National biometric identity cards

"It is time for Tony Blair to recognise that the tide has turned decisively against his plans to establish a national identity cards scheme," the progressive daily writes after the House of Lords called on the government to clarify the costs of the scheme to register and store citizens' biometric data. "Since [the London attacks of] July 7, the cards have been presented, once again, as an anti-terror measure. But this justification is as misleading as it ever was. There is no reason to believe the July 7 attackers would have been thwarted by the existence of ID cards. The bombers were home-grown extremists, not foreign jihadists. What evidence is there that they would have been picked up earlier by the security services if they had held some form of personal identification? (...) And let us not forget the Government's lamentable record when it comes to high-technology projects."

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