Anyone in the UK who wants to work will have to have digital ID, Sir Keir Starmer has said in an interview with The i Paper.
The Prime Minister said during what is effectively a relaunch of the controversial policy – first revealed by The i Paper last month – “If you want to work, you’ve got to have it.”
However, he insisted that it would be “voluntary” for all other purposes when questioned by invited reporters, on Thursday.
Starmer’s plan to rollout digital ID has proved highly controversial, with an online petition opposed to the scheme nearing three million signatures.
Initially the government promoted the line that the ID was needed to tackle address illegal working which is seen as a key pull factor for migrants who cross the Channel in small boats crisis
In an attempt to relaunch the policy, the Prime Minister spoke to journalists at a branch of Barclays bank to make a case for the wider benefits of digital ID.
How digital ID ‘will make lives easier’
In an apparent change of tack, Starmer argued that digital ID would “make lives a lot easier”, insisting several times it “is not going to be mandatory”, for purposes such as buying a house or renting somewhere to live.
However, he said it would be compulsory for those wanting to work. “The only area in which it will be mandatory is proving your right to work. Beyond that, totally voluntary,” he said.
“If you want to work, you’ve got to have it… that’s because we’ve got too many people who are working illegally and we’ve got to clampdown on it.
“Otherwise you don’t need it if you don’t want to have it.”
His words suggest it would also be mandatory for those claiming out of work benefits, as they are expected to be actively seeking work, and thus would need an ID card.
Keir Starmer speaks to The i Paper reporter Rhanie Al-AlasIf digital ID is a prerequisite for work, then it will be near compulsory for working age adults.
According to Office for National Statistics data, between June and August there were more than 34 million in the UK in work, with an employment rate for people aged 16 to 64 of 75 per cent.
Starmer said that customers he had spoken to at the bank had shown “enthusiasm” for the idea, because it would remove the “faff” of people having to prove their identity using things like bank statements.
“I made it really clear to them that apart from working this is not going to be mandatory, so nobody has to have it,” he said. “But the experience of other countries is that the benefits are so great and it makes life so much easier that in the end everybody says ‘I’d like that because it’s going to make it easier for me’. Whether it’s buying a house or actually sometimes buying a drink if you’re 18 and you want to prove that you are 18, digital ID will do it for you.”
Starmer claims ID will be ‘highly encrypted’
On concerns about cyber security, Starmer said digital ID would be “highly encrypted and very, very secure.” He said that the data would not be shared with private companies for other purposes and that it would never be used by the Government to track aspects of people’s lives.
Responding to online conspiracy theories that it could be used by the Government to track things like an individual’s meat consumption or how many flights they take, he said: “None of that is going to be any part of this, this is just a false rumour.”
He claimed future governments would not be able to widen the use of the digital ID because it would be enshrined in legislation. “It will all be set out in law what the limits are, how it’s controlled,” he said. “It will be in stone that this is the system and you can’t simply change it.”
He also said people would not be fined for not having it. “This is not something you have to carry or have to produce or anything like that, there will be no fining of people for not having it,” he said.
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The Prime Minister said the Government was working on non-digital options for people who do not have a mobile phone or want one.
“For people who don’t have a mobile phone, then this isn’t mandatory, so you don’t have to have it, it will make your life easier if you want it, but you don’t have to have it, we are consulting on what other forms of ID would help them.
“Some people won’t have a mobile phone or they won’t want a mobile phone, and therefore if they do want an ID we will make another form available to them.”
Civil liberties campaigners are opposed to any kind of mandatory ID. Big Brother Watch was among groups opposing the idea of a card when it was first announced and arguing it would be “uniquely harmful to privacy, equality and civil liberties”.
They argue the policy would not tackle pull factors for migrants and instead “push unauthorised migrants further into the shadows, into more precarious work and unsafe housing”.
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