Home > Politics > All

Saturday 21 November 2009

Letters

Wednesday, 7th January 2009

Spectator readers respond to recent articles

Vying with the neighbours

Sir: It was my lot for 20 years to write next to Jeff Bernard, Britain’s greatest ear. Jeff would write about drunken pub chitchat and the reader felt as bored as if he were there, such was Bernard’s ability to recreate the way people talk. After his death I thought my lot would improve. No such luck. Jeremy Clarke’s capture of Egyptian soliloquies (Low Life, 20–27 December) had me once again living in the land of the Pharaohs. Perfect. Also, Aidan Hartley’s story about Valentine Strasser (Wild Life, 20–27 December) was the last straw. There is a plot to humiliate the poor little Greek boy.

Taki Theodoracopulos
Gstaad, Switzerland

ID cards are attractive

Sir: It is nothing short of cynical scaremongering to claim identity cards will put vulnerable women and children at risk, as the No2ID advert does.

It is a fact that the scheme will use security protections as good as some military data-bases, with criminal penalties of up to two years imprisonment for abuse. Where someone’s details are considered especially sensitive, or make that person vulnerable, their identity can be given additional levels of protection.

Civil penalties would never be levied against someone with mitigating circumstances for failing to update their details, but I believe most people will want accurate information because of the benefits they will bring.

In the circumstance portrayed in the advert, we would work with such a woman, or the organisation providing her with sheltered housing, to find a mutually agreeable, third-party address for her to use. She would then have an identity card that would allow her to prove her identity, without ever having to share her address when she doesn’t want to. Her identity card would protect her privacy a good deal more than a utility bill — one of the most common ways currently used to assert our identity.

It is important to point out that for the vast majority of people identity cards will be entirely voluntary. However, I believe that for many vulnerable women in similar circumstances the greater protection and privacy provided by the National Identity Scheme would make an identity card an attractive choice.

Try as they might, No2ID’s use of myths, half-facts and untruths have not won them the argument. Even their own polls show more people favour the cards than do not.

Meg Hillier
Parliamentary under-secretary of state for identity, Home Office, London SW1

Previous page 1 | 2 | 3

Gil

January 8th, 2009 8:23pm Report this comment

Wot no reference to Jews or Israel, Taki? Your fan(s) will be disappointed.

Nutstrangler

January 9th, 2009 2:50pm Report this comment

It would appear that Meg Hillier believes her own propaganda. Neu Arbeit's record on the safeguarding of personal data is hardli confidence-inspiring. I am, however, very pleased to note that Ms. Hillier says, "For the vast majority of people, Identity Cards will be entirely voluntary". In that case, I won't be having one!

David

January 10th, 2009 10:42am Report this comment

"Entirely voluntary"

Does this mean we can still renew our passports, travel abroad and volunteer not to have an ID card?

Adair

January 10th, 2009 6:02pm Report this comment

Dear Meg Hillier,

ID cards are attractive---really?

Are you honestly suggesting your Govt's. scheme will be invulnerable to breakdown, error, attack, corruption, or abuse? Remember we are talking about a scheme which will control ordinary people's ability to conduct their ordinary everyday lawful lives.

Do you understand that databases, especially large and complex ones, are intrinsically liable to failure and error on a cumulative basis over time; not to mention the limitations of people using and maintaining the system. Given the Govt's. record in this area are you seriously suggesting the British people should entrust their lives and identities to the constant 'ownership' and permission of Govt. bureaucracy?

Finally, your assertion that ID cards will be 'voluntary' is ingenuous at best and a lie at worst. You must know, and if you don't it is shameful, that the entire implementation of the ID/NIR scheme is intended to make life without an 'ID card' (or authorised equivilent), effectively impossible.

'ID Cards' and 'National Identity Register' attractive to ordinary British people who wish to sustain the work of their ancestors in building a just, compassionate, and free society---I don't think so.

Terry

January 11th, 2009 9:10pm Report this comment

From where do Nu Labour dig up people like Meg Hillier?

Does this woman really believe this trash that she has penned?

Just what are the mitigating circumstances needed to avoid a £1000 fine for failing to update your ID card? Who would decide? Ms Hillier?

As regards the polls, I think Ms Hillier needs to look again. These are consistently showing that Nu Labour has lost the arguement. The majority of people polled DO NOT want ID cards. The trouble is that the government keep using out of date polls to 'prove' their arguement.

Clive Pollard

January 11th, 2009 11:03pm Report this comment

Meg Hillier states that "we would work with such a woman, or the organisation providing her with sheltered housing, to find a mutually agreeable, third-party address for her to use." My understanding is that amendments to the Bill which allowed for this were specifically rejected.

Tristram Defries

January 12th, 2009 12:31pm Report this comment

Sir,

Home Office Minister Meg Hillier claims (Letters, 7/1/2009) the national identity scheme "will use security protections as good as some military data-bases". Perhaps she is unaware of the hundreds of hard drives, laptops, USB memory sticks, and military / MoD ID cards lost or stolen over the past few years [1] - also, I'm sure our database security isn't much better than at the Pentagon, which seems to suffer regular electronic breaches.

Security is only as good as its weakest link, and there is plenty of precedent to suggest it is inevitable that people with access to our data will lose or it access it inappropriately, even in the Identity and Passport Service [2]. That is why there is a long standing principle of data minimisation - only keeping what is necessary for only as long as necessary - a principle given statutory basis in the Data Protection Act [3], and strongly recommended for the scheme by Parliament's Select Committee on Home Affairs [4], as well as every database expert on the planet about any database, but a principle the Government seems to flatly ignore in favour of collecting ever more of our data for spurious purposes.

NO2ID's Take Jane campaign, far from being "cynical scaremongering", is a hard-hitting and realistic attack on the notion that if you have nothing to hide you have nothing to fear. There are many honest and law-abiding people in vulnerable positions that do have something fear from ever more of their data being stored on ever more databases, and again there is plenty of precedent to suggest that people with access to the data will abuse it. The media have increased awareness of battered wives who have had their new and confidential addresses passed on to abusive husbands [5] by people who have access to HMRC databases, and women fleeing forced marriages and 'honour' violence have been betrayed by people who have access to healthcare, benefits, police and other confidential public sector data [6]. But how many cases go unreported?

Meg claims that someone in such a vulnerable position can ask for "additional levels of protection". This is welcome but there is no provision for this in the Identity Cards Act. Indeed there is a noticeable lack of any acceptance (let alone discussion) from Home Office Ministers that there are any risks associated with the scheme at all. This is not good enough. Unfortunately it is a sad fact of our democracy that the Government is able to press ahead with a scheme that not remains a solution looking for a problem but also one likely to be found unlawful when someone challenges it on human rights grounds.

Sincerely,

Tristram Defries

[1] For example, four reported incidents of "staff accessing the ID and Passport databases for unauthorised purposes" - http://news.zdnet.co.uk/security/0,1000000189,39282044,00.htm

[2] For example:
MoD computer hard drive missing, 1.7m people's details -
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/7667507.stm
Troops' manoeuvres left in club - http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/cornwall/7605923.stm
More than 100 USB memory sticks and 650 laptops have been lost or stolen from the Ministry of Defence since 2004 - http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/7514281.stm
Laptop stolen from a member of the military as he was eating in McDonalds - http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/7344043.stm
Ministry of Defence has lost 11,000 military ID cards in the last two years - http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/03/12/mod_loses_id_cards/

[3] http://www.opsi.gov.uk/Acts/Acts1998/ukpga_19980029_en_9#sch1-pt1

[4] http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200708/cmselect/cmhaff/58/5810.htm#a56

[5] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/2989424/Battered-wifes-secret-address-handed-over-by-tax-office-worker.html

[6] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/2213863/Forced-marriage-victims-being-betrayed-by-doctors.html
http://www.socialcohesion.co.uk/pdf/CrimesOfTheCommunity.pdf

Adair

January 14th, 2009 6:29pm Report this comment

Sorry -- 'ingenuous' should have been 'disengenuous'.

Mat

January 15th, 2009 2:59pm Report this comment

Meg Hillier

You are either a liar or grossly nive!
It is a matter of record that:-
Government held information is not secure.
Existing Civil penalties are already enforced against individuals with mitigating circumstances causing great distress in many cases.
ID cards will be 'Voluntary' only in name - those choosing not to carry one will be gradually pushed to the margins of frustration with all officials asking for them to get everything from a mortgage to a fishing licence - in Nu Labs Brave Nu World life without one will become impossible and we already know the HO is pressuring private business to adopt them as standard.
The NO2ID polls show that people do not trust or want ID Cards but clearly you were cast in the mould of Blair & Campbell and are now incapable of life without spin.

It is worth remembering that in Germany your beloved N I Register would illegal - because it is a high-tech carbon copy of the surveillance system the Stasi Secret Police had on every man, woman and child there, modern Germany took the view that such a mistake should not be repeated.

Meg Hilliar, you and your's are undermining parliamentary democracy, you are circumventing democratic accountability at every turn, you are changing forever the relationship between citizen and state, you are overturning hard won and long established rights and freedoms. You have already presided over laying all the foundation stones for anyone in the future, minded to establish a totalitarian police state - you are building Jackboot Britian

As a lifelong Labour supporter, you and your kind have disenfranchised me, as my conscience would never again allow me to vote for you and what you are doing to what used to be a model democracy.

jason

January 24th, 2009 3:32am Report this comment

It is of no relevance as to whether 'the data base' is secure or not. What is relevant is the principle. Until I break a law, it is of no concern to anybody who I am, where I live or what I choose to do with my life...govt, just butt out of my life.