The Mail On Sunday reports:

The Government is paying a top advertising agency to ‘sell’ its controversial £20billion ID card scheme to the public.

The Home Office has employed M&C Saatchi to mount a marketing blitz ahead of the National Identity Scheme’s launch in November.

ID cards will allow the Government to hold the personal details of 60million citizens - including fingerprints and iris patterns - on a central database.

But there are fears that fraudsters, terrorists or blackmailers could steal the information and use it for criminal purposes.

Despite this, the Home Office has ordered that all non-EU workers living in Britain hold an ID card as of November.

M&C Saatchi will begin the campaign with TV adverts and posters explaining the cards’ ‘benefits’ to a sceptical public.

Polly Toynbee writes in the Guardian, wondering what Gordon Brown actually believes in:

The imaginary Blair/Brown ideological distinction has now been exposed as the sham it always was. Brown used to let it be known he opposed university fees, war, ID cards, Trident, foundation hospitals and a host of other things he now supports. The 10p tax band abolition to bribe the better off was a wickedness entirely of his own devising. Letting rip the disastrous house price boom was him, as was letting top earnings soar unchecked while reckless banks had “light-touch regulation” and public sector workers were pinned to below-inflation pay. The sad truth is that he opposed Blair, not Blair policies.

Roanna Avison writes on the RoadTransport.com web site:

Biometric security introduced to improve the speed of container collection at the Port of Felixstowe has not shortened the queues, according to owner drivers.

The system, which uses handreaders to verify drivers’ identification, is touted as something that will speed the process up because drivers will not have to bring all their identification paperwork with them every time. Driver Keith Revell says the system has not made any difference to the length of the queues at Felixstowe. “The system verifies the driver’s identity, but you still have to give them the paperwork for the container.”

He adds that he had to go to the police station to get his identification verified for the system before he could go to the port. Another owner-driver says the system has just added another level of complication, rather than making anything easier.

Janet Murray writes in Education Guardian:

The sudden postponement of the government’s flagship ContactPoint database last week was immediately shrugged off by ministers and civil servants as being due to technical problems. Embarrassing, perhaps, for a project costing the taxpayer pounds 224m, but simply a matter of taking a bit more time to iron out glitches such as drop-down menus.

But an investigation by Education Guardian reveals much more fundamental concerns about hundreds of vulnerable children being put at risk because of flaws in the whole system, and raises questions over whether the government will ever get its ambitious project to work.

It seems that the mechanism for “shielding” some addresses is giving problems:

Where the risk to a child outweighs the benefits of sharing information between practitioners, ContactPoint users will be able to partially “shield” records - for example, hiding their home or school address. This might apply to families who have relocated because of domestic violence, those involved in witness protection schemes or sensitive fostering or adoption cases. Shielding may also be necessary to ensure the safety of children of celebrities or well-known people.

At present, only local authorities can apply to shield records and 17 of these - known as “early adopters” - were due to go live with ContactPoint next month. But Education Guardian has learned the government has not taken adequate steps to shield the data of vulnerable children.

Early last month, just weeks away from the proposed launch, a letter was sent to all directors of children’s services asking them to identify vulnerable children in their local authority as a matter of “urgency”.

One local authority source said: “I’m not surprised to hear ContactPoint is being postponed again - it was clear that local authorities just weren’t ready. Identifying and shielding vulnerable children in every local authority is a mammoth task and first off there needs to be a sustained public awareness campaign. But I’m not convinced three months is long enough to make it work. I suspect the government may actually be stalling before the whole project is shelved.”

According to Kable’s Government Computing:

The UK Border Agency has given a start date to compulsory identity cards, for foreign nationals applying to stay in the country as students or through marriage.

From 25 November, applicants from outside the European Economic Area in these two categories will have to travel to one of six centres to enrol in the National Identity Scheme, which will include having their fingerprints and a photograph taken.

However, a Kable analyst belives this move is largely cosmetic:

Philippe Martin, a senior analyst at Kable, said that non-EEA nationals already need a visa to work or study, and the card will work in the same way. “It’s just a renaming,” he said of the move. “Now they have a visa, and in future they will have an identity card.”

John Beddington, the Government’s chief scientific advisor, answers questions in The Independent:

Q: You chair an advisory panel on biometrics that warned old people might not be able to give good enough fingerprints for ID cards. Do you think the cards are feasible or cost-effective? — Leonard Baird, Chepstow

A: Biometric technologies are available today and are being used worldwide. They are also developing rapidly, so an identity card scheme is technically feasible. Even though the fingerprints of some older people are of a lower quality, the collection of fingerprints is just one part of the enrolment process. A decision to implement ID cards depends not only on the technology, but many other factors.

Vicki Woods writes in the Daily Telegraph:

I was stunned to read this week about the stupidly named “ContactPoint”: the children’s database that is almost ready to be launched.

“ContactPoint” will include the names, ages and addresses of all 11 million under-18s in England as well as information on their parents, GPs, schools and support services such as social worker and the police.

I can think of 20 objections to such a database; but here are a few: 1) Who the hell decided that “ContactPoint” was a good idea and to whom are they accountable? Us? Don’t think so. 2) Who the hell in government thought this was a good idea and why wasn’t it scrutinised and argued over by Parliament? Answer: parliamentary scrutiny is a kind of yesterday idea these days; do keep up. And 3) Why should any parent in Britain agree to have their three-year-old on a database? Answer: they won’t need to; nobody would dream of asking for their consent.

Anil Dawar writes in The Guardian:

The launch of a controversial new government database containing details of every child in the country is to be delayed for technical reasons, it was revealed today.

ContactPoint, a £224m computer system carrying personal information about all under-18s, was due to come online in April this year. It will now be delayed until January next year, children’s minister Kevin Brennan said today.

This is the second time the index’s start date has been put back. Concerns over data security following the loss of child benefit details by HM Revenue and Customs forced officials to delay its coming online from April to October.

Officials from the Department for Children, Schools and Families said that the delay was not about “security” issues, but user issues such as drop-down menus.

The spokeswoman said: “We are working hard to iron out glitches before it goes out to users. This is not about security issues.”

David Laws, the Lib Dem children’s spokesman, condemned the whole project. “Instead of delaying the launch of the database, this intrusive project must be scrapped altogether.

Chris Williams writes in The Register:

UK election scrutineers are pushing for polling stations to require tougher proof of identity to reduce the risk of ballot-rigging, but do not want voters to be forced to bring photo ID.

The stance is a reversal of statements made by Electoral Commission chairman Sam Younger just a year ago.

The BBC web site carries a transcript of a commentary by Katharine Whitehorn, broadcast in Radio 4’s “A point of view” slot:

The great writer and journalist G.K. Chesterton once wrote that he had spent all his life finding out that platitudes were true.

And maybe some of them are, though quite a few are ambiguous. “Ne’er cast a clout till May is out” - no-one seems to be sure whether it’s until the May tree is in bloom, or the month of May is over.

But some platitudes are all wrong - “No smoke without fire” for instance, as any teacher smeared for life by a spiteful child knows only too well.

And there is one platitude going around which is seriously damaging.

Whenever doubts about nationwide computerised health records or DNA banks or ID cards or biometric passports come up, someone will smugly say: “If you’ve done nothing wrong you’ve nothing to worry about.”

Oh no? What about the news item in last week’s papers that the police have kept the DNA records of 40,000 children who are innocent? And at the end of July some research by the Human Genetics Commission, funded by the Home Office, led to the Telegraph headline: “One million innocent Britons ‘criminalised’ says damning report.”

Rhodri Phillips writes in The Sun:

The Home Office has lost 43 laptops and 94 mobiles over the last three years in the latest data bungle to hit the gaffe-prone department.

It comes days after a memory stick containing the details of all 84,000 prisoners in England and Wales was misplaced.

The loss of the computers and phones was revealed after a query by Tory peer Lord Hanningfield. He said it was a “woeful failure” and called for an inquiry, adding: “Given the sensitivity of the Home Office’s work — including its lead role in the fight against terrorism — this is all the more worrying.

“This is, of course, also the Government department with responsibility for ID cards.”

Ben Russell writes in The Independent:

The Home Office contractor which lost a computer memory stick containing the details of 84,000 prisoners is at the heart of developing the Government’s controversial compulsory identity cards system.

PA Consulting – which on Tuesday told ministers it had misplaced the unencrypted names, dates of birth and expected release dates of the inmates, as well as the addresses of 33,000 prolific criminals – has won £240m of government contracts since 2004, including one as the Home Office’s “development partner” to “work on the design, feasibility testing, business case and procurement elements of the identity cards programme”.

The Home Office paid the firm a total of £95m between 2004-05 and 2006-07, including £25.4m to work on a national network of fire control centres. The company’s consultants have also been paid more than £33m by the Foreign Office to work on biometric passports and visas.

The Home Secretary, Jacqui Smith, faced angry questions from senior MPs from all the parties, amid accusations that the blunder would further erode public faith in the identity cards project.

Gerri Peev writes in The Scotsman:

The personal details of the entire prison population south of the Border have been lost in a massive security breach at the Home Office, it was revealed last night.

Information on tens of thousands of criminals – including expected release dates – was lost while private contractors hired by the government were transferring files between computers.

The blunder could lead to gang warfare and leave the taxpayer liable for compensation pay-outs to every prisoner in England and Wales, it was warned last night.

Critics of the proposed identity cards said the blunder was evidence that the government could not be trusted to run the scheme.

Allegra Stratton, writing in The Guardian, lists the data lost:

The data included the names, addresses and dates of birth of around 33,000 offenders in England and Wales with six or more recordable convictions in the past 12 months on the Police National Computer. Also lost were the names and dates of birth, but not addresses, of 10,000 prolific and other priority offenders, and the names, dates of birth and, in some cases, the expected prison release dates of all 84,000 prisoners held in England and Wales.

Douglas Fraser writes in the Glasgow Herald:

The next census will be the last of its kind under plans being drawn up for its replacement with a national population register.

The £500m census on March 27, 2011, will be the earliest in the year since the first Britain-wide survey in 1801, to avoid Easter and the Scottish Parliament elections, and would be the final such 10-yearly head count if the plans under preparation are backed by ministers in the next few months.

The proposed alternative is a National Identity Register:

In an interview with The Herald, Mr Macniven explained replacement of the census will require an identity register, which could be combined with an address register which has recently been drawn up for the whole of Scotland by local councils.

The identity register risks becoming enmeshed with the controversy over Labour plans to introduce identity cards. But Mr Macniven claims there are other ways such a register could be compiled, and at lower cost. His staff are preparing the ground for the NHS central register of GP patients to be used as “the spine” of an alternative census.

But the Registrar-General stresses he is independent of government, and there has been an assurance of Whitehall ministers that the data collected will not be used for the identity card system.

According to Kablenet:

The Home Office will wait until 2011 to issue the ‘vast majority’ of identity cards to students and young people.

The schedule is outlined in A Strong New Force at the Border, a document issued by the department on 19 August detailing plans for the UK Border Agency. It places the work in 2011 as part of a timeline, in contrast to earlier suggestions that it would happen a year earlier.

Christopher Hope writes in the Daily Telegraph:

Sensitive data for more than four million people was lost by Government departments in the past year, on top of the high profile loss of child benefit records.

Following the loss of details for 25 million child benefit claimants in November, Whitehall departments have begun including information on personal information losses in their annual financial statements.

Analysis shows that beyond the child benefit fiasco, Government departments were last year losing data at the rate of more than 300,000 people’s details a month in the year to April it emerged last night.

Some politicians are making the link to government database plans:

The Tories’ shadow Cabinet Office minister Francis Maude said: “This shows that the government cannot be trusted to protect people’s personal details.

“Ministers should think again about its even more risky and intrusive projects such as the identity card database, the all-encompassing children’s database and the property database for the council tax revaluation.

“Tougher safeguards are needed to protect the privacy of law-abiding citizens from the government.”

Etan Smallman writes in The Times:

Trust Britain’s youth to be characteristically ungrateful. The Government goes to all the effort of making a website for 16 to 25- year-olds to express their views on identity cards, and all they get in return is a solid mixture of scorn, sneering and scepticism smattered across their fancy new forums.

In a bid to get the country’s youngsters on board the controversial scheme, the Home Office has launched MyLifeMyId.org, where 16 to 25 year olds “can have their say about identity issues in the UK.”

But anyone browsing the discussions on the site would be hard pushed to find a single positive comment, with contributors branding the controversial scheme as “creepy,” “dirty” and “illegal” and the website itself as an “online propaganda machine”.

Chris Hastings, Beth Jones and Stephanie Plentl write in The Daily Telegraph:

When Gordon Brown called on the British Library to stage an exhibition about Britishness he perhaps envisaged a patriotic celebration of the national identity.

What he would not have expected is the resulting event, Taking Liberties, which encourages visitors to contemplate the perilous state of civil liberties in modern Britain under his Government.

The exhibition, which is the most ambitious in the British Library’s history, is in direct response to a call from Mr Brown for the institution to hold a display of patriotism, and critics have described it as a “snub” to the Prime Minister.

Visitors will be asked their views on issues such as ID cards and detention of suspects for up to 42 days, both of which are key Government policies.

Exhibits will be displayed in space in the shape of a clenched fist. As visitors progress through the exhibition, the space gets smaller and smaller to give the impression of confinement. Each visitor to the exhibition will be given a personal ID number.

Christopher Hope writes in The Daily Telegraph:

The personal details of 45,000 people, including dates of birth, criminal records, National Insurance numbers and court information, were lost by a single Government department last year.

The Ministry of Justice’s (MoJ) annual accounts show the data was lost in nine separate incidents in the past financial year.

The worst incident, in June last year, saw the loss of names, addresses and some bank details of 27,000 people working for suppliers to the MoJ.

Opposition parties are making the link to the National Identity Register:

Liberal Democrat Justice spokesman David Howarth MP said: “Yet again the Government has shown that it cannot be trusted with citizens’ personal data.

“How can ministers possibly argue for the introduction of a universal ID Card scheme when they can’t even keep safe the data they already have.”

Alan Travis writes in The Guardian:

The national identity card scheme faces fresh problems following a warning from the government’s top scientific advisers that the quality of fingerprints from 4 million people aged over 75 may be too poor to be used to prove their identity.

The “gold standard” integrity of the national identity scheme would depend on all 10 digits of the hands of everyone in Britain over 16 being accurately recorded on the central register, but experts have now told Home Office ministers that it is “hard to obtain good quality fingerprints” from the over-75s.

They warned that “exceptional handling” arrangements would have to be made to handle the registration of those whose fingerprints are not up to scratch. This would have a “large impact not only on the technical elements of the scheme but [also] on businesses processes, schedules and costs”.

American experts estimate between 2% and 5% of adults have poor quality fingerprints, which means ridges on the fingers are not sharply defined enough to be reliably copied by an automatic scanner.

The warning is contained in a report slipped out before Parliament rose for the summer recess from the biometrics assurance group, which is made up of independent experts from Whitehall, the industry and universities and chaired by the government’s chief scientific adviser, Professor John Beddington. The group was set up to review the science behind the ID card scheme.