Your Egypt

[poppy]

I haven't been back to England, the country of my birth for 3 years now! Strangely, i don't miss it in the slightest. But of course i like to follow its governmental and foreign policies, especially in relation to good old U.S!

The I.D. cards of the U.K. were in the pipeline, (being issued, initially for assylum seekers) before the public were included. While i was based in an English University and so i knew of them, before they happened. I don't have one! :shock:
Perhaps then, technically i don't exist??? :shock:

:wink: If this is the case, I won't have to worry about the end of the world then. hee! hee! :roll:


These humourous flashes - make me wonder whether i should even consider applying for the British I.D. Card! :shock: I love the way these flashes Instantaneously, convey the meaning via political satire, with an amusing stress on the serious core of the issues!



http://eclectech.co.uk/swizz.php :lol:



http://eclectech.co.uk/clarkeidcards.php :lol: ENJOY!!!


AND just to prove HOW PATRIOTIC I REALLY AM..... :wink:

:twisted: VOTE FOR BLAIR LOL :twisted: OR i'll send the boys round.


http://eclectech.co.uk/londoncalling.php :lol: hee! hee! :)

[moll]

poppy wrote:

The I.D. cards of the U.K. were in the pipeline, (being issued, initially for assylum seekers) before the public were included. While i was based in an English University and so i knew of them, before they happened. I don't have one! :shock:
Perhaps then, technically i don't exist??? :shock:



I don't exist either poppy, they haven't been introduced yet...

[poppy]

moll wrote: poppy wrote:

The I.D. cards of the U.K. were in the pipeline, (being issued, initially for assylum seekers) before the public were included. While i was based in an English University and so i knew of them, before they happened. I don't have one! :shock:
Perhaps then, technically i don't exist??? :shock:



I don't exist either poppy, they haven't been introduced yet...

And if they are not made compulsory by law Moll, will you even bother to get one? :roll: As i have no intention to return to U.K. on a permanent basis anyway. I would hate the idea of being forced to apply for an I.D. card! What are your views about it?

[moll]

poppy wrote:



And if they are not made compulsory by law Moll, will you even bother to get one? :roll: As i have no intention to return to U.K. on a permanent basis anyway. I would hate the idea of being forced to apply for an I.D. card! What are your views about it?

No, to be honest I probably wouldn't bother applying for one unless they WERE made compulsory........but if that happened, I wouldn't really have a problem with it, it's only another bit of plastic in your wallet and if it helped to cut down crime, it would be a small price to pay..

But I guess a lot would depend on how the authorities used it.

[ratty]

i am completely against this.


it a ripoff and a general infringment on the rights of all british citizens.

[poppy]

ratty wrote: i am completely against this.


it a ripoff and a general infringment on the rights of all british citizens.


If i were still resident in U.K. I would agree with you! :o In principle, i am against these cards too! :roll: and believe they are a convenient way for government to keep tabs on their prolertariat's! or members of the public.

Sigh! for a rodent your quite an indignant rat when it comes to your human rights, and i like that!
:cheers:

[poppy]

moll wrote: poppy wrote:



And if they are not made compulsory by law Moll, will you even bother to get one? :roll: As i have no intention to return to U.K. on a permanent basis anyway. I would hate the idea of being forced to apply for an I.D. card! What are your views about it?

No, to be honest I probably wouldn't bother applying for one unless they WERE made compulsory........but if that happened, I wouldn't really have a problem with it, it's only another bit of plastic in your wallet and if it helped to cut down crime, it would be a small price to pay..

But I guess a lot would depend on how the authorities used it.



:shock: I just found this, protest! :shock: So i assume its a pretty controversial issue in Britain right now.

Sign a petition
http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/IDcards/
This petition is now closed, as its deadline has passed.
We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to scrap the proposed introduction of ID cards. More details
Submitted by Paul Neath – Deadline to sign up by: 15 February 2007 – Signatures: 28,032
Government Response
The petition calling for the Government to abandon plans for a National ID Scheme attracted almost 28,000 signatures - one of the largest responses since this e-petition service was set up. So I thought I would reply personally to those who signed up, to explain why the Government believes National ID cards, and the National Identity Register needed to make them effective, will help make Britain a safer place.

The petition disputes the idea that ID cards will help reduce crime or terrorism. While I certainly accept that ID cards will not prevent all terrorist outrages or crime, I believe they will make an important contribution to making our borders more secure, countering fraud, and tackling international crime and terrorism. More importantly, this is also what our security services - who have the task of protecting this country - believe.

So I would like to explain why I think it would be foolish to ignore the opportunity to use biometrics such as fingerprints to secure our identities. I would also like to discuss some of the claims about costs - particularly the way the cost of an ID card is often inflated by including in estimates the cost of a biometric passport which, it seems certain, all those who want to travel abroad will soon need.

In contrast to these exaggerated figures, the real benefits for our country and its citizens from ID cards and the National Identity Register, which will contain less information on individuals than the data collected by the average store card, should be delivered for a cost of around £3 a year over its ten-year life.

But first, it's important to set out why we need to do more to secure our identities and how I believe ID cards will help. We live in a world in which people, money and information are more mobile than ever before. Terrorists and international criminal gangs increasingly exploit this to move undetected across borders and to disappear within countries. Terrorists routinely use multiple identities - up to 50 at a time. Indeed this is an essential part of the way they operate and is specifically taught at Al-Qaeda training camps. One in four criminals also uses a false identity. ID cards which contain biometric recognition details and which are linked to a National Identity Register will make this much more difficult.

Secure identities will also help us counter the fast-growing problem of identity fraud. This already costs £1.7 billion annually. There is no doubt that building yourself a new and false identity is all too easy at the moment. Forging an ID card and matching biometric record will be much harder.

I also believe that the National Identity Register will help police bring those guilty of serious crimes to justice. They will be able, for example, to compare the fingerprints found at the scene of some 900,000 unsolved crimes against the information held on the register. Another benefit from biometric technology will be to improve the flow of information between countries on the identity of offenders.

The National Identity Register will also help improve protection for the vulnerable, enabling more effective and quicker checks on those seeking to work, for example, with children. It should make it much more difficult, as has happened tragically in the past, for people to slip through the net.

Proper identity management and ID cards also have an important role to play in preventing illegal immigration and illegal working. The effectiveness on the new biometric technology is, in fact, already being seen. In trials using this technology on visa applications at just nine overseas posts, our officials have already uncovered 1,400 people trying illegally to get back into the UK.

Nor is Britain alone in believing that biometrics offer a massive opportunity to secure our identities. Firms across the world are already using fingerprint or iris recognition for their staff. France, Italy and Spain are among other European countries already planning to add biometrics to their ID cards. Over 50 countries across the world are developing biometric passports, and all EU countries are proposing to include fingerprint biometrics on their passports. The introduction in 2006 of British e-passports incorporating facial image biometrics has meant that British passport holders can continue to visit the United States without a visa. What the National Identity Scheme does is take this opportunity to ensure we maximise the benefits to the UK.

These then are the ways I believe ID cards can help cut crime and terrorism. I recognise that these arguments will not convince those who oppose a National Identity Scheme on civil liberty grounds. They will, I hope, be reassured by the strict safeguards now in place on the data held on the register and the right for each individual to check it. But I hope it might make those who believe ID cards will be ineffective reconsider their opposition.

If national ID cards do help us counter crime and terrorism, it is, of course, the law-abiding majority who will benefit and whose own liberties will be protected. This helps explain why, according to the recent authoritative Social Attitudes survey, the majority of people favour compulsory ID cards.

I am also convinced that there will also be other positive benefits. A national ID card system, for example, will prevent the need, as now, to take a whole range of documents to establish our identity. Over time, they will also help improve access to services.

The petition also talks about cost. It is true that individuals will have to pay a fee to meet the cost of their ID card in the same way, for example, as they now do for their passports. But I simply don't recognise most claims of the cost of ID cards. In many cases, these estimates deliberately exaggerate the cost of ID cards by adding in the cost of biometric passports. This is both unfair and inaccurate.

As I have said, it is clear that if we want to travel abroad, we will soon have no choice but to have a biometric passport. We estimate that the cost of biometric passports will account for 70% of the cost of the combined passports/id cards. The additional cost of the ID cards is expected to be less than £30 or £3 a year for their 10-year lifespan. Our aim is to ensure we also make the most of the benefits these biometric advances bring within our borders and in our everyday lives.

Yours sincerely,

Tony Blair :smt014

More information: http://www.pm.gov.uk/output/Page10960.asp

[moll]

poppy wrote:
:shock: I just found this, protest! :shock: So i assume its a pretty controversial issue in Britain right now



It's NOT, poppy.........it was for a while, but it seems to have died as far as the media are concerned :?

I don't have a problem with it, the world has changed in so many ways in the UK with threats of terrorism, illegal immigrants, etc :( and if carrying an ID card is the price we have to pay for making ordinary citizens of the UK (of WHATEVER religion/original nationality/ethnic origin) safer, if it makes it harder for illegal immigrants to stay here and terrorists to operate here, then I don't really see why people are objecting so strenuously.

[ratty]

moll wrote: poppy wrote:
:shock: I just found this, protest! :shock: So i assume its a pretty controversial issue in Britain right now



It's NOT, poppy.........it was for a while, but it seems to have died as far as the media are concerned :?

I don't have a problem with it, the world has changed in so many ways in the UK with threats of terrorism, illegal immigrants, etc :( and if carrying an ID card is the price we have to pay for making ordinary citizens of the UK (of WHATEVER religion/original nationality/ethnic origin) safer, if it makes it harder for illegal immigrants to stay here and terrorists to operate here, then I don't really see why people are objecting so strenuously.

id cards wont stop that moll they can still be faked.

[poppy]

ratty wrote: moll wrote: poppy wrote:
:shock: I just found this, protest! :shock: So i assume its a pretty controversial issue in Britain right now



It's NOT, poppy.........it was for a while, but it seems to have died as far as the media are concerned :?

I don't have a problem with it, the world has changed in so many ways in the UK with threats of terrorism, illegal immigrants, etc :( and if carrying an ID card is the price we have to pay for making ordinary citizens of the UK (of WHATEVER religion/original nationality/ethnic origin) safer, if it makes it harder for illegal immigrants to stay here and terrorists to operate here, then I don't really see why people are objecting so strenuously.

id cards wont stop that moll they can still be faked.

Very true! And bank and credit cards too! While on the subject of fraud and infringement of Citizen's Rights (i noticed this additional remark earlier on this thread too)

Take a look at this: (Monday 5 March 2007)

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2006/11/06/do0601.xml

We need ID cards to secure our borders and ease modern life
By Tony Blair
Last Updated: 12:01am GMT 06/11/2006

Comment on this story Read comments
At the bottom of the page.


No ID card: no benefits, says Blair

On any list of public concerns, illegal immigration, crime, terrorism and identity fraud would figure towards the top. In each, identity abuse is a crucial component. It is all part of a changing world: global mass migration; easier travel; new services and new technologies constantly being accessed. The case for ID cards is a case not about liberty but about the modern world. Biometrics give us the chance to have secure identity and the bulk of the ID cards' cost will have to be spent on the new biometric passports in any event.

I am not claiming ID cards, and the national identity database that will make them effective, are a complete solution to these complex problems. That is the tactic of opponents who suggest that, if their introduction is unable to prevent all illegal immigration or every terrorist outrage, they are somehow worthless. What I do believe strongly is that we can't ignore the advances in biometric technology in a world in which protection and proof of identity are more important than ever.

Nor is the Government alone in believing that biometrics offer us a massive opportunity to secure our identities. Firms across the world are already using fingerprint or iris recognition. More than 50 countries are developing biometric passports. France, Italy and Spain plan to make their ID cards biometric. Visitors to the United States now digitally record their fingerprint, and new UK passports from last month must carry a facial biometric.

We also know how effective it can be. In trials using this new technology on visa applications at just nine overseas posts, our officials have already uncovered 1,400 people trying to get back into the UK illegally.

A national identity system will have direct benefits in making our borders more secure and countering illegal immigration. Biometric visas and residence cards are central to our plans and will be introduced ahead of ID cards. I also want to see ID cards made compulsory for all non-EU foreign nationals looking for work and when they get a National Insurance number. This will enable us, for the first time, to check accurately those coming into our country, their eligibility to work, for free hospital treatment or to claim benefits.

I am convinced, as are our security services, that a secure identity system will help us counter terrorism and international crime. Terrorists routinely use multiple identities – up to 50 at a time – to hide and confuse. This is something al-Qa'eda train people at their camps to do. It will also help us tackle the problem of identity fraud, which already costs £1.7 billion annually – a figure that has increased by 500 per cent in recent years. Building yourself a new and false identity is all too easy at the moment. Forging an ID card and matching biometric record will be much harder.

The National Identity Register will help improve protection for the vulnerable, enabling more effective and quicker checks on those seeking to work, for example, with children. It should make it much more difficult, as has happened tragically in the past, for people to slip between the cracks. Crime detection rates, which fell steadily for decades, should also be boosted. Police, who will have access to the national database, will be able to compare 900,000 outstanding crime-scene marks with fingerprints held centrally.

This is how a national identity system will help tackle some of the major challenges facing our country. However, I believe its benefits go beyond helping us counter problems. Biometric technology will enable us, in a relatively short period of time, to cut delays, improve access and make secure a whole array of services. By giving certainty in asserting our identity and simplicity in verifying it, biometrics will do away with the need for producing birth certificates, driving licences, NI and NHS numbers, utility bills and bank statements for the simple task of proving who we are. A national identity system will quickly become part of the national infrastructure. It should prevent us having to tell every agency individually when we move house. In future, we could be automatically alerted when our passports are running out.

So these are the benefits against which we have to gauge the disadvantages of introducing a secure national identity system. There are three main lines of attack — the civil liberties argument, effectiveness and cost. I know this will outrage some people but, in a world in which we daily provide information to a whole host of companies and organisations and willingly carry a variety of cards to identify us, I don't think the civil liberties argument carries much weight.

More than two million shoppers in the US already use a "Pay by Touch" system that links their fingerprints to their bank accounts, and a similar system is on trial here in the UK. Parliament has attached important safeguards to the scheme, which should meet reasonable concerns. Individuals will have the right to see what information is held on them; the register will not contain medical records or tax and benefits information; full accreditation will be required for any organisation that wishes to use the data – and they will have to get consent from each individual before they access their details.

It was also very clear from last week's arguments about surveillance and the DNA database that the public, when anyone bothers to ask them, are overwhelmingly behind CCTV being used to catch or deter hooligans, or DNA being used to track down those who have committed horrific crimes. And that's what surveys suggest, too, about their position on ID cards.

Then there is the argument that ID cards and the national register simply will not work. This rests largely on the past failures, which I accept exist, of IT projects of all governments. This, however, seems to me an argument not to drop the scheme but to ensure it is done well. There are plenty of examples of how this can be achieved. The Passport Service database, which holds 70 million records, has already issued 2.5 million biometric passports since March.


That leaves the cost to the individual. Here, too, there has been some confusion. I simply don't recognise some of the figures that have been attached to ID cards which, too often, include the costs of biometric passports. This is unfair and inaccurate. We will have no choice but to have a biometric passport, if we want to travel abroad. The United States has started to require them. This will soon be the case throughout the world. On present estimates, biometric passports make up 70 per cent – or around £66 – of the cost of the combined passports/ID cards we want. The additional cost of the ID cards will be less than £30 — or £3 a year for their 10-year lifespan. Not a bad price for the problems I am convinced they will help us tackle and for the benefits they will bring.


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No ID card means no benefits, Blair tells migrants

Comments
The reactions on this forum to Tony Blair's sales pitch for ID cards are significant. Apart from one or two, they range from ridicule to disgust and defiance.

I believe - and it's a thrilling possibility - that this latest government outrage is going to be the one that finally shakes us Britons out of our apathy. Let's take our protests to the streets! Better still - to the steps of Westminster!
Posted by Liberty Bill on November 7, 2006 2:05 PM
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I can't remember whether Nostradamus predicted great woe visited upon the people by smarmy gits with sinister motives, but I predict the greatest civil disobedience since the 1926 General Strike. Brace yourselves, NuLab!
Posted by Free Briton on November 7, 2006 1:37 PM
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Hey, Tone - have a look at these posts! Looks like you've got a fight on your hands ...
Posted by nyahnyahguessmyidentity on November 7, 2006 1:02 PM
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The suggested benefits are all very vague (and I lack belief in their being attained).


Concrete examples with auditable promises of irritations which will be removed by having a card are lacking, and in my view strangely lacking if there is real official belief in the utility of the system at the purposes it is said to have.

How about "If you are carrying your card you will not be asked to fill in any demographic detail on any public service (state, local gov, NHS, school etc) form." That is a convenience, which might well be worth £30, but my view is that no official with a government form they want filled in will actually demonstrate belief that the details on the card are those of the person standing in front of them.

Posted by Adrian midgley on November 7, 2006 9:53 AM
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Accept a National ID card and the next thing they'll want to do is to implant you with the next generation of Verichip to tag and track you like a herd animal. NO THANK YOU, MR. BLAIR!
We're not that stupid! You can go back to your mates at the Bilderberg Group and inform them that the Great Unwashed refuse to buy into your Straussian scare tactics!
Posted by smadewell on November 7, 2006 9:30 AM
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V for Vendetta should be compulsory viewing for all Brits they might then have some understanding of what our control freaker government has in mind for us (Blair and new labour have two aims total control of the poeple and maxime benefit for themselves.)
Posted by Ann Craik on November 7, 2006 8:12 AM
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Will it turn out that ID cards and database are being introduced to comply (elaborately) with some EU requirement that hasn't yet been explained to us?
Posted by Adrianne Innes on November 7, 2006 3:44 AM
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Maybe we can tie the ID card system to the Census and have the ID card record your Income, religion, voting record etc.

This will make it really easy for them to find you when they decide to dissappear you in the middle of the night and load you in cattle trucks for being a christian/muslim/jedi/conservative/gay/straight or whatever some future Hitler / Cromwell "lord protector of UK" decides that your existence is an abomination to the state.

This is a slippery slope - as one WWII writer put it "when they came for the jews, I didn't protest, when they came for the homosexuals I didn't protest, when they came for me, there was no-one left to protest!"Posted by Ian Jones on November 7, 2006 2:43 AM
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We used to live in a free and democratic society; that was before year zero and the arrival of B.Liar and his cronies. I.D. cards will serve only to alienate the legal, decent, honest and truthful majority who have been so badly betrayed by the deceitful and mendacious power crazed "B.liarites" who have laid waste our Nation this past decade. This Government is against any aspect of personal freedom or liberty which is counter to its own perverse beliefs. Yet more public money is to be wasted on yet another system for capturing yet more information on the lives of the decent and hard working majority. [b]It is not enough for B.Liar and his cronies to tax us over and over again, destroy our pensions (whilst they platinum plate their own) and engage in illegal wars which are proving un-winnable yet highly detrimental to our security. Now they want to intrude into our daily lives and track us wherever we go; and of course make us pay for it. [/b]Life under Stalin, Honicker, Pol Pot, Hitler, Mao or Sadam would probably have been no worse than what lies ahead for the UK. B.Liar's ID cards will NOT work. The stupidity of the B.Liar and his vain glorious search for a legacy beggars belief; B.liar your legacy is IRAQ.
Posted by Dr Edmund Oliver on November 6, 2006 11:06 PM
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While I have great respect and admiration for Mr.Tony Blair, I am a bit saddened by this proposal.I am hundered percent for stop on all illegal migration and if needed legal migration as well.But to ask only non-EU people carry the ID cards seems to be open discrimination.Personally ,in such a case ,I would prefer to go back to my home country India and rather live a less luxurious life there instead of accepting the everyday humilation of carrying this "tag" of being an 'inferior' race in the UK.Posted by Rajeev on November 6, 2006 10:44 PM
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hope it`s not EDS Tony wants to use as they have already buggered up the CSA (system due to be scrapped ) and are now working on the Inland Revenue .......God help us all Posted by John on November 6, 2006 10:18 PM
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The only way an ID card system with biometrics would have any value would be if every official had a terminal to read the biometrics. Otherwise a visual forgery would pass muster. This would cost many times the figure currently being quoted. Who will joint me in a bonfire when the forms start being issued
Posted by K M Wells on November 6, 2006 10:09 PM
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I just read a lot of these comments, and am amazed at the number of people who think he is a liar.
He must have very thick skin to say these sorts of things knowng that so many people think he is lying when he says them.

Never trust a man with thick skin, they don't feel things like the rest of us.
Posted by Kann-alp Nehpetz on November 6, 2006 8:27 PM
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This video clip, in which an "unbreakable" biometric fingerprint system is broken in to using a photocopy (yes that's right, a photocopy) of a fingerprint that has been licked should hopefully make him shudder at the utter frailty of his assertion that biometrics provide proof of identity.
link
Mr. Blair, please just talk to people in industry who know about "authentication" and learn what biometrics do and don't give you. An identity card with the owner's fingerprints all over it is known as "easy meat".
Posted by Kann-alp Nehpetz on November 6, 2006 8:10 PM
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'...the public, when anyone bothers to ask them, are overwhelmingly behind CCTV being used to catch ... hooligans, or DNA being used to track down.... blah de blair de blah...'. So ask us Tone, ask us, do we want CCTV and ID cards?

No, you don't want to ask do you?


Posted by Joanne Hairy on November 6, 2006 7:36 PM
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I am against ID cards for most of the reasons mentioned above. But think of the positives if they are effective.

With good ID we will not need politicians as the everthing can be decided by referendum using the internet. We could all view proposed laws, spending proposals, regulations and other matters on our PC's. We then insert our ID cards into the PC and vote on the proposals. Forums could be used to formulate policy. Great.
Posted by Ted G on November 6, 2006 7:23 PM
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There is a pattern emerging with
Mr.Blair, sadly only too familiar these days:

1.Mr.Blair and Co. propose a new earth-shattering "initiative",

2. The British citizens are duly horrified and dismayed and start writing protesting letters to the papers.

3. The "initiative" nontheless is happily rubber-stamped by the Parlament and becomes a law.

4. There is nothing whatsoever that the silent majority can do about it,

5. Mr.Blair carries on unopposed and unstoppable as before.


Posted by lil on November 6, 2006 7:09 PM
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I'd suggest that when you get your ID Card, swap it with your friend /neighbour etc. or sell it in the pub and report it lost / stolen. If everybody does it, the whole system will probably be swamped in the first week and crash completely.
Posted by Tam Saunders on November 6, 2006 6:55 PM
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Those who are against ID cards really need to grow up. We live in a dangerous world and whilst most appreciate that ID cards are not perfect, they do take us along the road to having better security, perhaps assisting in stopping people gaining benefits fraudulently. I am sick of the human rights arguments against the so called big brother state. I am subject to the same restraints that CCTV, ID Cards and other measures to make us more secure bring about, but believe me, that small incursion into my privacy is a price worth paying. I have a simple analysis on this. If you have done nothing wrong then what have you got to worry about. Look at the benefits in the fight against crime that fingerfrints and DNA have brought, both wehemently opposed at their inception. A few years from now, the vast majority will be glad to have an ID card and think nothing of it.
Posted by Craig Milne on November 6, 2006 6:49 PM
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What a complete load of wordy twaddle. How on earth does Mr. Blair know how much this scheme will really cost, and how can he be so certain it will have any benefit? The fact is, if this plan has anything in common with nearly every single instance of state-sponsored interfering in the lives of ordinary people that this government has done, it will be of extremely limited value and at a time when businesses and individuals are desperate for tax cuts, will end up costing the taxpayer at least five times - perhaps ten times - more than was originally thought to be the case.
Posted by Michael on November 6, 2006 6:33 PM
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My main concern about these ID cards is "mission creep". Where will it all end? Will it end when the card contains our full medical history and our future health predictions? Will it end when the card contains all our educational qualifications and job references? Will it end when the card contains all our income details and what we've spent that income on? Will it end when we have been classified (grades A to E) depending on our value and usefulness to the state (and, of course, to our economic masters)?

Don't forget that a large proportion of the electorate is already ignored at a General Election because they are not "the right type of people" living in "the right area" who do not "fall within the right household income bracket". Note also that the idea that Parliamentarians (politicians) are the best guardians of our liberty is quite obviously rot. Anyone with any experience of these parasites over the past thirty years knows better than that. Who was it that once said hiring an MP is just like hiring a London taxi? Very easy to do, done in secret and cheap in every sense of the word.

Tony Blair has been such a great disappointment for our country. I first met him in the early 1990s and (like many others) was greatly impressed. His Labour Party seemed different too - but at heart it isn't. Once it was content to control business and industry. Now it seems content to control me and you. "Time for a change in Government," do I hear you say? "Time for Tony to go." Yet, who will replace him? By the time of the next General Election Gordon Brown, David Cameron and Ming Campbell will all be in favour of ID cards. Reason - "it has all gone too far and cannot be reversed." This is because the State, the Economy and the EU will always win. You (a part of the easily ignored and quite irrelevant masses) will always lose. Unless, of course, you all agree to break their laws. Perhaps YOU will. Somehow I doubt it. After all, if you have nothing to hide and nothing to fear there is a one thousand pound fine and the real chance of a spell in clink - until you obey and conform too. For there is always space in prison for noble fine defaulters - like frail elderly pensioners and the victimised poor. There is also time in prison for the forced administration of your ID card. For you are now a number for your nation and not an individual. For you too will be a part of this project which will allow Government to charge business a fee every time they need to check your ID. A nice little earner. Lovely jubbly. What a shame I won't get any of the money made out of my own identity. Only a Government as sleazy as this one would seek to privatize the people in order to sell them for a profit. Hitler and Stalin would be delighted and so should you be. For they both believed economic values were worth more than moral values. Now don't forget that, Number 8284916. Social Category E - (Lemon) - Worthless.
Posted by Neil Welton on November 6, 2006 6:30 PM
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Tony Blair is a liar, these ID cards will not be secure. Consider this: if your playstation 2 with advanced nanotechnology can be "chipped" to circumvent its security, how difficult will it be to circumvent a relatively cheap ID card?

Blair wants his head examining.
Posted by Scott T-unstall on November 6, 2006 6:22 PM
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Does this man live on the same planet as me?

What next: compulsory entrance to the DNA database just to 'wrap things up nicely' with those other wrong 'uns who've been arrested and had a swab taken (not actually charged and brought before the courts though - no need to bother with old-fashioned technicalities like that in NuLab's Britain)?

Well Mr Blair, don't you worry your silly little head about protecting me, the innocent, since hopefully, as a law-abiding, tax-paying, non-violent, British man with no criminal record and NOTHING TO HIDE, I'll be leaving the UK the moment ID cards come in. Then you can sit back and admire the wonderful PC society you've helped create and concern yourself with much more important matters: serializing your memoirs with Rupert M.

Freedom? Yeah, right.
Posted by Chris Hayes on November 6, 2006 6:17 PM
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"The case for ID cards is a case not about liberty
but about the modern world."

Errr maybe for the government, but for me (and
millions of others) liberty is the very core of our
society. ID cards have a profound impact on
those liberties.

"It was also very clear from last week's
arguments about surveillance and the DNA
database that the public, when anyone bothers to
ask them, are overwhelmingly behind CCTV
being used to catch or deter hooligans, or DNA
being used to track down those who have
committed horrific crimes. And that's what
surveys suggest, too, about their position on ID
cards."

Actually one thing that was evident from last
week's discussion of surveillance was how many
people were appalled by the situation we now
find ourselves in.

The evidence from Australia and here in the UK
suggests that people are in favour of ID cards
just so long as they remain ignorant of how the
system would work. The more they learn of the
details the more they become opposed to the
scheme. ID cards are popular amongst two
groups - authoritarians who don't understand
the technology (Blair and his Cabinet), and those
IT companies salivating over the fat contracts
coming their way.

Dear Mr Blair, 1984 is a satirical novel of a nightmare future. It is not the instruction manual on how to do it.
Posted by Michael Ney on November 6, 2006 1:36 PM
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(By the way, does lobbying (or money) from the biometrics industry have anything to do with Blair's enthusiasm for this scheme?)Posted by Suzon Forscey-Moore on November 6, 2006 12:56 PM
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If the people who are commenting on this subject believe it was written by B Liar you are deluding yourselves - ok he put his signature on it but you can bet it was written by his advisors ie the puppeteers not the puppet. ID cards wont make a scrap of difference to terrorist threats or organised crime although it wouldn't bother me to carry one.
Posted by Peter Hindley on November 6, 2006 12:56 PM
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The libertarian argument against ID cards does not have a cost/benefit analysis at its basis. Rather, it rests on the idea that government should be answerable to the people. ID cards are symbolic of a reversal of this relationship.

In the UK, authority flows down from the crown. However, whilst we may be British subjects, a large number of people on all sides of the political spectrum also regard themselves as British citizens.


It is in this context, that ID cards are objectionable, unless they are introduced as a short term measure as part of a "state of emergency" package, and subject to periodic reviews within Parliament.

Given the horrors of the 20th Century, given the neo-fascistic rise of the chav (watch this space), and given the rise of Islamist fascism, I don't believe that it is unreasonable for people to keep making the libertarian (as opposed to hand-wringing liberal) argument against universally mandatory ID cards. Even Rousseau appreciated that man is first born free ...Posted by Anon on November 6, 2006 12:55 PM
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Well Mr Blair I know who I am, and if anyone in authority wishes to know who Iam i will simply give them the information they require.
Now thats good enough for me.
If it is not good enough for the state which seems to be the case, then the state is asumming that Iam a liar. Well Mr Blair that is not acceptable.Posted by M. Ford . Bolton on November 6, 2006 12:46 PM
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"I don't think the civil liberties argument carries much weight."

This statement says everything we need to know about our Prime Minister. That a British PM can be so dismissive of civil liberties also says a lot about how he wants to change the nature of the relationship between the state and the individual. It is precisely for this reason that we should all vehemently oppose the proposed scheme.
Posted by Edwin Thornber on November 6, 2006 12:43 PM
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Pay by touch is an individual's choice. Not forced by law on the unwilling. Along with the same unwilling being forced to give DNA samples etc. Beign forced to pay for the 'priviledge'. This has nothing to with securing the population from crime and terrorism and everything to do with securing the population by the government. Along with proposals to fit tracking devices in every car. How can you talk of freedom when every fibre of your being is concentrated in imprisoning us? How typical of you to decide that normal law abiding citizens have to report to police stawtions as if they were common criminals.

The terrorism argument holds no water. I served in the army through the IRA presence. Remember them? That would be the terror group you bent over backwards for to accomodate. Betraying the memory of the thousands that died. We didn't need ID cards then and the threat was far greater.

I've seen your surveys. 57% in favour is hardly a landslide majority. That is not even a conclusive 57% either. First or second choice and only of those surveyed.

You don't agree with the costs because YOU won't have to pay them. £66 + £30 will still cost us £96 (by your own quoted figures). I bet you were convinced right up until the last minute that the Scottish parlament building would only cost £4 million.

We might not be able to see your lips movign in print, but we still know you are lying. For God's sake just go, and take your corrupt coterie with you.
Posted by Steve Ipswich on November 6, 2006 12:42 PM
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It's not the ID card that's the issue, Mr. B'Liar, it's the database you're proposing to put behind it.

I already have a Government-approved means of proving my identity. It's called a PASSPORT, and Governments all over the world accept its veracity. I don't need, don't want and won't have your and/or any successive Government monitoring and recording my every move for the rest of my life. Just as I will not allow your house inspectors into my home uninvited, I WILL NOT have one or your so-called ID cards.

Be sure to note, I'm not the only one, and you can't lock us all up.



:roll: I had to cut these comments short! :shock: The list continues, at great lenth right down the page! To view more of the British Public's opinions visit the web link at the top of this posting. :wink: