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Holyrood to vote against ID cards Holyrood rejects identity cards
(about 8 hours later)
The Scottish Parliament is expected to vote decisively against the introduction of ID cards. The Scottish Parliament has voted against the UK Government's plans to introduce ID cards.
However, the policy is reserved to Westminster and the first cards will be issued this month to foreign students entering Britain. MSPs backed a Scottish Government motion stating the scheme would not increase security or deter crime, while raising concerns about civil liberties.
It is planned to make them available to everyone in the UK by 2012. Scots Community Safety Minister Fergus Ewing said the estimated £5bn needed for ID cards should be spent elsewhere.
An SNP motion condemning ID cards as an expensive invasion of civil liberties is expected to be backed by all parties, except Labour. But Labour declined to back the motion, saying parliament should focus on issues which were devolved to Scotland.
The Scottish Government has rubbished the plan, claiming the UK-wide scheme would cost £5bn, but would not boost security or deter crime. The first identity cards will be issued to foreign nationals from next week, while young people will be asked to sign up from 2010 before their expected general introduction from 2012.
The Tories, Liberal Democrats and Greens are expected to back the SNP's position, during a government-led debate in Holyrood. There's nothing extreme or unusual in the introduction of ID cards Richard BakerLabour MSP
Labour attacked ministers for debating an issue reserved to Westminster. Mr Ewing told parliament ID cards were a "colossal waste of money", and that the UK Government could not be trusted to keep the data safe.
Leadership 'failure' "This scheme won't achieve its primary stated objective of making people safer nor reducing the terrorist threat," he said.
Scotland's public safety minister Fergus Ewing will argue that ID cards will do nothing to fight crime or improve national security and would have serious implications for the civil liberties of ordinary citizens. "We do believe that it poses an unacceptable threat to citizens' privacy and civil liberties."
The first biometric cards are being issued to students from outside the EU and marriage visa holders this month, before being issued on a voluntary basis to young people from 2010 and for everyone else from 2012. Liberal Democrat MSP Robert Brown said he was uneasy at the decision to issue cards to foreign nationals.
The UK Government has said there is strong public demand for ID cards He said: "It goes under the rather unpleasant title of identity cards for foreign nationals, with all the nasty implied innuendo of the recipients being aliens, other people from far-off countries that we know nothing about and probably terrorists anyway."
Labour's justice spokesman at Holyrood, Richard Baker, said the SNP should be bringing forward more important issues to debate. Tory Bill Aitken said governments had every justification to take action on improving security, but added: "Where there have been terrible terrorist outrages in the past, in countries where identity cards are compulsory, they have made not one whit of difference."
"At a time when our prison system is at breaking point through overcrowding, corners are being cut in an effort to hit police recruitment targets and when crimes of dishonesty on our capital city are increasing, it says everything about the Scottish Government's failure of leadership that they have chosen to use parliamentary time to debate a UK issue outwith their control," he said. Pointing out Holyrood had no jurisdiction on ID cards, Labour's Richard Baker said there would be no obligation on people to carry ID cards.
He said the UK Government was bringing forward a series of measures to enhance national security and public safety.
He added: "ID cards are a part of that.
"There's nothing extreme or unusual in the introduction of ID cards and the kind of data which will be on them."
The government motion was passed by 69 votes to zero, with 38 abstentions.