Did ID card applications surge after scheme was scrapped?

A series of questions in the Commons yesterday suggest that the ID card scheme had a surge of applicants even after it became clear that the Tories would be scrapping the scheme. The figures also shed some light on exactly how much insight the ID card scheme and its associated ID register gave to the government. The answer …

[Anonymous Coward]

probably

to get one in case its worth money in the future...

[seanj]

Who exactly was making these applications?

Easy. Retards.

Paris - quite possibly one of them...

[Captain Hogwash]

Which raises the question of who exactly was making these applications

souvenir hunters

[Anonymous Coward]

"Former Labour ID minister Meg Hillier"

I read that as "Former Lobster ID minister Meg Hillier"

(well at least I haven't done the Hitler joke again)

[John Smith 19]

AC@11:40

"I read that as "Former Lobster ID minister Meg Hillier"

Wot. She wanted to issue ID cards to lobsters as *well*

The woman is unhinged. Unhinged I tell you.

[Anonymous Coward]

leave Meg alone!

She's fabulous entertainment value.

This week she was being interviewed and said that the moves to scrap ID cards and the ContactPoint database were evidence that the Conservatives were taking us backwards rather than forwards.

I hope the Register continues to feature wacky New Lobster MP Meg Hitler long into the future.

[Anonymous Coward]

Way back when...

...I posted a comment here using the play on her name that brings to mind Red Dwarf - and it was rejected!

Anyway, yes, I would leave ??eg Hitler of the Lobster Party alone. In the dark. Throw away the key.

Actually I'd have her, Blunket and Johnson arrested for sedition.

[Sarah Bee]

Re: Way back when...

I can see here that you've never had a comment rejected, so I don't know what you're on about, dear.

[Roger Cornwell]

Cheaper European travel?

As perhaps the only benefit of the ID cards is that they can be used in Europe instead of a passport, possibly some folk decided to pay £30 rather than the £77.50 a full passport costs.

[Roger Varley]

Euro Travel

As an interesting aside, it doesn't work in reverse. I can travel anywhere within the EU on my Cypriot ID card - except the UK.

[Anonymous John]

No

Once the legislation goes through, the cards wont be valid for any purpose, including European travel.

[chr0m4t1c]

Not much of a saving

You had to have a passport already in order to get an ID card.

The people pushing the cards kept "forgetting" to mention that, otherwise even fewer might have taken them up on the offer.

What they /would/ be useful for is emergency backup documentation to travel on within Europe, they're essentially a duplicate travel document that you could legally acquire and then keep separate from your passport in case of loss.

A bit like the photo card that comes with driving licenses these days.

Of course, to do that all they needed was to duplicate the information on the relevant page of your passport and *that* could have been done at a fraction of the cost (a sort of Passport Lite). But for some reason the idiots at the top thought the best plan would be to build a massively expensive new system to run alongside the old one and collect all sorts of personal information that they didn't need to meet the stated aims.

[Anonymous Coward]

@Roger Cornwall

The only problem is, since the goverment has withdrawn them and stated that ID cards are no longer a valid means of identification, our European brothers are no longer obliged to accept them (not that many did).

Of course there could be a load of muppets around who did not think of this!

[Captain Mainwaring]

Unfortunately not

To get an ID card you would first have to either be in possession of a current passport or go out and spend an additional £77.50 to purchase one. No one without a current passport, as far as I am aware, was entitled to purchase a stand alone ID card for 30 pounds, so their was no bargain option for travel in Europe.

Something else Messrs Smith and Johnson kept quite about whilst doing their promotional sales tours.

[Natalie Gritpants]

Antiques roadshow 2110

or flogging off as fake id.

[The Original Ash]

A memento of the Labour government?

Isn't that a little like accusing a 50 year old East German buying a piece of the Berlin wall?

It's something nobody should want to remember personally, but should be recorded in the history books as one of the great failures of the past half-century.

[wondermouse]

do wot?

> even after the newly installed government committed to scrapping the screen...

[Rob]

Momento from Labour Governement

I have one already, I see it everyday when I read the news is called the fck'd economy that Twat brown helped create as a chancellor and a PM.

[Sir Runcible Spoon]

Sir

In view of the balance that the universe strives to achieve between opposite poles, surely there must be some kind of opposite to the data privacy advocate - i.e. someone who likes to put their own personal data out there to as many people as possible.

Personal data whores perhaps?

I'm not sure if I'm joking, so I'll just get my coat.

[IanPotter]

Re: Sir

"In view of the balance that the universe strives to achieve between opposite poles, surely there must be some kind of opposite to the data privacy advocate - i.e. someone who likes to put their own personal data out there to as many people as possible."

Facebook lusers...?

[Anonymous Coward]

@The Original Ash

"Isn't that a little like accusing a 50 year old East German buying a piece of the Berlin wall?

It's something nobody should want to remember personally, but should be recorded in the history books as one of the great failures of the past half-century."

There is a huge market in the former East Germany for East German Communist memorabilia

[nobby]

a mate

of me brother's went to Berlin immediately after the fall of the wall and brought home a suitcase full of souvenir rocks he was going to sell to people. I think there still in the back of the garage somewhere.

[A J Stiles]

Probably .....

..... the same people who enjoy drinking in pubs, now that they can have a pint and not come out smelling of cigarette smoke.

[Anonymous Coward]

Quick turn around

Angela Epstein's 'quick card' was a fake, she had to go back later to the get the real one.

[TeeCee]

Ah, bless.

I've just had a very amusing mental image of diehard Labour supporters meeting up to sit in a circle with their ID cards layed out in front of them, humming the Red Flag and dreaming of the day their Stalinist paradise will be realised.....

You can say you remember the Dark Ages*, but if you haven't got an ID card you weren't there!

*Brown years of course.

[andy gibson]

The rumour is...

Labour supporters and activists were encouraged to apply, so it made as much hassle as possible for the next Government.

[Scott 19]

Well

There was that Commentard here who demanded we all go down to our local fuzz station and get ourselves in the DB as if we had nothing to hide we had nothing to fear and then SCREAMED he was off there and then to get his details stored.

Wonder if he's still as crazy about losing his money as he was about the rest of us commentards calling him several choice words?

[Captain Mainwaring]

Obtaining a pristine original, maybe?

I don't know whether it will still be against the law to make copies of the now cancelled ID card, once they have ceased to be legal tender. If not, perhaps there might be a new lucrative market out there for the online fake ID card makers. With the pristine original in their hand , they can set about making a perfect replica, authentic in every last detail, for an up and coming fake family heirloom market. To keep everything as original as possible, they could charge 30 quid for the beautifully - crafted item to all those millions out there who never got the chance to get one the first time round. In years to come, these cards could be seen doing the rounds in family photo albums and antique road shows, a graphic reminder of the days when obstinate Labour Home Secretaries ruled with an iron fist and dismissed all dissention.

[Semihere]

This is England...

...so they were probably just complete cretins!

[Seanmon]

"...information ...

...held on the appointment booking system is not directly comparable with that held on the National Identity Register."

Hang on, feckin' WHAT? Am I reading this wrong, or is that basically saying "Even if we'd got this through, it would never ever have worked, because we've no fucking idea how to manage even the data we've collected so far."

Je--sus. How many millions?

[Danny 14]

aye

The graduate didnt know how to do an inner join.

[Tom 35]

approximately fewer than

That could be 14,400 and 14,600. Not much of a surge.

[JimC]

@approximately fewer than...

> So, we could probably assume that the final figure was upwards of 14,500 and nearer to 15,000.

Sir Humprey, were he willing to consider anything so undignified, would be rolling on the floor laughing...in the terms of Government, especially nuLab, descriptions of numbers, I am quite sure that both phrases could be describing the same number, depending on the exact direction and quantity of spin required...

[tumbleworld]

Thinking ahead

C'mon, they'll be worth a fortune on eBay's successor in 20 years... :)

[bobbles31]

Maybe it was Labour party activists

getting them for ID card swapping parties....well you know, they have to fuck someone else now that they aren't in power anymore.

[Anonymous Coward]

Q-CAl

Q-Cal is the booking system use by IPS and it's the most god-awful system in existence.

I work for an IPS supplier. Q-Cal is the bane of my life - At one point, we had 4 different booking systems all talking to each other (Legacy PHP, Newer (hah) Classic ASP, New ASP.Net and a secondary system also in ASP.Net) and then a manual process which involved calling up one of the passport offices, freezing all bookings and then re-keying the data into Q-Cal.

It doesn't surprise me in the slightest that they can't query it

AC for obvious reasons

[Guy Herbert]

Who was in the last rush? - A conspiracy theory

Perhaps all those Labour activists and MPs now making it their business to complain about the lack of compensation from the wicked Tories who are taking away (in real life, just invalidating) their beloved ((c) Denis MacShane MP) ID cards.

[Anonymous Coward]

CyberSub

I think you meant "scheme", not "screen":

"So even after the newly installed government committed to scrapping the screen was pushing the legislation through the Commons,"

[Winkypop]

Late surge?

Or, just a lying politician.

You decide.

[Ascylto]

Stalin

I hope they included the five ID card forms I sent off (Freepost) to Meg Hitler, Gordo et al? They all had their names on so they couldn't re-use the forms.

I left a note with each one stating I wouldn't vote for them because of the ID cards.

They evidently took no notice!

Hah! Listening government my arse!