Category: Identity Cards

The LSE’s report on Identity cards is fairly sanguine about the impact of the scheme on the Common Travel Area between Britain and Ireland. In the event that the UK identity card proposals pass into law, there is a perception that the existence of the Common Travel Area of the UK & Ireland will necessitate…

The DUP and the SDLP both voted solidly against the Government in last night’s Commons vote on the Identity Cards Bill. Lady Sylvia Hermon was the only Northern Ireland MP to contribute to the Government’s reduced majority. During the debate, there were a number of mentions of the bill’s implications for the Common Travel Area…

The Identity Cards Bill will have its second reading later this afternoon, so I suppose I’d better fulfill my promise to have a look at the stance of the Northern Ireland MPs on the issue. The most significant player will be the DUP who have 9 seats. Frank Millar of the Irish Times had a…

In this week’s Irish World I reported on a Home Office briefing on identity cards. The new minister in charge of the scheme is Harrow East MP Tony McNulty, who comes fom a London Irish background. This is perhaps ironic given that there have been concerns raised about the impact of the cards on the…

Back in January I applied under the new Freedom of Information Act for the correspondence between the British and Irish Governments on the Identity Cards Bill. In February, I got a reply saying that the Home Office was carrying out a public interest test on whether it should release the information. Last week, I heard…