INTELLECT (http://www.intellectuk.org) states its aim is to establish and deliver the vision and strategic objectives to improve the environment in which our members do business, promoting their interests and providing them with high value services, establishing and maintaining Intellect as the high profile, industry and public affairs focal point for the information technology, communications and electronics businesses. It describes its campaigns as "forming the PINNACLE of a PYRAMID of 150 programmes and issues that Intellect is currently pursuing on its members' behalf".

Both the Identity Cards Programme Director, Katherine Courtney, and the Head of Policy, Stephen Harrison, addressed the conference. Of particular interest was the talk entitled "Achieving Public Acceptance" given by Kevin Bell of Fleishman Hillard Public Affairs.

Meanwhile at a grassroots level it becomes apparent that ID cards are already a MUST HAVE for the festival going crowd. To gain entrance at the Glastonbury festival this year, Michael Eavis has decided that festival goers will have to produce compulsory photo id cards. These cards will include a photograph of the ticket-holder plus an electronic chip with their details. http://www.citizencard.net.

Remember that The centrepiece of the site is a pyramid, doubling as a stage, which is exactly a one tenth copy of the Great Pyramid at Giza, and is built over a 'blind spring' (a place where the earth releases and absorbs energy). The present pyramid was built after its predecessor was destroyed by fire. Michael Eavis said of it

"I can promise that the return of the Pyramid will be something special. This is the third one, the biggest ever and we really have got it right. It is going to be third time lucky. The Pyramid is unique and we hope that it will add to the festival's magic.

Mean Fiddler now has a 40% stake in the Glastonbury Festival, The festival's traditional not-for-profit ethos, reinforced by its commitment to good causes is somewhat compromised by Mean Fiddler PLC's part-ownership of the event, and corresponding share of the net profit. Eavis's defence takes the form of a strong emphasis on positive PR - in order to ensure that public attention is focused firmly on Glastonbury's more friendly aspects,

In addition to the ID cards, Glastonbury festival organisers employ constant CCTV monitoring of all areas of the festival, car parks and local areas: Facial recognition technology and the Livescan system - a way of capturing fingerprints by computer and transmitting them directly to the National Automated Fingerprint Identification System (NAFIS). This enables a live, immediate, identification to take place against a database of six million people. This must surely make Worthy Farm and the surrounding area the most heavily monitored mini police state in the world, and a prime example of SOFT POWER in action... B @ Global Elite

click here

MOO, MOO, Baaah! sheep act like cattle shocker!

Tickets for this year's Glastonbury festival broke all records yesterday by selling out in just over three hours. All of the 112,000 tickets for the pilgrimage to Worthy Farm, which went on sale at 9am, had gone by 12.20pm.

Organisers had been keen to avoid the recriminations which surrounded the ticket sale last year, when telephone lines were constantly engaged and the website crashed after receiving more than 2m hits. Many were left not knowing whether they had bought a ticket. - Guardian

Yet more behavioral control: VIA political shenanigans

Question: How do you make the Public accept ID cards?

Easy: Just run continual PSYOPS of the 'Make Poverty History' & Live8. POP stars showing their teeth and punching the air should make everyone feel really nice, like they are really helping out Africa!

then Just bribe them with the END OF THE WORLD!!!!

Energy ration cards for everyone planned

By Charles Clover, Environment Editor 02/07/2005

Every individual in Britain could be issued with a "personal carbon allowance" - a form of energy rationing - within a decade, under proposals being considered seriously by the Government. Ministers say that increasingly clear evidence that climate change is happening more quickly than expected has made it necessary to "think the unthinkable".

They believe they need to start a public debate on energy rationing now if Tony Blair's aspiration of cutting greenhouse gas emissions by two thirds by 2050 is to be achieved. Under the scheme for "domestic tradeable quotas" (DTQs), or personal carbon allowances, presented to the Treasury this week, everyone - from the Queen to the poorest people living on state benefits - would have the same annual carbon allocation.

This would be contained electronically on a "ration card", which could be the proposed ID card or a "carbon card" based on supermarket loyalty cards.

It would have to be handed over every time a form of non-renewable energy was purchased - at the filling station, or when buying tickets for a flight - for points to be deducted.

High users of energy would have to purchase points from low users, or from a central "carbon bank", if they wanted to use more energy. - Telegraph

Select Committee criticises ID Cards Bill

OUT-LAW News, 29/03/2005

Government plans for a national identity cards scheme will change the fundamental relationship between the State and the individual, according to a report published last week by the House of Lords Select Committee on the Constitution.

The Committee, which considers whether draft laws will have unexpected or ill-advised consequences for the constitution, warns that the Identity Cards Bill seeks to create a database that will record more information about every adult in the UK than has ever been placed on a single database before. Such is the significance of the database to the Government proposals that the Committee suggests that the Bill should more properly be known as the "National Identity Register and Identity Cards Bill".

"Such a scheme may have the benefits that are claimed for it, but the existence of this extensive new database in the hands of the State makes abuse of privacy possible," says the report.

The report suggests various methods by which privacy concerns may be lessened, stressing that the information contained on the Register should not be regarded as the "property" of the Home Secretary.

Fundamentally, says the report, the Home Secretary should not be responsible for the development, operation and maintenance of the scheme, but should be responsible only for the development of the proposals and the regulations within which it will operate.

An expert advisory or consultative committee should be set up to assist with this.

An independent Registrar, reporting directly to Parliament, should be created to oversee the maintenance of the Register, says the report, which compares the possible independence of the Registrar to that currently enjoyed by Customs and Excise and the Inland Revenue.

Operation of the scheme should be overseen by the proposed National Identity Scheme Commissioner, as set out in the current proposals, according to the Committee.

However, it expresses concern over the lack of provision in the Bill for the independence of the Commissioner from the Secretary of State, or the empowerment of the Commissioner to deal with complaints from individuals concerned about the Secretary of State's handling of their cases.

Accordingly the Committee suggests that the Commissioner should be independent, his powers increased and that he should be empowered to report directly to Parliament - rather than to the Secretary of State, as is currently proposed.

Finally, on the question of timing, the report suggests that Ministers should not try to provide in the current proposals for the future extension of the scheme from a voluntary one to a mandatory one.

At present the draft leaves Ministers with the power to enact the "compulsory" aspects of the Bill through a "super-affirmative" procedure, but does not detail the date on which the Government is likely to create the necessary legislation.

Ministers have said in the past that this is likely to be in 2012 or 2013 and that the legislation will be pushed through once a critical mass of the people have voluntarily received identity cards.

The Committee suggests there is no urgent need to provide for this now and that the Bill should be limited only to the introduction of the voluntary stage of the scheme, on the grounds that later legislation will better reflect the inevitable practical changes that experience of such a scheme will bring.

This is especially important, concludes the report, as "these measures reflect a significant change in the constitutional relationship between the State and the individual". In these circumstances, "the change to a universal and compulsory scheme should not be brought about by secondary legislation, even by a "super-affirmative" procedure".

The report follows in the wake of two earlier Parliamentary Committee reports critical of the Government proposals; one by the Home Affairs Select Committee of the House of Commons and the other by the Joint Committee on Human Rights.

see also House of Lords Select Committee on the Constitution Report on the Identity Cards Bill (6-page PDF )

out-law.com

Labour steps back in push for ID cards

Benefits were oversold and legislation is flawed, admits minister

Alan Travis, home affairs editor - Thursday August 4, 2005 The Guardian

The government has admitted that it has been guilty of "overselling" the case for a compulsory national identity card scheme in Britain and conceded that it will not prove a panacea for fraud, terrorism or the abuse of public services.

Tony McNulty, the Home Office minister now responsible for identity cards, has also admitted that "in its enthusiasm" the government also mistakenly emphasised the benefits to the state rather than arguing its benefits to the individual citizen.

His comments mark a significant change in gear in the Home Office approach under home secretary Charles Clarke to the national ID card scheme and contrasts sharply with the far more enthusiastic, almost "cheerleading" tone adopted by his predecessor David Blunkett. The legislation for the scheme is now going through parliament. The switch follows support for ID cards nosediving in the polls in the face of speculation about the possible cost of each card.

He also confirmed that ministers are to announce a "ceiling" on the cost of each ID card in October in an attempt to restore public confidence in the scheme in the face of speculation that it could range between £93 and £300 each.

Mr McNulty also revealed a fundamental flaw exists in the current ID cards legislation and acknowledged that a likely battle over whether the cards become compulsory between the Commons and the Lords will end in deadlock.

The government will not be able to use the Parliament Act to overturn the Lords opposition as the move to compulsion will be through secondary legislation.

"Perhaps in the past the government in its enthusiasm oversold the advantages of identity cards. We did suggest, or at least implied, that they may well be a panacea for identity fraud, benefit fraud, terrorism, and entitlement and access to public services."

He said ID cards would help where fraud and abuse of identity were part of the equation: "I think, maybe in the past, we were offering the system as a panacea to all these ills when it will help and benefit each one but is not going to solve any one of them."

Mr McNulty stressed the government was still committed to going ahead. "We don't resile from it. Perhaps we ran away with it in our enthusiasm. I apologise for our overselling the case for ID cards ...

"We have been arguing what the state can get out of it rather than what it can do for the individual in providing a gold standard in proving your identity. There are now so many almost daily occasions when we have to stand up and verify our identity."

In the immediate aftermath of the London bombings Mr Clarke argued that ID cards would not have prevented the attacks but said the scheme might make it harder for terrorists and their supporters to hide their activities behind multiple and false identities.

Mr McNulty also disclosed that the double-lock "super-affirmative" procedure for parliament to approve the move to compulsory ID cards by which both houses have to vote in favour is flawed. "We are looking again at it to see if it achieves what we want to do," he said. It was "an algorithmic recipe for deadlock because it does not resolve the situation if one house says yes and the other says no".

He warned that the battle over compulsion would end up being constantly batted back and forth because the government could not use the Parliament Act to override the Lords opposition because it is to be done by secondary legislation. - guardian.co.uk

Fingerprint ID scheme in school

Pupils' fingerprints will be used to register and measure attendance at a primary school in Wiltshire. The school, which prefers not to be identified until parents have been consulted, will use technology already piloted in Singapore. The head teacher said it would aid self-registration and cut teachers' administrative workloads. Youngsters will use check-in stations each morning, where the technology will identify and verify who they are. The parents of any absentees will be notified using text messages on their mobile phones.

The head teacher said: "We will be rolling it out for year five and six. "It is not to do with truancy - we have a statutory obligation to cut teachers' administrative tasks."

"The scheme will be used only on 10 and 11-year-olds "

Cost of ID card scheme questioned by Home Office consultants

- Plastic cards unlikely to last 10 years, say auditors
- Search for office space for staff may affect estimates

Alan Travis, home affairs editor - Thursday November 10, 2005 - The Guardian

Fresh questions over the government's costings for the introduction of the national ID card scheme were raised yesterday by its own consultants who doubt that the plastic cards will last for 10 years. A Home Office study by independent auditors KPMG also warned that the government may have overestimated the lifespans of the hi-tech biometric pods which contain the scanners needed to record every adult's fingerprints, irises and faces.

The study disclosed that the government is being forced to adopt a contingency plan in an attempt to find sufficient office space for staff who will compile the national identity computer database that is at the heart of the scheme. Temporary office space is to be rented because there is a shortage of suitable buildings in Britain and it would take three years to build them from scratch.

But Andy Burnham, a Home Office minister, said the study confirmed that the majority of the cost assumptions behind the scheme were "robust and appropriate". He said: "There has been lots of discussion of the potential costs of identity cards, much of it based on misinformation and misunderstanding. This review provides independent confirmation that, while estimates will continue to be refined as new information becomes available, the methodology is fundamentally robust and reliable."

The last official costing for the scheme put a figure on it of £5.8bn. The unit cost of a combined 10-year ID card and passport when it is phased in from 2008 was £93. A stand-alone biometric ID card aimed at the low paid and pensioners would cost £30. But a study by the London School of Economics earlier this year disputed these figures and claimed that a total cost of £19.2bn, with individual cards costing £230, would be nearer the mark.

The Home Office published only an extract from the KPMG study yesterday, which omitted any of the actual figures in the confidential report. The consultants raised fresh doubts over costings in three areas. These were:

- the 10-year lifespan of the cards: KPMG said information from suppliers was inconclusive on this point and therefore their durability was questionable. It suggested that the costs of replacing damaged cards as they wore out needed to be revised;

- lifespan of the biometric pods: the Home Office expects the advanced scanners to be used to take everybody's "biometric" - an electronic scan of their fingerprints, irises and facial images - to last five years. But KPMG said this appeared to be optimistic given their "very heavy use and the rate of technology advance", and a three-year life would be a better assumption, leading to higher initial costs;

- offices to house the national ID register staff: The Home Office needed to house the staff to set up the central computer database within two years but there were few suitable buildings on the market outside London and the south-east and it would take three years to build new offices. Extra costs would be involved in renting temporary office space.

The Home Office said card manufacturers believed it was possible to develop an ID card that lasted 10 years. Estimates for the programme's contingency levels would be updated early next year. - guardian

NO2ID: ID cards bill on the rocks - LSE vindicated

Tue, 17 Jan 2006 - NO2ID this evening welcomed another devastating setback to the Government's proposed ID cards and National Identity Register. The House of Lords overwhelmingly passed an amendment by a majority of 81 requiring the full costs of ID cards to be properly audited and presented to Parliament before the scheme can proceed.

Phil Booth, NO2ID's National Coordinator said:

"The Government are attempting legalised identity theft. They want to take our most personal data and not only charge us for the privilege, but charge others for checking it. The Home Office's proposed scheme would create a huge new State monopoly, funding the unprecedented surveillance of the British people. We applaud the peers who have brought the Government to account.

"It is particularly apt that the Lords should nail the Government on costs. They have tried throughout to make the argument about ID cards seem to be all about the costs; picking fights with anyone who contradicts them--most notably the LSE. No-one believes the Home Office figures, and they've seriously undermined public trust in ID cards before even managing to pass the legislation.

"At last the Government are being forced to justify themselves, and they don't seem to have any answers. What price privacy? How do you value freedom? And what choice will there be for law-abiding, tax paying citizens-or are we expected just to foot the bill in silence and suffer the consequences?" - politics.co.uk

Blair rejects Tory leader's call for ID cards re-think

Publisher: Jon Land - Published: 2006-01-18

Tony Blair today rejected demands by Tory leader David Cameron to think again over controversial plans to introduce identity cards.

Mr Cameron warned at Commons question time that ID cards risked becoming "a monument to the failure of big government". But the Prime Minister said they were needed to fight identity fraud and illegal immigration.

Mr Cameron, pointing to reports that Gordon Brown was opposed to ID cards, asked if the scheme would go ahead when the Chancellor succeeded Mr Blair.

Mr Brown, sitting alongside the Prime Minister on the front bench, nodded vigorously as Mr Blair replied: "I certainly can give a guarantee that the Government as a whole is absolutely behind identity cards ... "

The exchanges came after a serious setback for the ID plan in the Lords on Monday when peers voted to delay the scheme until the full costs were disclosed.

Mr Cameron, raising the issue today, demanded: "With rising deficits in the NHS, huge costs of pension reform and tighter pressures on public spending, how can you claim that spending at least ?600 million a year on your ID cards scheme is a good use of public money?"

Mr Blair replied: "Because if we introduce an ID cards scheme and reduce identity fraud that makes a major difference to the costs of government, to the costs of doing business. "In today's world if we want to tackle illegal migration, crime and identity fraud, then using the new biometric technology to have ID cards is an important part of doing so." - 24dash.com

UK Government to press ahead with ID card plans

LONDON: The British Government intends to proceed with Prime Minister Tony Blair's plans to introduce high-tech national identity cards despite suffering a setback when the House of Lords voted against them.

The Lords voted on Monday to force the government to provide more details on the cost of the controversial scheme. The vote, carried by a majority of 81 in the unelected upper chamber, could hold up the cards, which the government says are designed to combat fraud and terrorism. The government says it has already explained the costs and benefits, and a new probe would be costly and cumbersome.

"We have put figures in the public domain. We have been quite clear about how much it will cost to issue people with a biometric passport and a biometric identity card," Home Office Minister Andy Burnham told Channel 4 news.

The Lords also inflicted two other defeats on the bill, voting to demand a secure and reliable method of recording and storing citizens' personal data, and to change wording on the use of cards in controlling access to state benefits. The government says existing laws are enough to ensure the data is safe.

The cards with data for fingerprint, iris and face recognition technology are among the world's most ambitious experiments in biometric identification, and their roll-out could be used as a model for other countries.

The government argues ID cards are essential to combat identity theft, abuse of the state benefits system, illegal immigration, organised crime and terrorism. But opponents say the scheme is unworkable, costly and undermines civil liberties. Britons would initially be expected to buy the cards when they apply for a passport.

Home Office Minister Baroness Scotland estimated the cost of a joint passport and identity card would be 93 pounds (US$163) while a stand-alone ID card would cost 30 pounds (US$52) at current prices.

"The government has already made clear that the scheme will be self-financing ... We've already set the anticipated parameters," she told the Lords during a debate. The government says accountants KPMG have backed up its sums.

But opposition Lords cited reports that put the cost much higher. Academics at the London School of Economics last year estimated the scheme could cost up to 19 billion pounds (US$33 billion), meaning cards could cost up to 300 pounds (US$528) each to produce. - china daily