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Labour cannot be trusted with our freedoms

November 7, 2007 12:00 AM

Welsh Liberal Democrat Social Justice Spokesperson Peter Black AM has demanded that Labour scrap their ID Card scheme before yet more public money is wasted.

His comments follow the news that Gordon Brown has demanded a review of the technology behind the proposed new ID cards. Mr. Black said:

"Leaving aside the fact that ID cards are a solution looking for a problem, and will not assist in uncovering and convicting terrorist criminals, neither the finances, nor the operational details of the series of Labour schemes to keep tabs on us all stack up. Given their record, there is every reason to suppose that the £5.3bn ID cards scheme will be hit by the same problems that have engulfed other Labour IT projects.

"Labour has made a total mess of introducing interviews for first-time passport applicants. The project has gone over-time, over-budget and still isn't working properly. How can we possibly believe it will be able to introduce the infinitely more complicated identity cards scheme, which will be based on the same infrastructure, when it can't even deliver this basic system?

"Yet Labour intend to make it compulsory to go onto the identity register and receive an ID card when applying for a new passport. This means that ID cards would be compulsory for anyone wanting to ever travel abroad (the vast majority of us). This is a clear breach of Labour's manifesto commitment to introduce ID cards '…initially on a voluntary basis as people renew their passports'. Labour cannot be trusted with our freedoms.

"It is time to pull the plug on the ID cards proposals before we waste any more taxpayers' money on this expensive white elephant."

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