UK ID card scheme goes under

The Register is sounding the death knell for the UK Government’s mad, bad and dangerous to know ID scheme.

yesterday’s statements from the Home Office to make it a racing certainty that ID cards are dead in this parliamentary administration… Yesterday the Home Office said that the introduction of ID cards would be dependent on the review of Home Office operations being carried out at the behest of new Home Secretary John Reid, and a BBC report last night quoted Home Office sources as saying that within this, tendering had been postponed indefinitely… it’s not just a case of not happening as in missing it by a month, six months, slipping to 2009, but screwed, gone, off the radar unless somebody comes back with a spec for a viable project…
So outcomes – Blair accepts he’s been overwhelmed by the facts and backs off, or Shouty Blair resumes and a rebodged version collapses some more in the run-up, or even as a contributory factor to, his departure. Whatever, ding dong, the megaglitch is dead.
And next? A more sensible, and desirable Government approach to identity management now has a chance at a look in.

pax et bonum

Article posted at 12:41pm on 12 July 2006
Category: Politics, General