ID Cards For Manchester

Tony Blair’s government chose Manchester as the surprise location of Britain's first Las Vegas-style super-casino. Gordon Brown, when he became the unelected prime-minister shelved the plans.

Now the residents of Greater Manchester will be the first in the country to get identity cards.

Identity cards are already in use by foreign nationals to show that they have the right-to-work in the UK.

The credit card-size ID cards will carry fifty separate pieces of personal data including face scans and fingerprints securely encrypted onto an electronic chip.

A huge database will store the collected information which will become a magnet for con artists. The growing catalogue of lost data and missing discs has already illustrated the Government cannot be trusted with personal sensitive information.

Highlighting the feebleness of the argument “if you’ve nothing to hide you’ve nothing to fear” that champions of the cards so readily proclaim.

Residents will be able to apply for a £30 card from the autumn to enjoy the privilege of Labor’s stasi agents harassing them. Local residents wanting to apply for a card have been told to sign up on the governments Directgov web site which will inform users when the cards become available in their area.

Because the ID cards are so despised by British citizens the Government can only proceed to introduce them by stealth. From Manchester the voluntary scheme will gradually cover the rest of the country until they can be made mandatory in 2012

The Home Office is planning to allow post offices, high street pharmacies and photographic shops to offer application processing services.

Jacqui Smith said that it will not only be private companies that benefit from offering the service. "Their customers will benefit from being able to quickly provide their biometrics while they are out doing the shopping," she said.

Almost as if giving such personal information was no more important than buying a tube of toothpaste.

The government claims the scheme will offer increased protection against identity fraud and help protect communities against criminals, illegal immigrants and terrorists trying to exploit multiple identities.

They argue that, “Many people currently use their passport for such purposes but it is not a terribly convenient method and 300,000 of them are either lost or stolen every year.”

But what is to say that ID cards will not be lost or stolen?

The news of the voluntary scheme comes as airline pilots said they would boycott a compulsory ID card scheme for workers at Manchester and London City airports which will also be launched in the autumn.

Critics say the scheme is nothing more than an expensive risk to privacy.

Allied to mass surveillance of the population, monitoring of all telephone calls, e-mails, and internet traffic, introducing ID cards represents another milestone on our descent into socialist totalitarianism.

Do you want an ID card? Do you trust the Government to safeguard all your personal information?