[aldo_14]

Problem is that the current HoL (er... House of Lords.  Not the other one.  AFAIK) isn't exactly representative.... for every ID cards bill there's something like the Hunting bill, and if you have appointed peers then there's still that whole issue to handle.

Screwed either way, probably.  Albeit when you have fringe parties like the BNP being deliberately denied representation, you risk encouraging the kind of paranoia they spread to bring themselves support.  You probably have to recognise the lunatic fringe in some way or form, simply to work out ways to best remove them.

[pyro-manic]

Hit 'em repeatedly with something heavy, preferably.

I'm having a hard time understanding this whole idea. We had ID cards in the 40s, and they were a miserable failure. Why should things be different now? It'll cost waaaay more than predicted, it'll never work properly, nobody will pay attention to it, and it'll open up a whole new way for criminal types to make pots of money by forging them. Which will in turn require massive spending to combat. Plus it'll make everybody hate the govamint even more than they do now.


Ford: Hahah, thanks for that. I can almost taste the cheese...

[aldo_14]

Incidentally, the WW2 introduced ID cards were ruled as illegal in something like 1953; partyl because they were destroying any willingness to assist or trust the police, IIRC.

[karajorma]

I agree the HOL needs replacing. The question of what to replace it with is more tricky though. Simple majority is pointless, PR is bad and the current system doesn't answer to the public in any way.

When someone comes up with better replacement I'll be all for it but lets not throw out something that has worked for 400 years only to replace it with a rubbish system that makes things worse. Only an politician would think of doing something like that!

[aldo_14]

What if PR was tempered with a requirement for having some form of experience/intelligence?  For example only allowing qualified lawyers, long-standing police chiefs, judges, professors, etc to stand as a Lords candidate?

So you'd have a system that could be representative, but isolated from pandering to the stupidity of the mass majority.  A PR system in theory, but which has these qualifying conditions to weed out the brain-dead populists and BNP style nutters?

Maybe you could go the inverse and allow voting out of Lords.  Although that'd require a lot more interest in politics from the public than there currently is; I don't think I can name a single peer offhand and know their political stance or voting record.

[pyro-manic]

Tebbet. There's reason enough

[Ghost]

Oh yes, I realize our government is just as insane as yours is becoming, but I'm just saying we have some liberties still left to us... who am I kidding. We're just as ****ed as you guys are.

[IceFire]

I was sort of hoping that democracy would prevail in the UK even if it seems sort of disjointed and falling apart at the seams in the U.S.  Seems that can't be counted on as much anymore either...although I don't get the impression its quite as bad yet.

Does Canada get to be a holdout or not?

Actually, I think they were talking about ID cards too.  Comedy programs were doing funny things like showing pictures of what a card would look like.  Would have:

- Picture
- Name
- Age
- Terrorist: Yes / No

Funny

[Zarax]

Originally posted by IceFire
I was sort of hoping that democracy would prevail in the UK even if it seems sort of disjointed and falling apart at the seams in the U.S.  Seems that can't be counted on as much anymore either...although I don't get the impression its quite as bad yet.

Does Canada get to be a holdout or not?

Actually, I think they were talking about ID cards too.  Comedy programs were doing funny things like showing pictures of what a card would look like.  Would have:

- Picture
- Name
- Age
- Terrorist: Yes / No

Funny

I don't really understand what's your problem with ID cards...
In Italy we got two of them (a generic one and a "taxpayer code") and it's not like our civil liberties are limited in any way...

What's wrong with having a document that states who you are?

[pyro-manic]

That's not the issue. The issue is that these cards will have credit-card-style microchips on them, containing lots of information about the holder including biometric data (iris scan, fingerprints etc). This data will also be held on a central government database. Basically, whenever you open a bank account, buy a house, get a loan, any kind of major purchase, etc, that information will be recorded, and can be used to build a profile of any person. Which is unacceptable to many people, including me. The government has no right to pry into my private actions and life (not to mention the criminal possibilites - with all that info in one place, identity theft will become incredibly easy to carry out), and I will fight it every step of the way.

We have forms of ID, obviously - we have passports, driver's licences etc, and we have National Insurance cards (a kind of tax number), but we don't have to carry them, and tracking a person via them is not possible (there's credit cards for that ).

[IceFire]

Originally posted by Zarax


I don't really understand what's your problem with ID cards...
In Italy we got two of them (a generic one and a "taxpayer code") and it's not like our civil liberties are limited in any way...

What's wrong with having a document that states who you are?

Well I probably feel like many others do.  I already have my Drivers License and my Health Card which are both photo ID, require lots of previous documentation, and already sufficiently prove who I am, where I live, and what I look like.  Furthmore, I have my social insurance number (like everyone who works) which doesn't have all that info but requires it to get one....so what in the hell do I need another card for that tracks even more information about me thats otherwise totally unecessary (in my view) for the purposes of establishing who I am - they can already easily do that and do that easily.  Oh yeah and everyone of course has a birth certificate.

I'm not sure if the situation is different in the U.K. but I'm sure Aldo over there carrys around as much ID as I do.  How much more ID do they or I need to carry around to prove to people who I am?

So I personally think the move towards these cards is more of a method of tracking people in what is currently an unjust and unlawful manner but that is probably a minor consideration.  My big gripe is that its a political move meant to appease fears over terrorism and show the people that politicians are doing "something" about it when they can't or aren't willing.  Its politics and not really about security and welfare and thats what bothers me.

But its all a big confusing issue and I probably need to look at it a bit more to understand it greater.

[Flipside]

Thing is, we already have National Insurance Cards, Driving Licenses, Credit/Debit cards, Doctors Records etc. All the information that will be on  this ID card is information the government already has. It's not that which is the problem. It's the fact our government want to charge all legal citizens for being legal citizens. I think it's that which brushes me up the wrong way.

Charge the innocent cash on the pretence of catching the 'guilty'? I already pay my taxes for that thanks, why not just turn the Isle of Man into a Mini-Gitmo and have done with it?

[aldo_14]

Originally posted by pyro-manic
That's not the issue. The issue is that these cards will have credit-card-style microchips on them, containing lots of information about the holder including biometric data (iris scan, fingerprints etc). This data will also be held on a central government database. Basically, whenever you open a bank account, buy a house, get a loan, any kind of major purchase, etc, that information will be recorded, and can be used to build a profile of any person. Which is unacceptable to many people, including me. The government has no right to pry into my private actions and life (not to mention the criminal possibilites - with all that info in one place, identity theft will become incredibly easy to carry out), and I will fight it every step of the way.

We have forms of ID, obviously - we have passports, driver's licences etc, and we have National Insurance cards (a kind of tax number), but we don't have to carry them, and tracking a person via them is not possible (there's credit cards for that ).

just to emphasise that point; if these cards are going to be 'forgery proof', then they will require to be read vai machine and checked with some central verification point.  That means an integral part of the system will be perfectly positioned to track movement.

The difference between this and, for example, the driving license/passport systems is that the data for these is not held in a single central position - there are technical issues preventing this sort of easy tracking, because 2 different agencies hold different, disparate data.  In turn, that means in order to track people, the government would have to specify its wishing to 'join' (facilitate communication between) these databases for exactly that purpose.

Also, the data held in the central id card registry would facilitate unprecedented information access for any agency with access to it - not just movements, but also things like health records, previous/current employment, or any interaction you may have had with any government department requiring ID.

[Zarax]

Sounds to me like a good way to fight tax evasion, maybe it's not as bad as you'd think...

Remember that having the info is one thing, but using them is a whole different matter.

Besides, I'd rather give my personal info to the government than any private institution.

[aldo_14]

Originally posted by Zarax
Sounds to me like a good way to fight tax evasion, maybe it's not as bad as you'd think...

Remember that having the info is one thing, but using them is a whole different matter.

Besides, I'd rather give my personal info to the government than any private institution.

Placing RFID or GPS tags in our heels at birth would also be a good way to fight tax evasion, it doesn't make it right.  This sort of information is open to abuse (it may also be open to 3rd parties like banks as indicated by the government... or direct marketing when the costs spiral out of control); the very existence of such a registry removes another barrier to governments that would abuse such information.  As it's likely access will be controlled and kept secret by the government, it's a perfect system for facilitating persecution and oppression; just because we've not had a dictatorship in the UK yet (well, excepting Cromwell, which was really just english AFAIK) doesn't mean we can't have one.

[karajorma]

How about simply giving it to neither. They already have all the information they need. They don't need this and I'm not willing to pay a minimum of about £93 pounds in order to bring in a system which already has the flaws detailed above.

[Unknown Target]

The thing I don't like about the cards is because of the chip, they can track and store information, telling the government exactly where and when you travel.

So, theoretically, let's say you take a bus to work every day. The government doesn't like some things you're saying about it, so they arrange for an "accident" on your way to work.
That's taking it to extremes, but that's what ID cards allow for.

Not only that, but one ID card ALL your personal info on it just SCREAMS "IDENTITY THEFT"

[Rictor]

Originally posted by Zarax
Remember that having the info is one thing, but using them is a whole different matter.

In theory yes, in practice no.

A government, whether it governs by force or by consent, is by nature a powerhungry organization. Those who want to govern want power, for whatever reason. Their job is to act, now the motive may range from "I want to make everyone happy" to "I want to make out like a bandit" but their job is to take action regarding the lives of its citizens. Those who believe that their action is a righteous one will seek to enable themselves to perform these actions more efficiently, and that entails tracking the movements of it's citizens. Remember, no one is even thinking of tyranny here, it is honest people to truly want to help the citizens. But the road to hell is paved with good intentions.

Privacy is one of those abstract things that isn't important if you approach things from a strictly rational point of view. Logically, the only ones who have need of privacy are criminals. But we are a supersticious and backward people, who value privacy for it's own sake. That means we are willing to make life a little harder, waiting lines a little longer and the job of government a little tougher, so we can retain that magical privacy. But simply, we are suspicious of everyone to a degree, and don't want them to have power over us, even to do good. It's all about balance: absolute privacy must be given up in order to make a society function. But I for one do not want to give up more than the bare minimum necessary, which as things stand if even less than we have today.

Or to put it another way: if the potential for tyranny exists, it will probably be realized sooner or later. You can't afford to assume it won't. If you want to avoid tyranny, you have to take away the potential. And having these sorts of ID cards sure makes a dictatorship a whole hell of a lot easier. Same with guns: in America there are currently around 250 million guns. Any American government that really wants to oppress it's citizens is going to be met with the biggest *****-slap in history.

[Rictor]

In the debate, Home Secretary Charles Clarke said ID cards would help counter, not create, a "big brother society".

So they defend themselves against the claim of Orwellianism by resorting to double-think? That's some Zen shit right.

Watch; next thing you know they'll start claiming they were invited into Iraq by the government put into place as a result of the invasion. Oh wait, I'm one step behind.