The digital ID card is Keir Starmer’s latest gimmick intended to discourage unauthorised migration. As initially defined, it will be a requirement for British citizens and residents starting a new job.
The scheme is disparaged by Reform on the grounds it will do nothing to stop the use of illegal immigrants in the black economy. More surprisingly, it won the support of the normally sensible Institute of Directors.
Putting to one side this paper’s deep-seated concern about the infringement on civil liberty, one should not underestimate practical pitfalls.
Labour is desperate, having failed to ‘smash the gangs’, to bring down the number of illegal arrivals.
Pouring several billion pounds into such a scheme – at a time of fiscal frugality – is an expensive experiment.
The UK’s record on implementing complex digital systems is abysmal. The NHS’s early attempt at creating a national database cost £10billion and was abandoned in 2013.
Concern:Â The digital ID card is Keir Starmer’s latest gimmick intended to discourage unauthorised migration
Fujitsu’s upgrade of Post Office systems was a disaster which led to suicide, wrongful imprisonment and a big compensation bill. An effort at a home-grown app in the pandemic was a miserable failure.
Big tech in the shape of Microsoft, Oracle or Google could deliver the technology and more speedily thanks to AI. But these private and grasping behemoths know too much about our lives already and could exploit ID cards commercially.
Overnight, Amazon agreed to pay a £1.9bn fine to the US Federal Trade Commission for ‘tricking’ its users into signing up to its premium ‘Prime’ service.
In a week when the UK was alerted to how cyber attackers can halt the production lines at Jaguar Land Rover and threaten the survival of hundreds of suppliers, one must question whether the Government has any hope of keeping private ID information safe.
Other recent victims of such assaults include a chain of Kido nurseries as well as M&S and the Co-op. Think of the fun that hackers could have with IDs containing much of the country’s personal employment, welfare and health data.
All this before one considers the real-life experiences of poor mast coverage, rubbish broadband, flat batteries and tech incompetence. Spare us the misery.
Trump overdose
President Trump has done it again.
His social media post threatening to impose 100 per cent tariffs on branded and patented medicines is causing enormous confusion. Britain’s two biggest pharma groups, AstraZeneca and GSK, would appear to be vulnerable. The message from the share price reaction and companies is more a case of ‘we have got this’.
Britain has thus far been behind the curve in reaching a deal on pharma tariffs. The EU settled on 15 per cent. Switzerland, a big drug producer, will be in difficulty unless a deal can be carved out.
The approach of the British companies has been to try to inoculate themselves with eye-popping announcements of new American investments. GSK already has capacity in the US, with plants stretching from Montana in the west to Pennsylvania and the Carolinas in the east.
It is breaking new ground as soon as possible. But vital components for its world-leading vaccines, such as Shingrix and RSV, are produced overseas.
Astra is aiming for a fragmented strategy, manufacturing locally in the US, China and the rest of Asia and Europe.
Whether Trump and his acolytes will be persuaded by any of this is unknown.
But with so much uncertainty over life sciences, the Government must now settle with the industry over the ‘voluntary’ rebate on NHS revenues or risk further disinvestment.
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