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Richard Elliot:
"If you are a law abiding citizen, then you should have no problem with ID cards or a national ID database - it is a good thing if it can stop crime or increase the speed at which criminals are brought to justice."
If you don't see any value in the privacy arguments, fair enough - many people don't. An argument which might be more likely to persuade you, though, is simply this: ID cards cannot achieve any of the things you are advocating. It will not impact at all on benefit and identity fraud, or terrorism, and cannot make any significant impact (if any) on crime detection (the fingerprint records are the only thing that might, and the only result I can foresee from this is that more criminals will wear gloves. Marvellous.). The nature of crime may change a little, but its frequency will not diminish. The only way to achieve that is to deal with all the socio-economic factors which breed it, and seek effective deterrents, not seek a mythical quick fix.
Arguing that there is no compelling reason *not* to introduce ID cards is not enough for you to conclude that we *should* introduce it. If it cannot achieve any of its stated aims, then it is simply a massive waste of public money which could be better spent.
(And in case it's relevant to you, my background is in psychology and law).Nic Shakeshaft, 7 years ago.