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Identity Cards

01 March 1991

The debate over the need for identity cards voluntary or otherwise is continuing. Last year the Home Affairs Select Committee in its report on Practical Police co-operation in the European Community recommended that a voluntary machine-readable identity card should be introduced (paras. 137 and 138). The Committee argued that: "it will enhance our European sense of identity and make Europe an easier and safer place for its citizens". The government's response to this report published in January says that "it is not persuaded that the case for a voluntary identity card has been made out" (p10). It cites the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) who believe that a voluntary card would be of little use to the police . While the government position is that it is opposed to compulsory identity cards it is still considering voluntary ones. In practice the introduction of voluntary cards would soon become compulsory for people trying to obtain services such medical care social security and passports. The government's main objection is not one of principle but of the high costs of introducing ID cards. The Home Affairs Select Committee developed its proposal further in January this year when it proposed that a DNA database of the whole male population should be set up to help police with their fight against crime. This came in its report on the "Annual Report of the Data Protection Registrar". It cites evidence from Eric Howe the Data Protection Registrar to support its case for voluntary ID cards. However Mr Howe told that Committee in evidence that: "I probably would not take one out". Mr Howe went further and pointed out the danger of machine-readable ID cards as distinct from a simple card with a picture and signature: "But once you go beyond that(the simple card) to an automatic pick-up from the card you then take away the information into some automatic system then the control of the individual over it has disappeared... You are particularly looking for problems of privacy...How you actually issue codes to parts of the card which may go to chemists in one case to doctors in another case and to bank officials in yet another without these codes "leaking" all over the place; so that eventually the cards become accessible simply to anybody?" Two other reports have also backed the introduction of ID cards. The Audit Commission in a report on the poll tax says that a national identity card scheme may be "the only way to make a poll tax system work efficiently". A working group comprising representatives of the police banks and building societies and Home Office officials is recommending to the Home Secretary that a national ID system be introduced to combat money-laundering and the opening of accounts in false names. Practical Police Co-operation in the European Community Home Affairs Select Committee 7th report Session 1989-90 Commons Paper 363-I 20 July 1990 HMSO; Practical Police Co-operation in the European Community:the Government Reply to the 7th report from the Home Affairs Committee Cm 1367 January 1991 HMSO; Annual Report of the Data Protection Registrar 1st report Session 1990-91 Commons Paper 115 HMSO; Guardian 7.11.91; Independent 14.1.91; Independent 16.1.91.