by Paul Routledge in The Mirror
If the hard-line Home Secretary gets his way, PC Plod will be able to stop me and you and demand an identity card. If we fail to produce one, he could march us to the nearest police station to "check on the database, sir".
This is not the country I want to live in. Not the country that New Labour promised to build. More like Sharon's Jerusalem than the New Jerusalem.
Blunkett claims to have the support of the people in this Draconian act of authoritarianism. Six out of ten back the move in opinion polls.
They do so on the basis of a fraud. The Home Secretary claims that "biometric" ID cards will cut crime, keep out illegal immigrants and prevent terrorism.
They will do none of these things, but they WILL change the whole way we live. Britain will increasingly feel like apartheid South Africa.
The police already know who the criminals are on their patch. Illegal migrants will simply buy an ID card from the people smugglers who profit from this trade.
All the hijackers who caused the attacks on September 11 had the right form of American ID.
Do we want a virtual police state? Big Brother Blunkett clearly does.
Today he pleads the "war against terror" as justification. But you can bet once ID cards become compulsory, that they will stay that way.
Original story in The Mirror