ID cards pilot scheme for pilots!

It seems all the current policy stuff coming out from the government is Jacqui Smith's. This time she's on again about ID cards. The good city of Manchester is the first city where people can sign up for an ID card, should they wish to spend £60 on one. It is voluntary for Mancunians but it is not so for pilots at Manchester Airport. They will have to have one as a condition of employment. So will all the airport workers. This compulsion also applies at London City Airport. It the febrile mind of the Home Secretary, this compulsion is so that terrorists don't apply for jobs. What planet is she from? Does she seriously think Abu Hamza, the hook-handed horror of Islamic fundamentalism, is going to apply to work at Manchester Airport as a baggage handler? "Could you help me with my bags, my good man?" asks Margaret Rutherford type to the eager-to-please Hamza. Pantomime stuff?

Any person seeking to blow up the airport is going to recruit "home grown" terrorists who are "clean skins". No ID card is going to stop that!

And how come these cards won't be effective for five years. I would suggest to Mancunians not to bother. You'd be paying £60 for nowt!

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Playing your ID Card

ID Cards are now back on the agenda, with Charles Clarke pushing ahead with great gusto. The New Labour thinking is that new technology will help them solve all old problems, like where are the undesirables. These are allegedly Al Quaeda fifth columnists, illegal immigrants, and "bogus" asylum seekers. The government hopes to clean up here.

My problem with all this is trust. First, how is Mr. Clarke going to implement this law, assuming he gets it through Parliament. Is he going to have round-up squads, clearing the streets of people who don't have the right papers to get an ID card? Are the police going to be asked to be complicit in this? Probably! The Home Office should be getting their own priorities right by really checking the ports. The ID nonsense will cost millions if not billions. Surely a bruiser like Clarke could get his mind around employing more immigration officers that are paid well so feel good about their job, instead of cutting the force back to concentrate on Heathrow only.

Second, is this ID stuff going to be used by government departments to keep track of people and their daily affairs? My trust in New Labour is fairly low, not through any paranoia but by their actions, which have shown deviousness and sophistry.

See my favourite link to NO2ID. Here is a link about Charles Clarke.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4577087.stm

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