Thoughts on this?

[Suff]

It starts as free id. Then it becomes like a passport, need it more than once a decade and they start charging. Lose it or destroy it every year and eventually it starts to become an "offence" because the costs start to mount.

Once a government issues that little bit of plastic everything starts becoming your problem. Trust me on this one normal life, like having stuff stolen, becomes a real drama once you have an ID card which is stolen. Worse than having a passport stolen, you only need that to travel. Once an ID card is issued you need it to live. I've seen this several times with colleagues in the mainland who have had their wallet stolen which has their ID card in it. Ditto women with purses.

That is not a society I want to call my country. You can say I live in France so I'm a hypocrite, but, actually, France is not "my" country. They can do what they want, I will come home some day if I don't die unexpectedly first. So I have an opinion on what "my" country wants to do.

[Workingman]

You need to lay off the Mission Impossible DVDs.

There is a world of difference between M15 - 6 type security IDs with fingerprint and iris recognition and a simple photo ID with name, address, NI number and DoB. Most of us carry most of that last info every day, everywhere we go, just not in one place so not "acceptable".

I checked my wallet to confirm. It's no big deal.

[Osc]

I honestly don’t get the fuss. Here, we are told to bring photo id to vote, it’s perfectly normal, and most of the time we don’t get asked for it. Passport, driving licence or social welfare card, as Frank says, it’s not a big deal.

[Suff]

I would lay off except it is neither mission impossible nor even impossible. In fact it is not improbable and many "democratic" governments are well down the path.

It is often lamented, here, that government is too intrusive and too controlling.

Why on earth would you meekly submit yourself to the first step on a path to much deeper control?

The very best way to avoid this is never to go anywhere near it.

You need to experience it first hand in civilian society. One of my Swiss colleagues had his wallet stolen and with it his ID card and driving license. OK no drama with the ID card, go to the police station, identify himself from his photo and other documents, no issue he would get a new one in a month.

Then his driving license. Certainly, ID card please. No ID card, no way to get your replacement license. In Switzerland you are not allowed to drive without your license on your person. 1 month plus the license renewal. Nightmare.

Imagine being Belgian and having your ID card stolen. Immediate loss of access to your online banking in most banks. Then no way to identify yourself in the branch because they use the ID card.

So this one piece of "easy" identity filters into every walk of life because it becomes so easy to do and the government wants them to use it because everywhere you go you leave a trace.

Until it all goes wrong and you become a non person until that little piece of plastic is replaced.

These are not MI or MI6, these are real world examples of ID card usage in other countries, going on right now.

Where angels fear to tread!