ID cards may be delayed until 2012
Kablenet.com
Published: 23 Jan 2008 13:58 GMT
The rollout of compulsory national ID cards for British citizens looks likely to be delayed until after the next election, casting doubt over the future of the scheme.
According to a strategy paper marked "restricted" and leaked to David Davis, the shadow home secretary, the government is planning to roll out the second phase of its ID card scheme in 2012, two years later than planned.
A Home Office action plan on ID cards from two years ago set 2010 as a key milestone, when it would "issue significant volumes of ID cards alongside British passports".
The setback will fuel the view among opposition politicians that the scandal surrounding the government's recent security breaches and loss of personal data could derail the ID card programme altogether.
Furthermore, in a House of Commons written answer earlier this month, Home Office minister Andy Burnham said that no publication date has been fixed for a report on identity management commissioned by Gordon Brown as chancellor. The report was to have been published by Easter 2007, following a review by Sir James Crosby.
Crosby was tasked with examining best practice in identity management and looking at how the public and private sectors could work together on using the best identity technologies.
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In a statement, the Home Office began by saying that it does not comment on leaked documents, before confirming that it will begin issuing ID cards for foreign nationals this year and that the first cards for British nationals will be issued in 2009. Significantly, however, a Home Office spokesperson indicated that the rollout of larger volumes of ID cards alongside passports is likely to be postponed.
"The next move is to include fingerprints in a second-generation biometric passport, in line with international developments in passport security," the spokesperson said. "The date for that switchover to happen is currently under consideration, as the UK is not bound by the EU passport Schengen regulations to do this in 2009."
Enrolment on the National Identity Scheme cannot become universally compulsory until a further Act of Parliament has been passed, the spokesperson underlined.
The spokesperson also said that the move to strengthen the security of ID documents using fingerprints and facial biometric technology is a global one, with countries around the world moving to add fingerprints to passports.
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