Millions of public sector workers, including teachers and nurses, could be the first in Britain forced to carry controversial ID cards.Home Secretary Jacqui Smith today said she wanted a “universal” scheme, with a national roll out by 2017.
Among the first groups to be targeted for compulsory cards will be those in positions of trust - starting with airport workers next year.
The Home Secretary said this group could then be extended to Olympics staff, power station workers snd even teachers, nurses and care home workers.
Compulsion for these groups was a matter of ongoing discussion, she told the influential Demos think tank in a speech this morning.
Critics are now urging the Government to ditch ID cards completely after plans to make them compulsory for all British citizens were ditched
She confirmed people applying for passports would not now have to enter their details on the new ID cards database until the end of 2011 or 2012 - a delay of two years.
People will also have the choice of taking only a passport, although their details will still go on the database.
Miss Smith claimed the overall cost of the scheme would fall by one billion, to £4.5 billion, and that it would work faster.
She said: “The way we are now approaching the scheme will lead to a significantly quicker take-up of its benefits.
“One of the strengths of this choice is that now people will be able to get a card when they want, rather than wait until they renew their passport.
“This means that we can now aim to achieve full roll-out by 2017 - two years ahead of previous plans.”
In a speech in central London to the think-tank Demos, the Home Secretary predicted a future in which British people would voluntarily enrol for the cards - which carry their details and fingerprints in a microchip - because doing so would make their lives easier.
She said checks by the Criminal Records Bureau for teachers, some nurses and carers could be trimmed from four weeks to just four days for card-holders.
Ms Smith said: “It is inconceivable in today’s world that someone should not have a single, safe way of securing and verifying their identity.”
Rather than having to carry a range of utility bills, passport and other documents to prove one’s identity, there would be huge benefits to possessing a single ID card, she claimed.
And she added: “If anything, I think it will actually make it easier to retain your privacy.”
Home Secretary Jacqui Smith claims the cards will help protect people’s personal details and combat fraud
Former Prime Minister Tony Blair had said a bill making ID cards compulsory would be a major part of Labour’s next election manifesto.
But British citizens, apart from those in “sensitive” jobs, who are enrolled on the National Identity Register will now be able to choose whether to have a passport or an ID card or both.
Outlining a new, gradual introduction of the project, Ms Smith said that all non-EU migrants would be asked to apply for the cards as of this November.
Categories most at risk of abuse, including those seeking to enter the UK, stay here as a student or via a marriage visa would be targeted first, she explained.
Then next year, the scheme will be extended to UK citizens, starting with “people working in positions of trust”, including 100,000 airport workers and possibly security workers at the London Olympics.
Airports, which already carry out strict security checks on employees, are expected to have to meet the £3 million cost themselves.
A year later, youngsters opening bank accounts or taking out student loans will be asked to apply for cards, meaning many parents will end up footing the bill.
During that same year, the scheme will be opened to voluntary applicants of any age.
From 2011/12, all passport applicants will also be registered on the scheme as they apply for the new biometric passports containing fingerprints.
Critics immediately slammed the plans to introduce the controversial cards gradually, with the Tories claiming the Government was working “by stealth”.
Shadow home secretary David Davis declared that it was “inconceivable” that the public sector workers would not already have full ID verification.
He said: “Therefore the question has to be will this add to airport security or is it a way of getting the British public used to an ID card by stealth - despite an explicit promise from a former home secretary that this programme would not be rolled out in a compulsory fashion without a vote in the House of Commons.”
The Government had previously planned to make everyone have an ID card in addition to a passport by January 2010.
Its climbdown follows a series of data loss scandals and the Tories now claim Ms Smith should “get real” and ditch the policy completely.
Mr Davis said today: “The National Identity Register, which will contain dozens of personal details of every adult in this country in one place, will be a severe threat to our security and a real target for criminals, hackers and terrorists.
“This is before you take the Government’s legendary inability to handle people’s data securely into account.
“Serial scandals of loss of data have destroyed people’s belief in this white elephant, while major commercial companies clearly have no confidence in the project.”
He added: “Jacqui Smith should ditch the bluster and own up to the reality that this project is as far away from fruition as it has ever been.”
Shadow immigration minister Damian Green added: “The Government is continuing to blunder on with the ID card scheme, even in a case like this where it will provide little extra security at great cost to the industry concerned.
“The Home Secretary really should get real and give up on ID cards.”
And shadow attorney general Dominic Grieve immediately rejected claim that the cards would make life easier.
“That’s nonsense because the card itself will only have limited access to the information on it for those outside the state security system so those cards would be readily forgeable in a way to mislead a member of the public as to who somebody’s identity is,” he told the BBC.
“So I don’t think these cards are going to be of very much value to individuals to prove their own identity at all and if they do start being accepted in that way then I think there is a serious danger that they will be forged and used as forgeries to mislead people.”
UKIP leader Nigel Farage also attacked the plans. “They are just going to bring in ID cards through the back door,” he said.
“I wouldn’t trust this Government to run a donkey derby, let alone a database which would be the holy grail for criminals.”
Director of human rights group Liberty Shami Chakrabarti said: “Yet another re-launch of the ID scheme looks suspiciously like a new sales pitch for the same bad product.
“The message plays on fears of immigration, concerns about airport security and sentimentality about proud 18-year-olds buying their first beer.
“But foreigners already require passports and visas to come into the country and there is no reason whatsoever why workplace entry details need to be put on a central national database.
“ID cards remain disastrous for our purses, privacy and race relations. A slow soft sell won’t change this thoroughly bad idea.”
She also expressed surprise that adequate security measures may not already be in place for airport workers.
The definition of high-risk workers was “subjective” and could soon include other groups such as police officers, government officials and even teachers, she added.
Phil Booth of anti-ID card scheme NO2ID also dubbed it a “marketing exercise”.
He said: “Whether you volunteer or are coerced on to the ID database, there’s no way back. You’ll be monitored for life.
“That’s why the Government is targeting students and young people, to get them on before they realise what’s happening.”
Neil Pakey, chairman of the Airport Operators Association, said ID cards could potentially strengthen an “already robust” aviation security scheme.
But he warned that the Government must make sure the new arrangements did not duplicate existing processes and made background checks quicker and more efficient.
He said: “Airport operators would incur extra costs in implementing this scheme, which would need to be balanced by the benefits delivered.
No explanation has yet been given for the delay to the overall project, although opponents have pointed to concerns over its cost and whether the technology will work.
Plans to include iris scans have been shelved, with only fingerprints and facial scans now likely to be included on a national ID cards database.
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