ID cards in the UK.From a Left/Right perspective - Poll

[tzijlstra]

A lot of what you describe is the same in the UK. There are online systems to do/view most of the things you mention, and whilst voting cards are sent out in the post to confirm current address details, it's not that they aren't stored in a DB, it's just far more reliable than expecting people to log on and update an address themselves.

 

Go back to the list of all the data the ID card was intended to store the last time it was proposed.

If it isn't intended to do that, and is just to prove ID, then why not just issue everyone with a passport, using the existing system, and make the passport number everyone's unique ID... Passports contain biometric chips these days as well, that could easily also hold an address (if address HAS to be part of ID, which I'm not sure it does).

 

---------- Post added 05-08-2015 at 09:56 ----------

 

Apology accepted L00b.

 

Issuing a passport would indeed be one way to solve part of the puzzle, but it is the data infrastructure behind that which is antiquated in the UK. It is far easier to fraudulently use someone else's personality here than it is in the Netherlands due to this. If you know your way around the systems you can easily create a new identity, very handy if you arrive in the country illegally, for example.

[Cyclone]

So the police can already check ID. Nothing would change. They would still need to do more than look at your plastic card in order to actually verify the data.

 

Having a compulsory passport but not being required to carry it isn't exactly intrusive, and doesn't involve the centralisation of lots of data (and paying an additional £100 for a bit of plastic).

If the intent is to actually just ensure that everyone has a valid, hard to forge, well recognised form of ID, then extending the passport system is surely the obvious answer.

I guess there are a few people who would have a passport denied for some reason, but they can have a big red stamp in it saying "NOT VALID FOR TRAVEL" or something.

 

The fact is that the only ID card proposal we have as a reference had an extensive, and intrusive list of data that would be centrally maintained. It was an authoritarian governments wet dream. And whilst the current government might be benevolent (if you're rich at least), there is no guarantee that future governments will be.

At the risk of invoking Godwins law, what would the Nazi government of 1937 have done with such a wealth of data...

 

---------- Post added 05-08-2015 at 10:02 ----------

 

Issuing a passport would indeed be one way to solve part of the puzzle, but it is the data infrastructure behind that which is antiquated in the UK. It is far easier to fraudulently use someone else's personality here than it is in the Netherlands due to this. If you know your way around the systems you can easily create a new identity, very handy if you arrive in the country illegally, for example.

 

There are better ways to address this than adding more and more layers on top of the existing systems. Nobody wants to touch them though, as they are antiquated and poorly understood.

I worked at HMRC for a little while on IT systems. I never touched the legacy stuff, but it sounded like a poorly understood, creaking, tottering pile of assumptions, hacks and magic.

Edited August 5, 2015 by Cyclone

[unbeliever]

You're all discussing an imaginary compulsary ID card scheme that a UK government might introduce.

That's not really useful.

It is far more likely that you'll be offered an ID card scheme like the 2006 one.

 

A party manifesto including ID cards is not going to go into the kind of detail you need to be sure that you're not getting 2006 style ID cards. Pretty much the same establishment will be enacting your new ID card scheme as were behind the 2006 one. There's no reason to think it would be significantly different.

[tzijlstra]

There are better ways to address this than adding more and more layers on top of the existing systems. Nobody wants to touch them though, as they are antiquated and poorly understood.

I worked at HMRC for a little while on IT systems. I never touched the legacy stuff, but it sounded like a poorly understood, creaking, tottering pile of assumptions, hacks and magic.

 

No this is where perhaps I haven't been clear, so I am pleased you brought that up, the new system would replace the creaking mess that lies underneath. I know several people that work on large scale IT government projects and the complaint is ever recurring: The underlying systems are unsuitable. Without wiping that slate clean you are never going to fix the issue. There is a good reason most UK IT investments fail.