We are developing the social individualist meta-context for the future. From the very serious to the extremely frivolous... lets see what is on the mind of the Samizdata people.
Samizdata, derived from Samizdat /n. - a system of clandestine publication of banned literature in the USSR [Russ.,= self-publishing house]
|
Home Office Admits ID Card Costs Unknown The Home office has admitted that it has no idea how much innocent citizens will be charged for being forced to have an Identity Card.
At Lord’s Question’s today, Home Office Minister Baroness Scotland of Asthal was asked to confirm the current estimate of £70 per person (already almost twice the figure that was being talked about a year ago). She refused to do so, saying that the Government would not be able to assess the costs until the compulsory phase begins.
So every single person in the country is effectively being told to write the Government a blank cheque.
The predicted cost has already almost doubled within a year. Given the Government record on IT projects, how much higher will it go?
Full report in the Scotsman.
Cross-posted from The Chestnut Tree Cafe
|
Who Are We? The Samizdata people are a bunch of sinister and heavily armed globalist illuminati who seek to infect the entire world with the values of personal liberty and several property. Amongst our many crimes is a sense of humour and the intermittent use of British spelling.
We are also a varied group made up of social individualists, classical liberals, whigs, libertarians, extropians, futurists, ‘Porcupines’, Karl Popper fetishists, recovering neo-conservatives, crazed Ayn Rand worshipers, over-caffeinated Virginia Postrel devotees, witty Frédéric Bastiat wannabes, cypherpunks, minarchists, kritarchists and wild-eyed anarcho-capitalists from Britain, North America, Australia and Europe.
|
It may be a red herring. They haven’t decided the nominal fee, and it will be set at whatever (given plenty of exemptions and transitional arrangements) is deemed politically acceptable. Whatever the charge attached to the card, all of the (unknown but large costs) of the system will be borne by the citizen one way or another. If that adds up to only £70 a head a year I’ll be very surprised.