Proposals for new ‘BritCards’ – which would prove whether someone has the right to live and work in the UK – are being looked at by ministers amid claims it will help tackle illegal migration
Ministers are looking at plans to bring in mandatory digital ID cards for every adult in the UK.
Backers say the new “BritCard” – which would be linked to Government records – would help tackle illegal migration and rogue landlords. A new report says the ID, which would be stored on smartphones, would make right-to-rent and right-to-work checks quicker and easier.
Former PM Tony Blair has long called for ID cards, but the Government previously said it was not planning to bring them in. However a new report by think-tank Labour Together has been passed to No10’s policy unit.
Backbench MPs Jake Richards and Adam Jogee say the ID cards would be a “full, country-wide effort” allowing people to prove their right to be here. The think-tank said in a report that a “mandatory, universal, national identity credential” can help the UK secure its borders.
BritCards would be issued free of charge to everyone with the right to live and work in the UK, Labour Together says. It estimates it would cost between £140million and £400million to set up. Mr Richards and Mr Jogee wrote that digital ID “will help improve the enforcement of our rules dramatically”.
They continued: “But it is also progressive because it gives our residents and citizens thecast iron guarantees they have not previously had. This is your country.You have a right to be here. This will make your life easier.”
READ MORE: Two thirds of Brits want Keir Starmer to end arms sales to Israel, poll shows
Supporters argue the move would help prevent a repeat of the Windrush scandal, which saw hundreds of people wrongly deported or threatened with deportation. Morgan Wild, Chief Policy Adviser at Labour Together said: “The state makes everyone, whether they are a British citizen or not, prove their right to work or rent.
“But we don’t give everyone with the right to be here the ability to prove it. That leads to discrimination, unjust deportation and, as happened in the worst Windrush cases, dying in a country that is not your own. Through a national effort to provide everyone with proof of their right to be here, BritCard can stop that from ever happening again.”
The think-tank’s paper argues that BritCards should initially be rolled out for right-to-rent and right-to-work checks. It says this would support the Government’s clampdown on irregular migration and those living in the UK illegally.
Polling for Labour Together suggests around 80% of Brits support the idea for the specific purpose of tackling illegal migration. The paper says it will help tackle forgery and discrimination by landlords.
Kirsty Innes, Director of Technology at Labour Together said: “A progressive society can only work if we have meaningful borders. BritCard would make it far harder to flout the illegal work and illegal rent rules, and far easier to identify and punish exploitative illegal employers and landlords.”
Introducing ID cards was a pet project of Tony Blair’s. He tried to bring in compulsory identification documents when he was PM.
Last year he said: “We need a plan to control immigration. If we don’t have rules, we get prejudices.
“In office, I believed the best solution was a system of identity so that we know precisely who has a right to be here.
“With, again, technology, we should move as the world is moving to digital ID. If not, new border controls will have to be highly effective.”
But at the time Home Secretary Yvette Cooper said: “It’s not in our manifesto. That’s not our approach.”