Everyday Stranger

I'm opposed to the introduction of an ID card scheme in the UK. And not just for civil liberties reasons.

Other EU countries that already have such schemes suffer from exactly the same problems that Blunkett is trying to claim a UK scheme will solve, so I can't see it having any practical advantage. There's also the small matter of cost. I already have two forms of state-issued identification that carry my photo and are accepted everywhere: a passport and a driver's license. I'd rather the government spent £5bn on something beneficial to society rather than another bit of plastic for me to lug around.

On an autumn visit to NYC last year, my daughter and I passed a Federal Building in lower Manhattan. There was a line that stretched nearly 1/2 block and in the queue was the most diverse crowd that I have ever witnessed in my entire life--all waiting for their 'papers'. The image in my head still haunts me and I could kick myself for not having my camera with me. My thought at the time was, "We keep being told that we are a hated nation, but look at all these people who are trying to join us in opportunity." It was an incredible site.

Eloquent. Bold. You don't give a damn, do you? An issue like this with so many factors and variables and consequences? This isn't simple! I love it. Well stated!

Oda Mae said:
"As I understand it, the Germans don't want sick Czech citizens crossing over and collapsing in their hospitals."

I'm not trying to pick a fight with Oda Mae--she makes good points.

But this is exactly what I was saying earlier: who can blame people for trying to go to the place where they get a better quality of life?

Sick Czech people have the right to healthcare, do they not? So instead of spending so much money on making sure their borders are secure, why doesn't Germany spend some to help the Czech citizens get good healthcare in their own country?

Of course, that's somewhat naive. The burden doesn't really fall on Germany per se, it falls on Europe as a whole. The standardization of public services (including healthcare and asylum-seeker benefits) is one thing that a solid EU could regulate well.

Of course, this could turn into an EU debate! :)

If any one has an analysis that involves an erf or gamma function I would be interested in reading it:-) Everybody else sound...well I won't finish this sentence;-)

Anyone, how many more people would you like moving into your house or sleep on your sofa or rented apartment or build extra houses on your land for any person around the globe to move in? Do you have an upper limit? Does the limit move with your ability to provide a roof, first aid kits, entertainment, mediation of spats, etc.?

I think about this in terms of becoming an immigrant myself and believe the onus is on the immigrants. Nothing pains me more than have a recent immigrant or green card holder explain to me what is all wrong with America. Falls on deaf ears and I'm less likely to include said individual at next barbecue. Come here, learn what makes America work, assimilate, contribute and be friendly and you'll do fine. There is still going to be a large amount of immigration to the US, it's just going to be more picky.

And for those who have said what won't contain terrorism, do you have any solutions?

I find this Daniel Pipes article interesting. "Muslim life in Western Europe and North America is strikingly different."

looks like i came back at the right time!
I currently work with nder 18 year old asylum seekers. Well, to say i work with them - i look after them on behalf of the UK govt. it is a new job and i love it.

I think it is best i dont rant so all i have to say is i think the way we treat people is awful. if we signed up the the convention we shouldlive up to it and we should at least treat people well whilst we are deciding if we will let them stay or not.

The real trouble here is the bo**ocks we get fed by the media about 'illegal immigrants' etc. I can tell you from the front line alot of it is completely untrue. The other thing to remember is that in order to stop people being traffiked here etc etc we need to hone our immigration policy as a whole, not just villify poeple in the press for entering the UK.

hm, small incoherent rant there i think!

abs x

Sorry, I think we should closely monitor immigration. I immigrated to NZ with my husband - a New Zealand citizen. That's the only reason they let me in, after requiring letters from both our mothers that our marriage was legitimate (we lived on different continents for the 8 months prior to entry.) The other way I could have gotten in was by putting a large amount of money in a NZ bank, showing that I could pay my own way and not just drain public funds.

When taxpayer dollars pay for public support for immigrants - sometimes for years before a final resolution can be reached - I see nothing wrong with asking them to demonstrate skills and a knowledge of the English language before allowing them to reside in the country. I agree with an earlier post that the land of our grandfathers has changed. We are seen not always as the land of opportunity, but a gravy train.

If I try to enter Czech, they have the right to ask to see a copy of my health and car insurance before allowing me through. (That might have changed in the last two months) And the same back in to Germany. As I understand it, the Germans don't want sick Czech citizens crossing over and collapsing in their hospitals.

I also see nothing wrong with an identification card as long as it is done effectively. I doubt that an unforgeable card can be produced at this point in time.

What bothers me most about current immigration laws tightening in almost all Westernized nations is how it shows that *nobody* reads history any more. Helen, I take your comments about the U.S. accepting immigrants in the past with good grace, but the truth is that we only took people who were European openly. We've had historical cycles with those of Asian, Southeast Asian and East Indian descent for generations now that were racist and unfortunate to say the very least. Ask any Japanese of the Nisei generation what it was like to lose their property during WWII. Look at how we treated immigrant Chinese during the Gold Rush - where do you (and I mean "you" in the greater sense - no finger pointing, H) think the word "coolie" comes from? They were basically indentured servants, building the railroads and feeding the white people.

The truth is that this is the pendulum swinging far, far to the opposite side of freedom as an aftereffect of events in recent years. We're afraid. That means we clench down. I think that's true worldwide. It it helpful? Accurate? Responsive? Hell, NO. But let's face it: humans are frightened mammals. In the U.S. especially, the population is aging, which means more conservative voting and more restriction of freedoms. Welcome to 80 million babyboomers who are afraid of losing their homes.

It was only a matter of time before we agreed on something Helen:) Although I think we agreed way back when on Patriotism.

Best Friend - I'm with you on trusting the gov't due to my law abiding, upstanding, natural citizenship, good standing status; but that paranoid little man in the back of my head speaks up when stuff like this is proposed.

As for cell phones, I don't have one, so good luck tracking me Coppers (that's cops or police for anyone unfamiliar with the term)!! :)

I'm like you - my great-grandparents came to the US from Austria when they were young. They immediately learned English and they were hard working, tax-paying individuals. They were proud to be citizens, and they were an asset to the country. I think that nations are on the losing end if they think closing the borders will help anything. The terrorist will manage to get in somehow - you are only shutting out the good people that are trying to be legitimate about the process.

H,
Looks like I picked a fine time to pop back in to say Hi!

I don't have a problem with the ID card approach. Like Best Friend said, I have nothing to hide. It's basically just a Personal Google Card(PGC). It's a little laminated list of already existing search results compiled for easy scrutiny.

I remember a business trip I took to Toronto 5-6 years ago where I talking my way past Canadian Customs with nothing more than my U.S. driver's license and a Voter Registration card. When coming back through U.S. Customs a week later the lady asked for my Passport and I handed her my driver's license and Voter card and told her this was all I had on me. She said in all her years of working Customs she'd never heard of anyone being admitted like that. I simply shrugged and I attributed it to my honest-looking face allowing Canadian Customs to give me the benefit of the doubt. Needless to say that would never happen today - anywhere. The world is different and I don't ever see it going back to people being given the benefit of the doubt.

As a Yank that recently spent 2 hours going through multiple x-ray scans, packs of drug/explosives-sniffing dogs, and multiple documents checks in the Lima airport I have a newfound appreciation for having whatever credentials grease the wheels with the men with automatic weapons! I'm sure I looked like Charlie in Willy Wonka with a death-grip on his Golden Ticket. You should have seen my lip quiver as a lady came by and plucked my Passport from my hands to check against the terrorist lists. I was sure the second that precious document left my hands one of those drug dogs was going to catch a whiff of my coca tea breath and I'd find myself in my own version of Midnight Express.

In the U.S. a driver's license is the preferred means of identification. Nobody carries their Passport with them on a daily basis. Everyone from the cops to a store clerk want something with your current address on it. If you don't have a driver's license then you at least need a state ID card to go anywhere from shopping if you plan of writing a check, do some banking, or just to stop for a drink in a bar.

I personally don't think the new U.S. Visit program of collecting biometric data will have any significant effect on preventing terrorism. Highly-motivated people will always find a way to circumvent whatever obstacles stand between them and their objective or "destiny".

This is going off on a tangent but I found it interesting...

Did anyone happen to catch this recent Newsweek article covering the Madrid bombing investigation? Spanish police found a lone fingerprint on a bag in the van full of detonators and gear believed to have been used by the bombers. That lone fingerprint was given to other governments to assist in the investigation and the FBI found it matched that of an attorney in Portland, Oregon. It turns out the suspect had only been fingerprinted because he served in the U.S. Army. If it hadn't been for that single record of his fingerprint that lead would have been a dead end.

If the U.S. insists on collecting biometric data on visitors they should apply that rule to ALL visitors. And since they're doing this under the auspice of Homeland Security then Biometrics Should Begin at Home!

Sorry for the long-winded post. I've been away for a while so I think I've built up a little bandwidth credit!

I've missed having you as the start to my days lately, little flame. I won't let that happen again.

My personal opinion is that borders should be more open.

However, I am convinced that many "asylum seekers" are also "benefits seekers." But who can blame them? Who doesn't want a good standard of living?

The law is clear: when you are seeking asylum, you must stay in the first "safe" country that you land in.

Many of the "asylum seekers" in the UK have come from far afield, passing through several "safe" countries in order to get to the UK. Why would they do this, except that the UK benefits for asylum seekers are better?

Now, the real question is not "How can we stop these cheating illegal immigrants?" It's "How can we get all of Europe to provide the same (good) standard of benefits for people who are seeking asylum?"

If all European countries provided the same standard of benefit, the number of asylum seekers would not be disproportionate in any one country, thus reducing the "invasion factor" felt by a country, thus reducing the perception of asylum seekers as fraudsters.

The exception would be a country that is immediately next to a country that lots of people flee. Perhaps that country should have the right to "refuse" a certain number of immigrants; I don't know. Certainly America and Americans generally don't suffer because of an influx of Mexican immigrants.

Solomon! My lovely boy, see it IS possible that we can agree on things! :)

I have nothing to hide (other than my horrible dating track record, but I don't think the government really cares about that.) I too see ID cards simply as the first step in a very real foray into what we once thought of only as science fiction, but now may be able to embrace-monitoring and tracking people without the slightest provocation.

Solomon,

I take your point totally, and I'm sure my view on ID cards is tainted by my status as a native of country with a parliamentary democracy and top rate legal system and as such have no reason to consider that i may stand a higher percentage chance of being stopped and asked for random ID checks than a large number of people who may not share my northern european colouring. With the power of ID cards comes the responsibility to use the data in an appropriate way. Freedom of information act means that any information held on as part of the card database is accessable to me for viewing at my leisure.

In the UK, we have cameras on a huge number of street corners already and pretty much all new generartion mobile phone are now tracked to a accuracy of a 100m or so when they are switched on, with the next generation up an order of magnitude in resolution (GPS aided tracking). Who needs to go to the expense of inserting a tracking chip into people when you can follow their phones that they agree to have tracked as part of their subscription?! Most of your nightmare future is here BEFORE the ID cards arrive ;)

Ah, the buzzing of my PC speakers tell me that my phone has just done a location update - time to move before the spy drone gets here ...

Thomas Jefferson said, "Those who would trade freedom for security will end up with neither." IDs will not make things more secure and will infringe on people's right to privacy. If any entity (gov't or private) gets hold of ALL your "private" information (blood type, DNA, finger-prints, and so on), it becomes much easier to frame, control, and/or eliminate "enemies of the state".

Some say those with nothing to hide shouldn't mind having an ID. Let's don't stop there. Let's put a camera on every street corner and in your house. Let's put a tracking chip on every person. If you have nothing to hide, surely you won't mind:)

Where does it end? As I see it, ID cards aren't bad (it might even be nice to have a nationwide standard), but it IS a big step towards something potentially very bad and controlling.

I am not qualified to express an opinion on British immigration. As for the US, I am only marginally more qualified. Let me make two points. One, I agree with the people before who noted that the US has the right, as any country does, to regulate its borders. Two, Helen, it seems to me that the quality of immigration to the US has changed. When your father came here, or my great great etc grand parents came here, it was to make a new life as an American. Your father achieved great success here because he learned the language and made a committment to stay. Illegal immigration and even legal immigration does not have this character. It seems as if many immigrants are here only to make some money and retire back to their country of origin. That does not strenghen or help the US. As immigration changes, so should our policy. Anyway, you've touched on a delicate issue today. Forgive my generalizations, please.

I've been as active as I can be without being in Britian regarding the refuge immigration, because most of the people that are trying to come in are Romani (Gypsy). It's heartbreaking to think that in most of the Eastern countries, for all of the hardships that those countries went through, the best thing that happened was that everyone was equal under communist rule. Once the Wall fell, the racial hatred that regrew its head, especially against the Romani has been horrific. That's why many are seeking refuge in places like Britain. And to see the racism rear up its ugly head like it did a few (maybe 6) months ago regarding the burning of the caravan effigy, shows that there are still people who really think that other people are substandard just because of their race.
Oh, and regarding the ID cards, every time I hear of something like this, I think of the old Robert Heinlein quote that said something along the lines that when any society requires you to carry identification on you at all times, it's time to leave that society. Idealistic, yes... but I'd love to be able to do it sometimes.

Hi Beth,

In what ways are ID cards bad? A lot of people say just ID cards=BAD but don't follow it up with reasons. For instance, people say that ID cards infringe on their civil liberties, but I have never understood why that should be?

We do bitch 'over here' about the immigration restrictions getting into Australia and New Zealand - and they are part of the Commonwealth!! Most people would much rather live there than the US even if the water does go down the plug hole the wrong way :)

As far as US immigration goes, as far as I know, if I travel to Australia they will not take biometric data from my 3yo daughter because she might be a terrorist ...

No worries-I don't mind if people disagree with me.

These telecoms folk were already in the U.S. and already in jobs (so they didn't take them away from U.S. citizens, they already had them)-and two of them were already going through the naturalization process. It was stopped and they were told they had to leave, which meant selling homes, taking kids out of schools, and selling off their cars-which is a revenue loss for the U.S., actually.

I know myself what it's like to be in telecom and trying to get a job in a foreign country. I just did it, and it was hard. And in Europe, we hear a lot about their immigration restrictions, although theirs seem to be a lot less stringent than the Americans are (commonwealth citizens, for example, have more flexibility).

ID cards - bad.
Restricting Immigration - that is totally the right of a country to do - Australia has extreme immigration restrictions, and no one bitches about it. It's just that everyone in Europe loves to bitch about the US, so we will be forever damned if we do and damned if we don't.

Helen, I used to be in the telecommunications industry. So did many thousands of other Americans - that industry has fallen through the floor, we don't need more people coming here to look for nonexistent jobs in the telecommunications industry. This is one time that your arguments don't fly with me, still like you, though, hope you won't get pissed at me for disagreeing!

Yes, yes and... yes. Is the percentage of Bulgarian criminals superior to the UK criminals? Or Portuguese? I think not. People should be judged by their input to society. If one pays his taxes and respects the local laws, and is a productive member of society, he can only be put down because of ignorance and prejudice. In the UK, in Bulgaria, in Portugal. Or anywhere else in the world. And I am adding my two pence to Best Friends... Miguel.

I have no problem with ID cards - but I'm sure even when we have them we will still be asked for a copy of our gas bill when we try to hire out a movie from the local video store ;)

To be honest I have never quite understood what people have against ID cards. To me it implies that you have something to hide ...

As I understand it all of the information that would be on an ID card is stored in various places today anyway. Biometric data will start to be stored on your credit card soon for ID purposes. People do not seem to have a problem with this. It's OK because it means that someone can no longer steal your card and steal from you. Never mind that a private company has your biometric data. But if the government does it to simplify administration of benefits such as health and social support then there is nanny state uproar!

Just my two shiney new pence ...