White Rose is a protest blog collective focusing on civil liberties in the UK.
It was set up to point a finger at the erosion of personal freedom in the UK.
Government's active measures introduce new means of control such as identity cards and surveillance cameras, the passive measures such as weakening of double jeopardy and presumption of innocence.
The arguments
- Most measures regarding security and crime control do not work.
- Their effect is restriction of 'honest citizen's' privacy and freedom.
- Alternative solutions to the security and privacy 'trade-off'
The resistants
Gabriel Syme and Perry de Havilland of Samizdata.net to rally the Anglosphere behind the UK.
White Rose contributors are those bloggers and non-bloggers who oppose restrictions on personal liberties.
To find out how to become a White Rose contributor, please
go here.
Wednesday, November 12, 2003
Compulsory ID cards by back door
Some numbers surrounding the issue of identity cards from Telegraph:
From 2007, people renewing passports would be issued with an ID card and would have to pay £77 at current prices. At present, passports cost £42.
Identity cards may also be combined with driving licences at a cost of £73 instead of £38.
The cards on their own would cost £35, but 16-year-olds would receive them free. The elderly and people on low incomes would pay £10.
The charge would cover the cost of biometric identifiers, such as iris prints, fingerprints or facial recognition, taken from everyone wanting to travel abroad or to drive.
More than 40 million Britons have a passport and about 35 million hold a driving licence. As each comes up for renewal the personal details would be entered on a national identity register and the new document combined with an ID card.
The £3 billion scheme would also cover 4.5 million foreign nationals resident in Britain.
Once about 80 per cent of the population has the cards, a decision would be taken making it compulsory to produce the document to access public services such as the NHS, or to get a job or claim benefits.
Hardly back door, I'd say they're coming right in the front.
Big Blunkett states right up straight that this is to be a compulsory ID card, but it will take a while.
Hopefully it will take long enough that somebody takes note that it is plain and simple a bad idea. However I doubt it unfortunately.
This is going to make life extremely difficult for anyone like me who intends not to co-operate with any ID card scheme. I can imagine someone thrown in jail for not carrying an ID card would get quite a lot of sympathy, but if the charges are driving without a license...? I'd better make sure my driving license and passport are up to date in 2006.
I've just re-read what Blunkett said -- presumably very carefully drafted:
"[...]- only basic information will be held on the ID card database - such as your name, address, birthday and sex.
"It will not have details of religion, political beliefs, marital status or your health records."
Leaving aside the dishonesty of suggesting that with a common identifier that will be used in other databases those databases are anymore separate information, "basic information" is not limited. It will be everything the state considers basic -- such as your NI number? whether you are on the Sex Offenders Register?
His promise with regard to excluded information is strictly limited, however. Just four items, and no "details" of them, not no reference to them, not no possibility that they will be accessed using ID.
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