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ID cards for the UK; when do we get our barcodes?
Topic Started: Feb 14 2006, 10:45 AM (185 Views)
Ecopoeia
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E-u-o-c-o-u-p-i-e-i-a-u-o-e-a
Grumpy Old Men
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Yep, the bastards in the House of Commons accepted compulsory ID cards. Once again we're relying on the unelected old toffs in the House of Lords to save our bacon. Interesting to note that Gordon Brown has come out so vociferously for the legislation. Well, fuck him. Blair Mark II ain't getting my vote.
_________________________________________________________

ID cards in two years as rebellion fails

Concern remains over backbench discipline ahead of further key votes

Patrick Wintour, chief political correspondent
Tuesday February 14, 2006
The Guardian


Millions of British citizens will be compulsorily required to hold an identity card and see their biometric details placed on a central database after the government last night fended off a backbench rebellion designed to derail the plan. Anyone applying for passports or immigration documents will in two years time be required to apply for an ID card.

Government whips had been anxious that they would suffer a fresh Commons defeat, adding to the sense of a government losing control, only a fortnight after the surprise reverse on religious hatred bill. But MPs voted by 310 votes to 279, a majority of 31, to reject the Lords demand that ID cards could not be brought in covertly by making them conditional on application for a passport. Twenty Labour backbenchers rebelled, about the same number as the first time MPs voted on the issue in October.

The result was greeted with dismay by civil liberties groups who accused the government of bludgeoning their backbenchers. The victory was a relief for Tony Blair ahead of a week in which he faces a further close vote on outlawing the glorification of terrorism tomorrow and the possibly chaotic sight of ministers voting different ways on a smoking ban today. The prime minister gave the Labour party a free vote on smoking after he had been unable to achieve an agreed cabinet line on the issue.

Ministers privately admit the whips operation is breaking down, with some backbench rebels no longer giving prior notice of their intention to defy the whip, a breach of the previous custom inside the parliamentary Labour party.

The sense of a government running out of luck had grown earlier in the day, when Mr Blair, due to fly back from South Africa early to attend the cliffhanger, was grounded in Cape Town when his chartered jet broke down on the runway. The pilot saw sparks flying from one of its three engines and then heard a bang as he was accelerating halfway down the runway. "If it had happened 20 or 30 seconds later things might have been different" said one of those on board.

With Mr Blair away, it was yesterday left to the home secretary Charles Clarke and the chancellor Gordon Brown to shore up the government case for identity cards. Mr Brown, not previously known as a public advocate of the cards, used a major speech on security to argue that such schemes "could not just help us to disrupt terrorists and criminals travelling on foreign and stolen identities, but more fundamentally protect each citizen's identity and prevent it being forged or stolen".

The main assault on the bill last night came over claims that the government was covertly introducing identity cards by making it a requirement that the British public and foreign residents living in the UK for more than three months apply for an ID card when they seek a new passport with the new biometric data.

The shadow home secretary David Davis complained that this represented "creeping covert compulsion", and the country was "sleepwalking towards the surveillance state". Mr Davis claimed that the ID card database would become "a target for every fraudster, terrorist, confidence trickster and computer hacker on the planet".

Last night, Shami Chakrabarti, director of Liberty, the civil liberties watchdog, said: "The government will be relieved but it could only push this half-baked compromise through. Support for identity cards continues to wane in the country. New Labour's poll tax may be beaten yet."
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Gruenberg
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The Lords will save us. I find it amusing I'm looking to David Davis to protect my civil liberties now.

And this is one of my frustrations with the Lib Dems. They should be saying "no to ID cards" every second sentence, and instead it's on and on with council tax reform. Maybe that's what the focus groups tell them polls well, but they should be making a political issue out of it, instead of i) not appearing to give a shit and ii) pretty much letting it happen.

Having said, I almost hope ID cards do come in, so I can burn mine.
[size0]Everything that can be done visibly in this world can be done by demons.

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Ecopoeia
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Agreed on all counts.
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Fonzoland
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I have always found the British response to the ID debate extremely amusing...

My personal experience from the Portuguese compulsory ID cards:

- I have never been asked for ID by the police.
- It makes interaction with banks, public services, fiscal authorities, etc. a lot easier.
- It reduces identity fraud. The ease with which you can create a bank acount with a false name is staggering.
- As an added bonus, it works as a passport within the EU.
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Gruenberg
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I noticed that. I have a friend in Poland, whose reaction was "So?" She couldn't believe there was opposition to ID cards. Whether that was lingering Soviet mentality or just pragmatism, I don't know, because she's about as libertarian as you can get.

My opposition isn't to the use of them in transactions. It's that the government has no right to impose that sort of burden upon us. If they want voluntary cards then, so long as I don't have to pay for them, fine. If they want us to register ID when we get a bank account, fine. ID in terms of driving, buying alcohol, getting a job, etc., is something where we are exchanging it in return for a service. Compulsory ID cards as a part of normal life are not in return for a service: just for living in this country. That's not something I care to see as a transaction.
[size0]Everything that can be done visibly in this world can be done by demons.

For an organisation that likes to think of itself as elite, [UNOG] doesn't have the highest of standards when it comes to membership. -- Cluichstan
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Fonzoland
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You get a compulsory National Insurance ID when you are 16, I believe. Did you ever feel like it restricts your freedom?
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I met God the other day, but all I got was this lousy quote:
"He's too feminine for his shirt...too feminine for his shirt...oh so feminine it hurts..."
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Gruenberg
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No. Because I only have to use it when I want to do something: to get a job. That is not the same for ID cards.
[size0]Everything that can be done visibly in this world can be done by demons.

For an organisation that likes to think of itself as elite, [UNOG] doesn't have the highest of standards when it comes to membership. -- Cluichstan
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Fonzoland
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Gruenberg,Feb 14 2006
12:31 PM
No. Because I only have to use it when I want to do something: to get a job. That is not the same for ID cards.

An ID card is something you only use in situations where you have to prove your identity. All these situations currently require you to present driver licence, credit card, bill receipts, passport, etc. as an alternative, simply because there are no ID cards.

I understand that you may be worried about "compulsory to carry" or "compulsory to show on demand" systems. But neither is implied by a simple "compulsory to have" system.

I guess the main division is that you are arguing from an ideological perspective, while I am being pragmatic. From my experience and that of many others across europe, nobody cares! (Except when they lose their wallet and have to queue to get another one... ;))

Actually, to be accurate, the thing that disturbs me is the fact that we still have a voter card, fiscal card, health card, instead of unifying everything into the same ID.
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I met God the other day, but all I got was this lousy quote:
"He's too feminine for his shirt...too feminine for his shirt...oh so feminine it hurts..."
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Gruenberg
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I know no one cares. And I know it wouldn't bring about the apocaypse. But it's the principle.

And, look. I had flu on the day of the Iraq protest. I don't like Edinburgh, so I couldn't go to the G8 protests. I want to be angry about something: this is as good an opportunity as anything.
[size0]Everything that can be done visibly in this world can be done by demons.

For an organisation that likes to think of itself as elite, [UNOG] doesn't have the highest of standards when it comes to membership. -- Cluichstan
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Fonzoland
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Why don't you choose tuition fees, homophobic ULU leaders, or LSE trashing King's College? ;)
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I met God the other day, but all I got was this lousy quote:
"He's too feminine for his shirt...too feminine for his shirt...oh so feminine it hurts..."
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Groot Gouda
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Fonzoland,Feb 14 2006
12:13 PM
I have always found the British response to the ID debate extremely amusing...

My personal experience from the Portuguese compulsory ID cards:

- I have never been asked for ID by the police.
- It makes interaction with banks, public services, fiscal authorities, etc. a lot easier.
- It reduces identity fraud. The ease with which you can create a bank acount with a false name is staggering.
- As an added bonus, it works as a passport within the EU.

I fear that identity fraud will increase with the compulsory ID carrying we have in the Netherlands. After all, with many more people carrying their passport or driver's license around, they're more likely to get stolen or lost, ending up in criminals' hands.

About the interaction, that's different. Sure, it's easier in a bank, but that doesn't mean you should have to carry your ID around all the time, and I understand that that is proposed in the UK (and is already practice in the Netherlands).

Mind you, I only take my ID with me if I am going to need it, at the risk of a 50 euro fine. Sod the rules!
(and the fine is cheaper than replacing a lost passport anyway).
Sincerely,

Michel (Mr April)
Groot Gouda

Member of the International Democratic Union. Writer of the Sex Industry Worker Act, the Natural Disaster Act and The Right to Form Unions.
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Fonzoland
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Once I lost my wallet in Portugal. Cancelling/replacing the national id card was the last thing on my mind, the bank cards and driver licence are much more troublesome. Everyone carries various pieces of id with them, which are a lot easier to abuse than the national id.
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I met God the other day, but all I got was this lousy quote:
"He's too feminine for his shirt...too feminine for his shirt...oh so feminine it hurts..."
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Telidia
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We can rest assured our government’s superior efficiency and utter lack bureaucracy will not result on our biometric data landing in the wrong hands. I am even surer that once I receive that shiny card with all it’s trinkets and wonders it will truly contain my data. I’d hate to be confused with Tony Blair.

I know for one I’ll be sleeping better at night…
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Hirota
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I wonder if it will be able to record voting trends etc.

There is a lot of stuff it could record.
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Ecopoeia
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One, the systems that this legislation would put in place are inadequate and would have virtually no impact on reducing identity theft.

Two, why should I fucking pay for such incompetence? Have you seen how expensive all this shit is going to be? And no, not govt estimates, how about LSE figures? Payment is a minor issue next to that of liberty, but it still galls that we're asked to fork out a ton of cash for the 'privilege'.

Three, these aren't the same as European ID cards; biometric data is considerably more intrusive, for starters. You clearly haven't seen the massive infiringements of civil liberties Labour are perpetrating - and these aren't manifesto pledges or even actions passed by the Houses. These complete arseholes are subverting our entire bloody 'democracy'. We're going in the wrong direction.

Four, I'm being asked to place my trust in not only this govt not to abuse these powers, but all subsequent ones? And also the companies that will actually run the process in this wonderful PFI state of ours? No thanks.

Five, if Europeans are happy having sacrificed some of their liberty, fine, but I think they're foolish for doing so. If having ID cards and being happy about it is part of being European, then I'm no European.

Sorry, this is such a rant (fuelled by a liquid lunch) but this is a 'get these fuckers out of govt' issue for me. Not that I'd ever vote Tory, but I see no reason any longer to prefer Labour.
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