Home Office minister Meg Hillier has said the government wants industry to help drive down the cost of ID cards to the public.
Hillier said that, although the public was largely supportive of the National Identity Scheme, many people had concerns about the fee involved.
The first cards will be issued at a charge of £30, but Hillier said that, as the volume issued increased, companies should be able to produce them more cheaply. She emphasised, however, that most of the cost of the scheme was created not by the cards themselves, but by databases and supporting systems.
"Cost is a very important part of this and I am pleased that the work we have done over the past year or so has meant that we have reduced the cost of the scheme by around £1bn," Hillier told a conference on document security in London on Tuesday.
Hillier said that some 60 percent of citizens are in favour of ID cards and that the percentage has remained steady, despite the huge data loss at HM Revenue and Customs. She predicted that, as ID cards are rolled out, people will realise the benefits of carrying them.
Sir James Crosby's recently published review on identity assurance suggested that the scheme would provide greater benefits for the public if the card was issued free of charge.
Philippe Martin, senior analyst at Kable, said: "I welcome the minister's aim of reducing the cost of the card, but the government must demonstrate the benefits of the ID scheme to citizens, such as accessing health and other services, if it wants widespread adoption."
ID theft is a growing problem and it is estimated that two percent of all UK adults are victims. Hillier gave the example of pensioner Jean Hutchinson who "hijacked" other peoples' identities in one of Britain's biggest benefit scams. The 65-year-old would look for newspaper stories about people who had emigrated and then use their identities. She defrauded the benefits system of £2.4m, before landing a five-year jail sentence.
"She would not have been able to do that if there had been ID cards," said Hillier .
Talkback
They must have found a very leading question to come up with 60% in favour, probably on the lines of "If the card were free would you be in favour of an ID card so that we can stop nasty terrorist type people coming into the country" Followed by "How much would you pay" which would then give them the statistics and to say that cost is a large factor stopping people giving full support.
Asking and expecting the industry to bail them out works. Just look at the way the banks passed on the interest rate cuts to mortgages. Worked for Darling Brown. Oh it didn't. Still there is always the positive example of how quick fuel prices drop with the barrel fluctuations after NuLab asked the companies to pass on savings. Oh Hang on that didn't work either.
Maybe this smacks of desperation as in "Have faith because someone somewhere will make it right, we watch the movies you now and some of our friends are in show biz."
Re Benefit fraud - ID cards would not make up for the fact that the system is crap as are the perpetrators, DWP or whatever they are called nowadays. I have made savings due to pension wipe outs thanks to this NuLab crew. As a consequence, now I am job hunting again, my benefit entitlement, having stuffed over £3K into the system with Tax and NI over the last 3 months of work is £60 per week for 6 months full stop, absolutely nothing else and if I don't bend over quick enough on the bi weekly visit, they threaten to stop that.
Thanks to the NuLab laws we can now work on until death but that doesn't help if there are no suitable jobs and if there are they wont hire you due to age, sorry over experience or was that experience (presumably of Play School) not current enough.
It is quite alarming that even with mass communication, in a very short relative time period, this lot have been able to do more damage to the country than 2 world wars.
Meg Hillier MP says 'the public was largely supportive of the National Identity Scheme, many people had concerns about the fee involved' and then goes on to say 'most of the cost of the scheme was created not by the cards themselves, but by databases and supporting systems'
Surely even someone of minimal intelligence can see therefore, that the most effective way to reduce the cost is to eliminate the central ID cards database - the most expensive part of the system accrding to Hillier and exactly the part of the system which people are concerned about.
I have yet to see even an attempted justification by the government, or indeed anyone else, for the presence of the central database in the ID cards system.
It's not a matter of ensuring the central database is secure enough. If data exists, and someone desires to obtain it, a way can always be found, however secure the IT systems may be. The only 100% reliable way to ensure the data in the central ID cards database cannot be stolen is to ensure there is no central ID cards database.
Meg Hillier's statement is another example of the government trying to fool the public into thinking they are addressing people's concerns by distracting the public with details of some minor area, while ignoring the major problems.
If the statement that 60% of the population are in favour of the whole ID cards system as planned by the government, it can only be because the government's PR has succeeded in this respect.
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Just in case anyone had yet to realise this; listen carefully now; The Government Doesn't Have Any Money Of It's Own. The only dosh they have to spend, they either raise in taxes, or on President Brown's watch, borrowed from wherever countries borrow money.
If we then supplement this insane scheme by subbing them anothe 30 quid, that money is Post Tax. So we end up paying them two (or more) sets of tax on top of each other. If we're all supposed to have one of these things, then we should not be paying for them out of taxed earnings. They are never going to be free, but we should at least be spared having to be double or treble taxed to finance this lunatic plan.