IMHO, this is a distinct possibility. If you think our current AG would balk at this, you need to think again. Once the national ID is established, it is a short step to busting you if you decide to grow your hair longer than in your ID photo, grow a mustache or beard, tatoo something on your forehead, change your hair color, wear colored contact lenses or alter your appearance in any way at all. I’ve never been fingerprinted for any reason at all and I want to keep it that way. I don’t want my retinas scanned and I don’t want everything about myself in some sort of all-encompassing database. To be plain about it, I don’t want to give up any more of myself than I already have, and that is too much as it is.
Aside from any predictions of doom and gloom with stormtroopers demanding to check our papers before we can move along? The real reason most of us don’t want a national ID is because we see very little benefit to having one.
Marc
In those countries which have national ID systems, what happens if you go out in public without one? Do the police ever ask people for their ID’s whom they hadn’t already stopped for some other reason? Whether you’ve been stopped specifically for an ID check, or for some other reason, is it a crime or violation of any sort to not have one’s ID card on you in a public place?
Nothing (but I’m the equivalent of “White Male Middle-aged non-person”. Dunno about people who are, say, Arabs, or rowdy-looking)
Not that I’ve ever heard of. Again, with same caveat as above
Nominally yes. Never seen it enforced, though. I was once spot-checked for driving license and was without ID or license - got a slap on the wrist, a $20 fine and had to show up at the local police station to prove I had a driving license to the name and ID I gave. They didn’t care about my not having ID - it was having no form of identification that got me even the minimal treatment I got.
And this is in a country that has some real security issues, with reason to want to be able to identify people quickly when necessary!
Dani
Because of that alone nothing happens. You are obligated to have one and present it on request (but not neccessarily on the spot) However it is advisable to carry it in case you are checked for any other reason. If you don’t carry it, and someone who is allowed to check your identity officially (e.g. police, not the cinema cashier) checks you for some other reason and you can’t present it, they can count you as “not identified” If you’re suspected of a crime or misdemeanor they can take you with them to identify you.
No, unless you you count things like an occasional check whether the clients in a club or something similar are of legal age.
To give some idea of the present government’s mentality, not possessing an ID card will note be a criminal offence.
Three cheers for freedom and human rights. :dubious:
No, it will be a Civil offence- no right to jury trial and no right to a defence of any kind- it will be an absolute offence with a large fine attached. :smack:
So Blunkett is able to have his cake and eat it- as he said (paraphrasing) he doesn’t want any lily livered liberals becoming martyrs by refusing to carry one and having their day in court (with a good chance of having a jury find in favour of their liberties). No, he will just remove money from their bank account until they comply.
And anyway it is thought to be going to cost each person some £50 ($80) for the card although there will be discounts against its use as a passport and driving licence.
Additionally, initially it will be voluntary, except that any new passport or driving licence will come with an additional charge of some £30 ($50) and an ID card.
One of the several reasons why Labour has lost any chance of my vote (previously I would have voted for them if my own part (LibDems) had no chance- not any more. (of Course Iraq and the treatment of Asylum Seekers by the Govt was making my vote doubtful anyway.)
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again - the ID card is a red herring. This is about getting a nationwide database of biometric samples. It is exactly the same as if we were all asked to toddle on down to the local bobby shop next week for fingerprinting. How on earth can anyone insist that I ought to be perfectly happy with this?
The government’s own information protection watchdog has recently registered serious concerns about the attitude the government is taking with this scheme. As he says, it goes well beyond almost every other ID scheme in foreign countries, whose existence we are supposed to take as proof that it will be harmless. The scale and application of the proposed ID is quite a new step.
In my case, it’s because I accept the government’s right to regulate my right to drive on public roads, but I do not accept their right to regulate my mere existence in my own country. I will not pay vastly in excess of £3bn in order to prove to David Blunkett that I am not a criminal. That is not how I wish my country to work.
Clairobscur I think makes many of the points I would like to, and in doing so proves my point. The ID card in and of itself is not the problem, and indeed has many useful facets, convenience being one of them. This is why I believe it is a complete fake, a handy carrot for Blunkett to get what he really wants. The key issue is the information stored, processed and accessed; by whom, with what cause, and with what oversight. To date, the answers to these issues have been that the information stored will be far-reaching, indepth and highly personal. Oversight, access and use issues have not been answered in the slightest. Look at the card trial. Let the people of some city or other play around with the shiny cards; let the Mayor proclaim how happy she is that she can claim benefits now, or some such. Great - we know the cards are shiny. This addresses none of the real issues. It is a stunt, designed to show off the funky new toy that is supposed to sucker us all into being fingerprinted for the convenience of the police.
Arguments that I already carry around no end of ID perplex me - yes, I do, and it works just fine. If I like, I can leave it at home. Where is the problem here that is being solved by the introduction of an expensive shiny thing? Are we really that shallow that we’re willing to be fingerprinted and subjected to fines simply so we can have something that fits in our wallet?
I’m affraid I’m very ignorant on this topic, since first, laws on ID documents have changed a couple times, and second, because the last time I was asked my ID by the police I was a highschooler, in a bar owned and patronized by corsican criminals and former convicts and where druck traffic, fencing, etc…was taking place (In case you’d wonder, we would hang out there because it was the only place where they would let us stay all day long for the price of a cup of coffee. Paying customers really wasn’t their main source of income)
AFAIK they can ask you your ID for any reason whatsoever or none at all. For instance, there are police officers making ID checks in the subway, targetting potential illegal aliens (IOW, if you don’t look african or arab, you’ll never be stopped). Whatever kind of government-issued ID is fine (ID card, driving license, the french equivalent of a “green card”, civil servant’s ID, passport…). You’re under no legal obligation to have one (hence you can’t be fined or whatever else if you don’t) but, still AFAIK, they can drag you to the police station to establish your identity if you don’t. I wouldn’t know either if they must have any valid reason to do so, nor if they can keep you for an undetermined time if they can’t find out/ you can’t prove your identity.
A pair of stories on the pending US Supreme Court case which some are saying may determine whether national ID cards would ultimately be found constitutional. I don’t know enough about the case to make such a claim but thre are implications of the case I find disturbing.
OK. I found an official site explaining the stuff :
Identity checks can be made :
*When there’s an indication that the person(s)
-Commited or attempted to commit a delict
-Are preparing a crime or delict
-Are likely to provide informations about a crime or delict
-Are researched by a judiciary authority
*According to the Schengen agreement :
-In areas situated within 20 kilometers of the boundaries with countries whic are part of the agreement.
-In ports, airports, railway stations, bus stations open to international traffic
*When ordered by a prosecutor to research defined delicts, in a determined place for a determined duration.
So, laws are much more restrictive than I thought. Hence the apparently random identity checks I refered too above are either done without legal basis, or actually ordered by a prosecutor.
You can establish your identity during these identity checks with a broad variety of documents I’m not going to list, or, weirdly, by testimonies of other individuals.
If you’re unable to do so, as I wrote above, they indeed can bring you to the police station to establish your identity, but they can’t keep you to do so for more than 4 hours ( the rights you’re entitled to if they do are also mentionned, but I’m not going to list them, either).
So, actually, laws are much more restrictive than I used to think.
(That would be for France…just thought I didn’t mention it, and not everybody will know I’m french)
In Germany you must have an ID card (except when you have a passport; but the ID card is more convenient to carry around). You don’t need to carry it on you but if you are stopped by the police in suspicious circumstances and you cannot establish your identity by documents they might take you to the station for fingerprints/photograph. Usually everyone who carries a wallet also carries their ID card.
To put it in perspective: the only time in my life that I was asked by the police for my ID card, 15 years ago, was also the only time that I had a gun pointed at me, not an occasion that you forget easily. (I was in a bank’s public lobby at night, at a public videotext terminal peaceably trying to break from the closed bank’s system into the public videotext system,and the break-in alarm apparently went off. They let me leave after noting down my identity and checking that I was not wanted.)
But I am reasonably well-behaved in public, stop drinking when I notice the first change of mood, and don’t hang around in publicly known drug market areas. More adventurous souls might have their ID checked more often.
On traffic stops (usually at evenings on alcohol-prone holidays and when the regional prison found itself an inmate short), and also on occasion of the two traffic accidents I was in, I only ever needed to show my driving license and occasionally the papers for the car.
Apart from that one occurrence I only needed my ID card to prove my identity e.g. to open a bank account, rent an apartment, register a new domicile, also to travel to other European countries. I’d also need it to buy wine at the supermarket if I looked younger than 16, which I don’t.
One aspect of the British project that is very differenct from usage in Germany is that it seems the British ID cards will be based on a national register, while the German system is based on the municipial residents’ register (registration is mandatory but there is no national register, except for aliens (the human sort)).
This is a bit of a hijack, but bear with me:
After 9/11, there was talk of creating a sort-of “frequent flyers ID”, which would allow you to bypass most security, or at least get preferential treatment, in exchange for a background check and probably some other things as well. I kinda wish they had actually done that and that I had one, even though it’s not like I’m flying every weekend on business. (More like 6 or 8 flights a year.) Note, however, that this would be a totally optional card.
Also, I agree with the worries about function-creep. Look at Social Security and your SSN. It was not intended to be used the way it has been. So far, the function-creep seems to have been benign, but I could see something happening that turns the function-creep malignant.
If this had been in place, the hijackers could have found a way around it. The background check wouldn’t be that thorough - don’t forget that they already avoided heavy security scrutiny simply by being on business-class tickets, and checking in at the last minute at a busy time of day.
What Noone Special said applies to Greece too. They dont make a fuss if you dont have your ID