Questions of identity permeate our politics. What is it to be English, to be British? The Prime Minister sought to reclaim patriotism for the left in his conference speech, but his invocation of football stadium flag-waving and Oasis swagger was a remix of Britpop themes which were tinnily jarring two decades ago and beyond tired today. It was karaoke Cool Britannia.
A much more thoughtful consideration of what modern patriotism requires, and where the dangers in an exclusively ethnic approach to national loyalty lie, came from the Home Secretary, Shabana Mahmood. In both her conference speech and her comments at a fringe meeting with The Spectator, Mahmood navigated questions of faith and flag with a candour and willingness to challenge the simplicities of both simple-minded left and hard-hearted right which was refreshing.
It also stood in stark contrast to the ugly questioning of her right to call herself English, which emanated from ethno-nationalists online after her speech. Mahmood demonstrates a commitment to open debate, empirical reasoning and civility towards her opponents which is much more quintessentially English than the exclusionary identitarianism of her detractors. But what is not quintessentially English, or British, let alone justified by any appeal to empiricism, civility or openness, is Labour’s proposal to make our individual identity a commodity controlled by government.
The PM’s plan to impose digital ID is illiberal, incoherent and undoubtedly counter-productive
The Prime Minister’s plan to impose a digital ID system on Britons is illiberal, unworkable, incoherent, unnecessary, ideologically wayward and undoubtedly counter-productive. The argument from first principles against any form of identity card system goes to the essence of what it is to be a British citizen.
Liberty lies at the heart of our identity. To be British is to be free to act, speak, associate and enter contracts without requiring the state’s permission, oversight or consent. That is at the root of our Common Law traditions. We are sovereign over our own actions, save for those which the state explicitly prohibits for the common welfare.
Other jurisdictions operate differently. Napoleonic principles and statist assumptions govern how other countries regulate common life. There, actions require state permission or licensing. The presumption is that liberty is so precious it must be rationed by the authorities. Raison d’état trumps live free or die. Hegel and Rousseau, the primacy of the state and the supremacy of the common good, are the tutelary influences in other countries. For Britons, it is Edward Coke and John Locke, John Milton and George Orwell – the defenders of the cussed independence of the individual from executive overreach.
The establishment and maintenance of a national database which will register – and regulate – movement and employment treats humans like cattle to be branded or commodities to be imprinted with a barcode. To be British is to find the idea itself alien.
It is not even as though the state itself can make an argument from efficiency. There are already multiple personal identifiers the government generates and then fails to manage adequately. We already have passport numbers, national insurance codes, driving licences – and yet the government still cannot police our borders robustly, collect taxes fairly or get the DVLA to operate with minimal efficiency. Past efforts to create a single – voluntary – identifying code for users of government services have run aground against resistance from departments jealous of their data and technical incompetence from the state’s officials.
The one state body that should be trusted above all to use data rigorously, the Office for National Statistics, is facing a crisis of credibility over its failure to produce reliable information. Why should any of us submit to another government data programme when the existing programmes don’t work effectively, government departments themselves don’t trust them, and the state cannot guarantee their efficiency, transparency or honesty?
Advocates of the new digital ID system protest that we already share our data with tech companies daily. What greater infringement of privacy does an itty-bitty government programme really involve?
Big Tech may know more about each of us than we’d like. But it doesn’t possess the state’s clunking fist. And the chilling effect on liberty this government has generated is real. The recent armed arrest of the comedy writer Graham Linehan for a provocative tweet was merely the highest-profile recent example of the police taking action against citizens for speaking too freely. More than 12,000 people a year – more than 30 a day – are arrested for causing online offence.
Britain appears gripped by a state of ‘anarcho-tyranny’, with social media posts zealously policed while shoplifting surges and burglaries go without investigation. Why should the law-abiding majority be forced to carry a digital ID when the state seems incapable of tackling the crime gangs whose e-bike couriers deal drugs on our streets, whose black economy labour is laundered in fake barber shops, and whose people-smuggling activities escalate every day?
The Prime Minister’s argument that we need digital ID to tackle illegal immigration is industrial-scale gaslighting. Employers must already check the immigration status of any hire. If they are set on employing an illegal worker, a lack of a digital ID won’t dissuade them. The black economy has not shrivelled in other countries with ID cards, such as France, Germany and Italy.
Meekly accepting the imposition of digital ID would be to accept the government’s alibi for its failure on migration. But worse, it would be to acquiesce in an erosion of the liberties which define these islands. The Conservatives are right to oppose this folly. It must be resisted à outrance.
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