So Charles Clarke is ready to present the new proposal for the introduction of compulsory identity cards, supposedly to combat identity theft. I wonder how long they have actually spent thinking about this scheme, as surely identity theft will be far easier when we all have our existence reduced to a single card. A central database of ID’s on a computer will lead to a nightmare for many, computers are not reliable enough to be responsible for our existence – and even if they were there are serious moral implications. With the introduction of ID cards we will experience the ultimate expression of a totalitarian state, a complete lack of anonymity, nowhere to run, nowhere to hide from the state.
Imagine the scenario: it is 2010 and citizen 59712 walks into their bank to withdraw some money, but due to a system error they no longer exist as their ID card is not accepted - ‘computer says no’. They are then sent to their local government ‘unpeople’ detention centre where people live until their existence can be determined. If they cannot be traced they will be put into (new) labour camps until they earn the requisite points to be given a new identity. The lucky ones who manage to escape will be able to buy back their original identity on the black market; which - since the cards were introduced in 2006 - is replete with stolen identities due to constant hacking of the government database.
By 2020 the government have managed to crack down on any form of terror, apart from state terror, which exists daily in random arrests, known as ‘Tagging’. Tagging is where the government suspects someone of terrorist or criminal intentions and to pre-empt any action by that citizen they add some ‘Tags’ to their ID cards. These Tags can be anything from a parking offence to murder, depending on how quickly they want the suspect to be arrested. The worst Tag available is to be marked as ‘Terrorist’, if this happens to your card (even in error as is often the case) then it immediately alerts the nearest ‘CI’ (Citizen Informant) who will track you and inform the Terror Police; who are usually on the scene in minutes. Rumours abound that many of these ‘Terrorists’ were in fact innocent, and had been incorrectly linked to the Underground movement that was trying to bring down the government, by trying to destroy the government database.
The Underground movement were in existence from the very beginning of the ID card launch, but are also responsible for pursuing other civil liberties, such as a free press, and freedom of expression. Intellectuals and popular musicians, who were classed as dangerous citizens and officially gagged for the protection of Britain’s Democracy in 2008, frequented the Underground, and were often absorbed by it. There was a series of large protests against the government shortly before the 2009 election, but the government claimed these were terrorist acts. They began a sustained propaganda campaign through the state-controlled media, and managed to arrest the protest leaders. Within weeks fake videos were issued by the state news Terror department, showing these leaders confessing to being involved in a terrorist plot to overthrow the government, and steal democracy from Britain. Tony Blair subsequently decided that in order to protect British Democracy from terrorism he would have to suspend the elections until order could be restored. Due to the ongoing ‘War on Terror’, it has not been safe to hold elections since…
ID cards are being presented now, in 2005, as simply a way of cracking down on identity fraud, and that the information held on such cards would not be ‘substantial’. However, what trust can we put in a government that has consistently lied to its electorate since its election in 1997? What is to say that once they manage to introduce these ‘basic’ cards they will not in future make amendments to them, that they will not see fit to increase the information and importance of cards due to increased (and false) security threats? The government have proved themselves unaccountable to the public, and they always have been, we only know what they allow us to know; so what is to stop them from secretly holding vast amounts of information of these cards in order to better control us? Senior backbencher Gwyneth Dunwoody said some Labour MPs were uneasy about the scheme:
‘The history of police forces or governments holding every element of information about people’s lives is not that they are always used responsibly, but used in some instances by governments for the worst possible reasons’
If you think that Britain as a totalitarian state is a ridiculous notion, then look around you. We have taken several steps towards this future already, and unless we stop to open our eyes and look around, we will keep walking blindly towards this future, until it is too late.