too much to operate, with millions of checks being made every week.

The British state has one objective: Without the ID Card, you will have no life.