By the deadline date of 15th February, 27,946 people signed the petition asking the Prime Minister to scrap the ID card legislation. The PM has responded to the petitioners:
"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."
Actually the security services believe no such thing. Senior members of the security services have stated on the public record that the ID scheme could make their jobs more difficult.
"Terrorists routinely use multiple identities - up to 50 at a time... ID cards... will make this much more difficult."
Nope. The government scheme is so full of security holes the scale of fraud that potential system attackers could engage in would be scary.
"Secure identities will also help us counter the fast-growing
problem of identity fraud."
No. There is a very high probability the UK government's approach to ID cards will make the problem of identity fraud worse.
"I also believe that the National Identity Register will help police
bring those guilty of serious crimes to justice...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...
...role to play in preventing illegal immigration and illegal working...
Firms across the world are already using fingerprint or iris recognition for their staff...
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...
These then are the ways I believe ID cards can help cut crime and
terrorism...
the majority of people favour compulsory ID cards...
...help improve access to services...
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."
It's the usual spin, obfuscation and tired old claims, repeated over and over in the hope that people will believe him if he says it often enough, packaged in sufficiently attractive language.
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