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The Guardian has an inspiring leader yesterday about identity cards and David Blunkett’s approach:
Yesterday’s performance by Mr Blunkett was equally bad. He fudged on the huge costs, referring to only the first three years in which double-digit millions will be spent, when the 10-year bill has been put as high as £3bn. He exhibited a worrying faith in the foolproof nature of the new biometric technology – a faith which is not shared by financial service organisations. They have decided against biometric use for payment applications due to the rate of false positives and false negatives among other reasons. Here is an issue needing close scrutiny. True to his tradition, there was little concern from Mr Blunkett for civil liberties or the effects on community relations. Only a year ago ministers were saying ID cards were not needed to combat terrorism. Now it is included, along with illegal working, when the police have said there would only be limited effects. The ball is now in parliament’s court: that is the proper place to decide the balance between rights and security.
Some numbers surrounding the issue of identity cards from Telegraph:
From 2007, people renewing passports would be issued with an ID card and would have to pay £77 at current prices. At present, passports cost £42.
Identity cards may also be combined with driving licences at a cost of £73 instead of £38.
The cards on their own would cost £35, but 16-year-olds would receive them free. The elderly and people on low incomes would pay £10.
The charge would cover the cost of biometric identifiers, such as iris prints, fingerprints or facial recognition, taken from everyone wanting to travel abroad or to drive.
More than 40 million Britons have a passport and about 35 million hold a driving licence. As each comes up for renewal the personal details would be entered on a national identity register and the new document combined with an ID card.
The £3 billion scheme would also cover 4.5 million foreign nationals resident in Britain.
Once about 80 per cent of the population has the cards, a decision would be taken making it compulsory to produce the document to access public services such as the NHS, or to get a job or claim benefits.
The Telegraph’s leading editorial is about ID cards. It sums up David Blunkett’s ‘sneaky’ strategy to force them onto the British populace.
So David Blunkett has come up with an ingenious compromise. He proposes to introduce an elaborate ID card scheme, but without making it compulsory in the first phase. A National Identity Register will record biometric details of the population. Thousands of machines will be installed to read the new ID cards, paid for by employers, the NHS and whoever else wants them. Individuals will also have to pay when they apply for new passports or driving licences. Mr Blunkett apparently hopes that people will hardly notice the £3 billion cost, at least as long as the scheme remains voluntary and is phased in over a decade or more.
What is the point of inserting a “draft Bill” into the Queen’s Speech? What is the point of an ID card that is not compulsory? If America and the European Union are requiring biometric passports, what is the point of confusing that technical problem with the highly political issue of ID cards? Why should a government that has hitherto ignored civil liberties now respect them in the case of ID cards?
Quite.
I’m to be on Talk Sport Radio tonight at 10.30pm, talking about ID cards, unless something bigger happens between now and then and they cancel. I’ll do my best, which probably wouldn’t be as good as some of the other luminaries here. Or here and here.
I’ll probably only be on for a minute or two, but it’s a stimulus to educate myself. I’ll try to strengthen my grip on the subject by working my way down this lot.
I have received the official document produced by the Home Office and presented to the Parliament this month, outlining the stages of the plan to introduce identity card in Britain. It is called Identity Cards The Next Steps.
You will find a permanent link to the document (pdf) on the right in the links section.
Anyone who thought recent events meant that the campaign against ID Cards had been won should think again. Big Blunkett has just made a statement in the House and made it quite clear that he still intends to force compulsory National Identity Cards on innocent British citizens.
Blunkett discussed a timetable for introducing compulsory ID Cards. He left no doubt about compulsion, beginning his speech with the words:
The Government has decided to begin the process of building a base for a national compulsory identity card scheme.
His plan is to proceed in two phases. The first phase will be the introduction of biometrics through renewal of passports and driving licence. As soon as the database is available foreigners wishing to stay in the country would be issued with an ID Card and there would be a ‘voluntary’ scheme for British those few citizens without a driving license or passport.
The second phase will be compulsion.
Blunkett mentioned civil liberties only once, blithely stating that they would be safeguarded without addressing the issues. As usual, when answering questions he descended into personal abuse to cover his lack of intellectual rigour. Big Blunkett remains as much a threat as ever and must be stopped.
Cross-posted from The Chestnut Tree Cafe
Oh God, he’s back. Last Friday there were the good news in the media that the ID card plans have been put on hold. This morning, SkyNews reported that Big Blunkett is expected to announce a bill to introduce ID cards today. His ‘compromise’ to the bitter opposition in the Cabinet is to make the scheme voluntary to begin with. And there I was thinking it was meant to be voluntary all along.
It is rare to see a more blatant crusade by a public figure in the face of evidence and opposition. Granted, the opposition to ID cards in Britain is not vociferous enough and it is time to turn up the volume. Trevor has set up an iCan campaign agaist identity cards and there are others with similar concerns.
Let’s see what is to be done…
The Times reports that plans for compulsory national identity cards were put on ice yesterday when the Government delayed a decision on a mandatory scheme until “later this decade”.
Although David Blunkett got the go-ahead for a draft Bill proposing a voluntary scheme in this year’s Queen’s Speech, it will only give the Government powers to build a database using information from passports, driving licences and residents’ permits.
The decision is a blow for both the Home Secretary and Tony Blair. The Prime Minister has invested considerable political capital in the project, saying that Britain has to have compulsory ID cards in the future.
However, after weeks of fierce negotiations, mostly at John Prescott’s Domestic Affairs Committee, the opposition of Cabinet heavyweights led by Jack Straw and Gordon Brown proved too difficult to overcome and a fudge was agreed.
In an unusual step, the Cabinet issued a statement after its weekly meeting yesterday. “In principle Cabinet believes that a national ID card scheme can bring major benefits,” it said. “In practice, given the size and complexity of the scheme a number of issues will need to be resolved over the years ahead.”
The Government would proceed “by incremental steps”. First there would be legislation to set up a scheme, “but we will reserve the final decision on a move to compulsion until later this decade”.
Oh great, so we have some time to spread the word. I would not shut down your iCan campaign against identity cards just yet, Trevor. There is also Big Blunkett’s ‘voluntary’ database that should cover 80 per cent of the population, five to six years after the programme gets under way. Also, Mr Big Blunkett does not want to let go of his scheme and insists that it is phased in, with passports and other official documents acting as a first wave of the programme.
It is far from over yet.
A kind reader sent in a link to the debate on ID cards that took place yesterday in the House of Commons. Judge for yourselves:
Mr. Simon Thomas (Ceredigion): Let me say at the outset that I am opposed to ID cards, both in principle and on grounds of practicality. To put it at its most brutal, I do not believe that the best way of remembering, as we do this week, those who gave their lives for freedom is to introduce the sort of society that would have had Saddam Hussein drooling. The apparatus of totalitarian repression depends on knowing who and where every citizen is and was, and which God they worship. The Government may have dropped the God bit, but the potential for all the rest remains.
…
At the moment, we balance privilege with responsibility. It is a privilege to drive a car, and it is a responsibility to pass a test, hold a driving licence, tax a vehicle and so on. It is a privilege to enter another country, but a passport is needed. Other forms of identity, including credit cards, party membership cards such as my Plaid Cymru card and parliamentary photo passes, are mere conveniences that we can opt to use. An ID card system tips that scale and reduces citizen to cipher. It forgets that the Government should be subject to the people and instead makes the people subject to the Government. The central tenet of freedom—for people to be able to move around as they please, live where they please and do want they want, as long as they do not harm others—is reduced to a nannying, bullying attitude that the Government must know where people are and what they are doing.
…
I would like to tackle the Government’s arguments head on. However, as I said earlier, the Government have not presented a unified argument in their discussion of a national ID card. They have been as convincing as they have been consistent. We were told first that ID cards would deter international terrorism and political violence; next that they would enable the Government to end benefit fraud; and then that they were the panacea that would stop illegal immigration, asylum troubles and illegal working in the UK. The Labour Government, much like the Tory Government in 1995, have used any justification for the introduction of ID cards. It is a clear example of a solution in search of a problem.
Hear, hear, hon. Ladies and Gentlemen. It is worth reading the whole thing.
Tony Blair’s official spokesman has made an announcement about Big Blunkett’s plans to introduce compulsory national Identity Cards for innocent British citizens. The statement is confusing and seems to be an attempt to patch over the splits in Cabinet.
According to the statement, Ministers have agreed in principle that there would be major benefits to such a scheme. However they have also agreed that the practical issues are immense. Of perhaps most interest is this sentence:
We will legislate to enable the scheme to be introduced and plan on the basis that all the practical problems can be overcome but we will reserve the final decision on a move to compulsion until later this decade.
That could be seen as a victory for either side.
So long as this enabling legislation is in place the threat of compulsory National Identity Cards will remain. We must make it clear to the government that proceeding any further down this road will lose them the next election.
Cross-posted from The Chestnut Tree Cafe
The Cabinet domestic affairs sub-committee met yesterday to consider Big Blunkett’s plans to introduce compulsory national Identity Cards for innocent British citizens.
The plan has split the Cabinet with Gordon Brown, Jack Straw and Patricia Hewitt said to be amongst those opposing Blunkett.
According to reports in today’s media, the meeting was “acrimonious”, “savage” and a “bloodbath”.
Incidentally, the BBC have launched a new website iCan for campaigners. If it takes off, it could generate a lot of exposure. I’ve started a campaign against ID cards.
Partially cross-posted from The Chestnut Tree Cafe
The Cabinet is increasingly split over the issue of introducing compulsory national Identity Cards for innocent British citizens. Despite this the Sunday Times reports that the Queen’s Speech is likely to contain reference to them in the form of a draft Bill.
The Sunday Times suggests that this is just a “fig leaf” to cover Big Blunkett‘s embarrassment and that ID Cards will not actually be introduced before the next general election if at all.
They might be right, but that’s not a risk we can afford to take. We need to redouble our efforts to oppose this dangerous idea.
Cross-posted from The Chestnut Tree Cafe – now with mailing list
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