According to PublicTechnology.net:

Ahead of today’s House of Commons Public Administration Committee’s inquiry into the implications of ID cards for the public services, Liberal Democrat MP Julia Goldsworthy – a member of the committee – has slammed the government for refusing to publish the “gateway” reviews of the viability of the scheme.

On the 18th October 2005, Home Office minister Tony McNulty pledged to “provide that gateway information to the extent that we are able.” But in a written Parliamentary answer received by Ms. Goldsworthy yesterday, she was informed, “The government has no plans for publishing Gateway reviews.” But the answer goes on to say, “…the most recent review covering business justification did confirm that the programme was ready to proceed to the next phase”.

Ms. Goldsworthy said: “The government seems determined only to publish information which is supportive of the scheme. Having promised to provide us with the information last month, we can only wonder why the government seems unwilling to release these reviews now. We have long suspected that the ID card scheme would cost more than the government have told us, and that it would be an administrative disaster. The suspicion must be that there is growing evidence that ID cards are impractical, but that the government can’t afford the political embarrassment of retreating at this stage. Before they proceed any further down this route, the public and Parliament need to know the truth.”

This entry was posted by andrew on Thursday, November 24th, 2005 at 13:15 and is filed under Anti, General, UK News Articles. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.