Labour minister says 14 year olds should get ID cards

Labour minister says 14 year olds should get ID cards

www.theregister.co.uk

A government minister has spoken glowingly of the prospect of kids as young as six handing over their biometrics as she boasted that the Tories and LibDems would find it impossible to unpick the government’s ID card scheme.

Meg Hillier, an under secretary at the Home Office, told a fringe meeting of tobacconists and convenience store owners at the Labour Party conference that cards could be foisted on given to 14-year-olds, the BBC reports.

(visit the link for the full news article)

Please read on to the rest of the article.

www.theregister.co.uk
(visit the link for the full news article)

This is getting really bad. We have a government that is determined to push itself onto the population even though it knows it isn't popular enough to be kept in power were there an election today. Most opinion polls show the Labour government to have low popularity (28%. For comparison, their largest political party rival has a 50% popularity rating (22nd Sep. 2008)).

[edit on 23/9/08 by Rapacity]

From the same source:

Hillier pointed out that six year olds were already required to hand over their fingerprints as part of visa applications. While 16 and 17 year olds are due to be caught up in ID card plan, she said the age range was “up for grabs” and there was every possibility of its being lowered, if the cards were deemed popular.

If by popular she means that children will find themselves ostracised or unable to prove they are entitled to cut price travel without a card, she may well have a point.

Warming to her theme and no doubt ordering another vat of Kool-Aid, Hillier then told the meeting that the government was going “full steam ahead” with the plan and that Gordon Brown wanted to roll the scheme out “quicker than it was possible.”

The article continues a little more but I don't think it'd be right to reprint the whole thing so please follow the link above.

Sorry, I didn't really feel the need to read the whole article because I am really not surprised at all. People will wind up demanding to be stripped and chipped in the next few years, the same way we see people demanding that the fluoride be put back in their water.

Here in the States, most schools require that their students carry an issued photo ID, "in case of emergency." The school I worked at most recently had their ID's issued through the town police department, but linked to the state.

While I think it's morally wrong to force biometric ID cards onto 14 year olds and (I didn't know this until this article) to force 6 year olds to provide their fingerprints for visa applications, I've mainly posted the article because I'm absolutely astounded at the amount of voice \d hatred of this current "government" that is shown in the comments given by readers of the news:

For example:

Bunch of smug f###s

By Anonymous Coward Posted Tuesday 23rd September 2008 14:37 GMT

==The current government.

Smug, self-important f###s. Who eat the s### that suppliers feed them. And grin hugely.

and

ELECTION. NOW.

By b Posted Tuesday 23rd September 2008 14:37 GMT

I really didn't think it was possible to loathe slimy bunch of parasites any more.

I was wrong

more

I beg

By Anonymous Coward Posted Tuesday 23rd September 2008 14:46 GMT

I beg to differ, I have a very easy solution to "unpick" the stazzi-esque database it's called a tonne of of high explosives in the building that houses the system.

A second solution is to line all the Labour MPs up against the wall and have the shot as an example to future politicans that they're job is too keep the economy running and that's more or less it.

If people in the world were thinking that people in the U.K were content and blind then maybe some of the other comments provided to the news article might open your eyes. They opened mine.

[edit on 23/9/08 by Rapacity]

I don't see the problem in the Netherlands we have that for sometime .. even in some areas we have police may body check and check bags in criminal areas and in places where there is a party like Saturday evenings.
It brings down criminality because you may never now if they check you and it is a crime here not being able to show a passport or Id cart if asked by police.. you will have to pay a fine than.

reply to post by jackinthebox


Jackinthebox, you're not missing much by not reading the whole article the important bits are in the sections I've quoted

I think most people on ATS will agree that the only outcome of the "chip-n-pinning" of us all will be our own total captivity. I'm an intelligent guy but I really do not understand how we have come to this unless it's our human nature to domesticate and herd ourselves just as we have our domestic animals. I feel that we are becoming lemmings in that we are quickly running into the sea without looking in front of ourselves. Our eyes, ears and hearts tell us to stop running but we keep going. Boy, I'm glad I can swim; and I'm glad I'm running in the opposite direction to the majority.

Christ i hope they manage to pull off the leadership vote they are after

get the crazy scot out of there and hopefully someone with a better plan in power

at the very least it should slow the plan down a bit

reply to post by MarkLuitzen


The problem isn't the identity card. It's its purpose, imposition and breadth.

We all already have means of identifying ourselves (driver's license, passport, bank account, bus pass, relatives, national insurance card, previous address details, whatever ID is used to provide this ID card in the first place). Those who do not want to identify themselves don't; and a biometric ID card will not change that. There will always be a loophole that will allow someone to have multiple ID's. Biometric or not.

The cards will neither prevent nor stop "crime." The "criminal" mindset is an unchangeable part of a person's biological and psychological make up. Environment and society determine a crime's actualization from a thought. Then it takes someone to report it.

I object to an ID card that will turn me into a property of the state (don't laugh ). This government's idea for this card is that it will turn a random, unorganized body of data (ie a person) and turn it into a quantified, organized set of statistics that may be used by any government, civil servant, business (plus the rest) for any purpose they will. Be that purpose to target advertising (electoral rolls and data held by the DVLA were used for this), to assess taxation liabilities, to determine a person's rights, to determine government spending, to give or restrict access to state assistance (benefits, schooling). It could be used for much more sinister things too (I wouldn't like to mention them. It's been done several times before and will be done again, I'm sure). This ID card will be used for more than identification. It'll be used as justification.

[edit on 23/9/08 by Rapacity]