This morning, 26 September, PM Keir Starmer announced the new, but long-threatened, ‘Brit cards’. This is a compulsory digital ID card that will be necessary in order to work in the UK or rent a home. The government claims that this is a measure against illegal immigration, tying it to rhetoric around the ‘small boats crisis’.

This led us in the Canary newsroom to speculate as to whether Starmer genuinely has a big red button labelled ‘digital ID’ to push whenever he has too many crises going on at once. Unfortunately, we were forced to conclude that even Keir couldn’t be this clueless.

If you wanted a distraction from the ongoing McSweeney scandal, surely you would look literally anywhere other than a deeply polarising mess of a scheme cooked up by…. McSweeney’s think tank, Labour Together. Right?

Don’t we already do that?

Making the announcement, Keir Starmer said:

I know working people are worried about the level of illegal migration into this country. A secure border and controlled migration are reasonable demands, and this government is listening and delivering.

Digital ID is an enormous opportunity for the UK. It will make it tougher to work illegally in this country, making our borders more secure. And it will also offer ordinary citizens countless benefits, like being able to prove your identity to access key services swiftly – rather than hunting around for an old utility bill.

The official press release went on to explain that:

A new digital ID scheme will help combat illegal working while making it easier for the vast majority of people to use vital government services. Digital ID will be mandatory for Right to Work checks by the end of the Parliament.

The scheme will be available to all UK citizens and legal residents, saving time by ending the need for complicated identity checks which often rely on copies of paper records.

Now, fair is fair, I need to offer my thanks to Labour here. Usually I at least have to read a few sections into a document before the glaring issues start cropping up. Here, some kind junior aide put the contradiction in the first three sentences.

I don’t know about you, but the last time I got a job I had to provide a copy of my passport. Add to that a couple utility bills, bank statements, a blood sample, three strands of hair and a retinal scan. Don’t get me wrong, I’d be thrilled if that faff went away.

But the point is: we very much do already check right to work in the UK. We also already have a digital and biometric identification scheme, specifically for migrant workers. They’re called eVisas – people usually receive them automatically when they apply for a visa.

So what exactly is checking the right to work in the UK (but it’s digital now!) going to do to curb illegal immigration again?

Haven’t we already tried that?

If all of this stuff about mandatory ID cards sounds familiar, it should. We had nationwide compulsory ID during WW1&2 to help with things like rationing and conscription. It was scrapped in 1952 because of mission creep, as the cards were increasingly used for law enforcement purposes. At the time, we decided that this was fundamentally opposed to British values and civil liberties, and uncomfortably European (I’d say it was the 50s, but that bit sounds like Farage could have said it yesterday).

Tony Blair actually tried cooking the idea back up again in 2006 with the Identity Cards Act. The pilot scheme finally got off the ground in 2008… and promptly failed miserably. Both the Conservatives and the Lib Dems opposed the plans as “intrusive, ineffective and enormously expensive”.

Never one to let massive unpopularity and infeasibility stop him from championing a bad policy, Blair started banging on about the need for compulsory ID again in 2024. He wrote in the Times:

We need a plan to control immigration. If we don’t have rules, we get prejudices. In office, I believed the best solution was a system of identity, so that we know precisely who has a right to be here. With, again, technology, we should move as the world is moving to digital ID. If not, new border controls will have to be highly effective.

However, at the time, then-home secretary Yvette Cooper ruled out the idea. She stated that:

It’s not in our manifesto. That’s not our approach.

That was 14 months ago, for anyone keeping count. It’s not even Labour’s fastest U-turn this year! so what changed?

Well, apart from needing a new way to look ‘tough on immigration, grr’, Starmer’s team also received a policy paper championing the scheme. It was written by Labour Together, a think tank dedicated to pulling Labour to the right and opposing Corbynism. The document explained that:

For a progressive society to work, it needs to be able to collectively agree who is allowed to join it. Because it will exclude those who cannot join it, it needs to give its members proof that they belong. The UK doesn’t do this. Our conflicted historic approach to issuing identity credentials has led to a situation that represents the worst of both worlds. We currently can’t effectively stop people from living and working in our country illegally. Nor can we efficiently support legal citizens and residents to exercise their rights.

Some say that if you put your ear to a Labour Together policy paper, you can actually hear the echo of Blair whispering to you about the value of socially conservative but economically interventionist politics.

Who actually wanted this?

Starmer’s announcement has faced criticism from multiple angles. Over 500,000 individuals have already signed a petition opposing the measure, calling it  “a step towards mass surveillance and digital control”.

Tory leader Kemi Badenoch said:

There are arguments for and against digital ID, but mandating its use would be a very serious step that requires a proper national debate.

Instead, this is a throwaway conference announcement designed to distract attention from Andy Burnham’s leadership manoeuvrings and the crisis in Downing Street over the prime minister’s chief of staff.

If it’s too draconian for Badenoch, something’s gone really wrong. Likewise, Silkie Carlo – director of anti-surveillance campaign group Big Brother Watch – said:

Digital IDs would do absolutely nothing to deter small boats but would make Britain less free, creating a domestic mass surveillance infrastructure that will likely sprawl from citizenship to benefits, tax, health, possibly even internet data and more.

Incredibly sensitive information about each and every one of us would be hoarded by the state and vulnerable to cyber-attacks.

Starmer has no mandate to force the population to carry digital IDs and millions of us will simply not do it. The cost to the public purse will likely run into the billions, much like Blair’s failed scheme, but the cost to our freedoms would be even more serious. He is making an enormous mistake and should drop the plans sooner rather than later.

The National speculated as to whether any of the residents of Northern Ireland, Wales or Scotland had been consulted on being forced to carry a ‘Brit card’. The paper’s ‘Jouker’ asked:

Did no one think about the ramifications of those in Northern Ireland being forced to carry a “Brit Card”? What about the Scots, of whom a large proportion would sooner defecate in their hands and clap than be referred to as a “Brit” in any form?

Before the digital ID plans can take full effect, they’ll first go through a period of consultation. Then, they’ll need to be passed as legislation in the House of Commons.

In the meantime, I’m sure Starmer would be grateful if you’d look away from the McSweeney scandal, Mandelson/Epstein, and the comparatively high charisma of Andy Burnham. There’s a good chap.

Featured image via the Canary

By Alex/Rose Cocker

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