By Nick Heath, 22 December 2008 13:26
NEWS
More than 1,000 messages asking for ID cards have flooded into the Home Office.
Over the last two years, 1,142 out of 3,073 pieces of correspondence to government on the biometric cards have been classified as "wants an ID card", according to Home Secretary Jacqui Smith.
Smith revealed the figures in a recent parliamentary written answer where she added that the cards appear to be growing in popularity.
"From October 2007 to September 2008, the number one theme every month, accounting for by far the most common subject matter, has been 'wants an ID card'," she said.
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The announcement follows Identity and Passport Service (IPS) research that found 55 per cent of the public "agreed with ID cards" in November 2008, down from 60 per cent in August.
Smith also said that the Home Office also planned to introduce a secure "web-based service" to allow people to check how much of their "core identity information" is held on the National Identity Register, the central government database containing the personal and biometric information of ID cardholders.
She added that the IPS is in the process of procuring the system to run the web service from those companies bidding to produce the ID cards and run the National Identity Register.
Comments
There are 30 comments. Join the discussion
1. Radical Meldrew
Oh no, tell me they are not serious. Individual access to view our own personal details is a potentially serious flaw. How are they intending to prevent others from also viewing all of the held data on an individual? I expect it'll be an ID card number and a PIN - That's no more secure than our bank cards which are hacked and cloned every single day! I would urge them to reconsider and restrict access to only be made from vetted, secure locations.
2. anonymous
Oh please, what the hell is jacky on now, 1000 requests! Please remind me, how many citizens are there in the UK.
3. drew stephenson
Really? So a thousand people want one as opposed to the many thousands who don't? Best get on with it then...
And whilst we're actually asking questions, what exactly does it take for an e-mail to be classed as "wants an ID card"?
Sounds like a bit of spin in the making to me.
4. Simon Evans
It is reasonable to want an ID card. The massive opposition to the UK government's plans stems from two factors. The first is the inability of this government to control data security, with the consequent fear of ID theft and all its consequences. The second is the National Identity Register, designed to record every transaction involving the ID card, and to be accessible by government, without the card owner necessarily knowing. No-one trusts this government, with good reason, and we have no real reason to suppose future governments will not play fast and loose with our private information.
5. Guy Reynolds
So thats 1000+ out of how many million UK Citizens and less than 50% of the 3000 pieces of correspondence.
6. D Waltham
Lies, damn lies, statistics, Govt statistics. .whatever they say believe the opposite....Far far closer to the truth..
why not put it to a vote...
7. Jimi Davis
I don't believe that in a million years. It's probably part of a PR campaign to suggest there has been a turnaround in public opinion! Then again I am a member of no2ID...
8. anonymous
A thousand. Flooded? Over the course of a year?
And how many have joined NO2ID in that time?
Actually, the first question should probably be: what are the other categories that the Home Office file letters under?
1,000 letters in favour, out of 3,000 letters in total, suggests that most people are not in favour. Have the Home Office been separating out all the different reasons that people oppose the ID scheme, but lumping all those in favour into one pile to inflate the figures?
Methinks you have been spun.
9. Guy Herbert (General Secretary, NO2ID)
We don't know whether these are distinct individuals or what the content of the letters actually was. "Wants an ID card" is actually quite a broad tag. *I've* had 3 letters this year asking 'where can I get an ID card?'... but several more declaring themselves in favour of what they conceive to be the scheme, or an alternative version - all of which could be construed as wanting an ID card.
In light of the newspaper coverage this week perhaps we should wonder how many of the 1000 letters are from spouses of members of the government
10. Chris Tolmie
OK so 1,000 out of 60,776,238 (July 2007 est.) is one six hundredths of a percent of the UK population. Democracy at work! Did she count the objectors too? Of course not.
The bar gets lower and lower.
11. anonymous
There was an online petition against id cards with over 30,000 signatures.
12. anonymous
Well if it's down to public demand, lets have a referendum on the ID cards and then see how many people want them! Any yet - despite these things being predicted years ago, when they start coming true, people simply think they are always for the public good.
13. Barry Stamp
This is broadly equivalent to the number of people who ring the customer services number on the side of a beer can and ask for a top-up to be delivered.
14. anonymous
Today's Government spin fantasy. Just how gullible do they think we are
15. Tim Jackson
Did the Home Office press release refer to 1000 letters as a "flood"
16. J Baldwin
From this clever piece of PR, we can infer that 63% of people don't want to be given an ID card.
P.S. To take a straw poll do you just ask the Secretary of State for Justice what he thinks?
17. Ed Neale
That's great news! I have had just over 1,000 visitors to my web site, so based on Jacqui's figures, a stunning 55% of the UK population want my services - and there was I thinking the next 12 months were going to be tough....
18. Gary Stimson
So 1,000 pieces of mail in 2 years. That's 2 per day. 1,000 out of a population of 60,000,000.
They do not say how many are repeat correspondence from the same person or how many have been written by Jacqui Smith's husband.
Two thirds of their mail is not "classified as wanting an ID card". I can't believe Silicon.com have fallen for this spin! The headline should be:
"Please don't make me have an ID card" say two thirds of UK citizens.
19. Roger Huffadine
Lets have some interesting research - get the 1000 people and do IQ tests on them - & - lets have bookies giving odds on the resulting average IQ - my bet would be about 87 - anyone else care to place an estimate?
20. anonymous
No Jacqui - the most common subject matter was actually 'who wants an ID card'
21. Richard Davies
who are these people? probably brain washed morons who would queue up to jump off a bridge if you asked them to!
22. GALLEYSLAVE
PLEASE NOTE!
IT WAS PLEASE GIVE ME AN I.D. CARD
NO ONE MENTIONED BUY OR PAY!
THEY WANTED A FREE ONE!
NOW THERE'S A THOUGHT!!
IF THEY WERE TO BE GIVEN FREE WOULD THE DISSENTERS BE SILENCED.
23. Tony Evans
I would encourage people to think carefully about why they do not (or do) want an ID card.
At the heart of this is a serious point about how our country works.
Do we:
a) Want government and parliament to tell us what to do and have an increasing control over our lives, or
b) Maintain the principle of government and parliament being the servant of the people?
The way that we wish to be governed should determine the core direction of information flow and who is accountable to who.
It is not about security of information in a system, cost of the system in money terms or whether we trust this or any other colour of party in government. It is about the people knowing about the people who have been elected to govern on our behalf. That does not include the incremental acquisition of information on the individual subject or citizen - under any guise.
Having taken several centuries to remove power from a monarch, I for one am not in a hurry to see it handed over to another power base who appears to have an increasing desire to be served rather than serve.
24. mj
so that's 10 emails a week over the last 2 years?
I tell you what Jaqui if this was the amount of traffic you were getting on ebay you wouldn't sell a bloody thing , and I'm guessing that's exactly what's happening your not selling this bloody thing and you never will , try ebay though you might get rid of them for their novelty value
25. anonymous
Thats not a representative amount. Most of us here dont want them. Remember that over 1000 people in mental health care each year claim to be napoleon.
26. Charles Shaw
I really dont believe that at all. I suppose the immigrants that are getting the cards first asked for them. I'm sure next years students who need a student grant have petitioned the government asking to make sure they take out an ID card or they cant have one. Sorry, that just sounds like rubbish. Is santa gonna bring them to us? ha ha
27. karen challinor
I don't know, I take a few days off for christmas and the government release a piece of spin in support of the ID card/NIR scheme, it's almost as if they knew what I was doing
so lets see, most of the comments so far have nailed pretty much what I want to say, 3000 mails in two years is hardly a flood and 1000 in favour is not a majority in any accounting system used outside parliament, 2000 against however is a majority in most books.
one thing I am confused about though, given their record with confidential information how have the government managed to keep the supposedly freely available email address they used for this information so secret for two years?
I was totally unaware of any address I could send my thoughts on the matter, could silicon.com please publish the address so that I can rectify that please
28. Ask Jacky
Yes, it would be good to have the email address of where we can state our opinions of Jacky's ID cards. It would also be interesting to ask the Home Office for a repeat of their much vaunted 'statistics' a month after the email address was made public.
29. Bob Sole
I wonder if they've been counting the mails from people who don't want an ID card? I've just sent them one. I hope we get a press release next year telling us how many they got.
Fat chance.
30. anonymous
Spin spin spin - and silicon.com seems to be lapping it up. The original question was about the balance of pro and anti comments/ enquiries, the Home Secretary chose to answer a different question. Also note that the classification is done by the IPS itself...
Ignorance of what 'having an ID card' means is probably one cause, and another may be the number of foreign nationals who have enquired shortly before ID cards became compulsory for them!
Say no to ID cards and (more seriously still) the National Identity Register