The Labour manifesto equates identity cards with common sense: but the government has only offered doublespeak instead of arguments for ID cards.
Under Strong and secure borders, on p. 52, the manifesto reads:
"From next year we are introducing biometric ePassports. It makes sense to provide citizens with an equally secure identity card to protect them at home from identity theft and clamp down on illegal working and fraudulent use of public services."
At the same time the Home Office ID cards unit is sending out letters that state:
"I must emphasise that we have never said that the Identity Cards Scheme is intended to be the sole solution to identity fraud, illegal immigration and working, or terrorism. The scheme is therefore not being designed to be the primary method of combating these problems."
So what is the purpose of ID cards? If they are not the primary method, then the £5.5bn would be better invested in a visible police presence, the security services and immigration officers to protect borders and locate illegal employers and their workers.
We already have laws that make it illegal to employ those without UK work permits. And we already have employers that flout those laws. An ID card would no more prevent illegal working than the current laws do; such people have no problem employing illegal (and therefore unprotected) labour, and will ignore whatever measures are introduced.
The Department of Work and Pensions when questioned pulls figures from the air and guesses that around £50m each year is paid out in benefits fraudulently claimed on false identity. By comparison, the total cost of benefit fraud is estimated at around £2bn. This identity-related benefit fraud figure is so paltry that it pales in comparison to, say, the cost of running the ID card scheme – estimated at £500m a year. Not to mention the as-yet unestimated costs of scanners, software and secure infrastructure in every Jobcentre, DWP and council benefits office across the country which would be required to implement any system – this would be a loss making venture.
As for the tired argument that having a single ID document is sensible: it makes no sense to put all our eggs in one basket. Multiple forms of ID with specific and limited uses are the safest way to ensure that even if one ID document is compromised, the potential for fraud and profit is limited.
A single ID card, with so much weight given to it (right to work, right to public services, even right of nationality) would become a beacon for forgers and criminals from around the world. Single identifying cards or numbers have been the cause of high levels of fraud in Australia and the US, and other countries that have tried it (Malaysia, Taiwan, Nigeria) are now taking steps to reverse that decision.
NO2ID National Coordinator, Phil Booth, said:
"The Home Office themselves admit that ID cards wont solve identity fraud, illegal immigration and working, or terrorism. Ministers have made wild claims for the ID scheme in the past, so their manifesto justification - that it makes sense - sounds as hollow as David Blunkett’s ‘just trust me’ did before his resignation last year, or Tony Blair’s promises that there were reasons to go to war – he just couldn’t show us.
"Why have Labour gone back to calling the scheme voluntary when in fact from next year British citizens will have no option but to be fingerprinted like criminals if they want to travel abroad - authoritarian doublespeak from a party that claims to champion choice.”
NO2ID advise anyone who is concerned about this invasion of their privacy and liberty to renew their passport as soon as possible, before the safety and security of their identity falls victim to Home Office incompetence.
The NO2ID Campaign
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