Here (thanks to Ideal Government) is a piece from the UK where Sarah Arnott advises forgetting about the proposed brick and mortar ID Card and instead concentrating on a government-issued electronic identity. Sarah thinks a single identity is sufficient for everything. She also says:
It is unlikely that ‘function creep’ will inaugurate a Big Brother state.
More probable is that the government will spend fantastic amounts of money on an inflexible and ineffective plan, conceived out of political expediency, achieving nothing more than a vague notion of improved security.
And a useless piece of plastic.
And another fiasco to be added to the already battered reputation of public sector IT.
Ideal Government has also published a list of companies which have announced their intentions to bid. A lot of smart people there – it will be interesting to see if the plan evolves to take advantage of advanced identity technology more in conformance with the Laws.