30 April 2004
Ministers from the big-spending Whitehall departments have wholeheartedly endorsed the creation of ID cards, insisting that they would lead to more efficient use of public services and a significant reduction in fraud.
Although Education Secretary Charles Clarke and health minister John Hutton admitted that their departments had no clear idea how much money was lost through service abuse each year, both backed the principle enthusiastically.
Hutton told the home affairs select committee that the current system of establishing entitlement to NHS care was not as robust as it could be. 'We either have rules or we have completely open access,' he said. 'If we have rules, we should enforce them and we can't do so with confidence at the moment.'
Clarke added that the national rollout of the Education Maintenance Allowance meant ID cards would be useful in establishing that people claiming the funds were attending the courses they said they were.
Benefits minister Chris Pond indicated that the Department for Work and Pensions had made more progress in assessing the likely impact of ID cards. He told the committee that approximately £50m of benefits was lost to the taxpayer each year through identity fraud.
Pond added that although ID cards were not crucial to anti-fraud measures, they would make the benefits process more secure and more convenient for claimants.
The DWP estimates that the introduction of ID cards would result in £90m–£100m of benefit fraud savings, although the minister stressed that these were estimated figures.
'I do believe there are real benefits for customers who are entitled to benefits and who are not claiming them,' he added.
Draft legislation published this week set out proposals for a compulsory national ID card scheme, using unique biometric identifying data, such as fingerprints and iris scans.
Home Secretary David Blunkett said: 'ID fraud is a growing crime, costing the country more than £1.3bn per year. Multiple or false identities are used in more than a third of terrorist-related activity and in organised crime and money laundering.
'It is crucial we are able robustly to ascertain and verify our own and others' identities.'
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