Identity commissioner Sir Joseph Pilling has expressed concerns about the Identity and Passport Service’s two-stage approach to its core technology.

“The IPS have gone for what they call a tactical and a strategic solution to the IT demands of running an ID scheme in this country,” he told the Security Document World conference in London on 8 February. One system has been put in place for the small-scale launch of the scheme, but another will be introduced when it is expanded by forcing passport applicants to enrol.

“I am not sure whether if you have two schemes in short order you double, treble or quadruple the risk or even more than that, but I am pretty clear that it is a quite ambitious approach to take, and I am particularly intending to take an interest in the transition from the tactical to the strategic,” said Sir Joseph.

THE first young person in London to apply for a new national ID card has completed the enrolment process in central London.

Peter Fawcett, 21, of Lorne Gardens in Wanstead, had his fingerprints recorded and a photgraph (sic) taken at the London Passport Office in Victoria this morning (Monday February 8).

Mr Fawcett, who has lived in Wanstead his whole life and went to Davenant Foundation School in Loughton, said: “I was keen from the outset to get a National Identity Card.

“I will be travelling to Holland next month and the convenience of taking the credit card-sized ID card with me in my wallet for use as a travel document far outweighs taking my passport with me.

“My passport is also getting really battered by me carrying it around as proof of age. With a national identity card, I can leave my passport at home and carry my ID card in my wallet instead.

“If I lose it I only have to pay £30 instead of £77.50 to have it replaced.”

The good news is cutting public spending is technically easy when you look at just how much needless and wasteful spending there is.

Anyone saying you can cut without sacking a single nurse, doctor, teacher or uniformed person is usually ridiculed, but it is true.

Out of the 6 million state employees, only around 1 million are these essential front line workers.

Over the last few years public sector efficiency has failed to rise, whilst private sector efficiency regularly rises by 2.5% a year or more.

It is possible to do more for less in the public sector, by applying some of the disciplines of the well run office, shop or factory.

So what should we be cutting? We could begin with the marginal, wasteful or undesirable programmes.

There is no need to buy compulsory ID cards and the big identity computer.

The large and expensive NHS centralised computer schemes can be put on ice whilst we look for cheaper and better local options.

It’s insane. I don’t want to be vetted and barred. I don’t want to be on a database run by 200-odd public servants in the North of England. There used to be a presumption of trust between adults and children. Now, nobody wants to volunteer any more. One of our churchwardens nearly exploded when vetting and barring was explained to him. Another neighbour, who has put time (and money) into various community ventures over the past 10 years, suddenly stopped.

The Government’s flagship ID cards scheme suffered an embarrassing setback when a bank refused to accept one as proof of identity.

Darren McTeggart tried to use the £30 card to pick up a replacement credit card from a branch of Santander – formerly Abbey – in Manchester, where the scheme was rolled out on a voluntary basis last year.

Mr McTeggart, one of the first people to get the card, said: “They said it was not on their list of approved ID.

“I sent an email to the head office, but they wouldn’t budge. The government has been pushing this card on TV and elsewhere so it beggars belief why the bank won’t accept it.”

Keeping innocent people’s DNA on the national database causes such distress it has even forced one man to kill himself, the pioneer of fingerprinting technology told MPs.

Sir Alex Jeffreys, who invented the use of DNA profiles as a crime-fighting tool, said storing innocent people’s DNA gave them an unfair “presumption of guilt” in the eyes of the police.

The DNA database for England and Wales holds over five million profiles – the largest per head of population in the world – including an estimated one million people with no criminal conviction.

Sir Alex told MPs on the home affairs select committee that these innocent people should be removed immediately.

He said he had been frequently contacted by innocent people on the database to say how distressed they were.

One person had even committed suicide because of the “shame”, he said.

His concluding remarks are reported by Public Servant magazine:

“I’m not a lawyer but I always understood that one of the great foundations of English law was a presumption of innocence. What we’re seeing now is a presumption of future-possible-guiltyish-ness, but currently you may be innocent-ish. I find that a deeply worrying shift in the whole ethos of how the legal system operates.”