Parliamentary Question re Identity Cards Programme meetings
Mark Oaten, the Liberal Democrat Home Affairs spokesman has received a Written Parliamentary Answer from Des Browne, the Minister for Citizenship and Immigration regarding the recent meetings held by the Identity Cards Programme with the private sector in the last 6 months.
They seem to have attended about 20 conferences and seminars, and had meetings with at least 60 companies.
You may well wonder what meetings, if any, there have been with people or groups who are worried about the privacy and security of the proposed scheme, or who are opposed in principle to some or all aspects of it.
Perhaps our FOIA request for meeting diaries, minutes, agenda etc. will make things clearer.
"Identity Cards ProgrammeMr. Oaten: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will list the (a) conferences, (b) seminars and (c) meetings with private sector representatives attended by members of the Identity Cards Programme team in the last six months. [208287]
Mr. Browne: In the last six months, members of the Identity Cards Programme team have:
(a) Attended the following conferences
Biometrics 2004
CIFAS Executive Forum
e-Government Exchange
e-Government Summit
National Fraud Forum
Risk and Security Management
UK and Ireland Fraud Liaison Group Annual Conference
Whitehall Industry Group Fraud Solutions Workshops;
and conferences organised by:
Experian
The Financial Services Authority
Institute for Public Policy Research
Institution of Electrical Engineers
International Association for Biometrics
Royal United Services Institute
Telecommunications Users' Fraud Forum;
(b) Participated in the following seminars
BT Syntegra Consultation Event
Naked Science: The State of Identity (Science Museum/Dana Centre);
and four seminars organised by Intellect the trade body for the UK based information technology, telecommunications and electronics industry.
(c) Held meetings with the following private sector organisations:
ABTA
Airline Operators Association
APACS
Atmel
Atos Origin
Authentec
Aware
Axon
BAA
BAR-UK
BATA
Bioscrypt
British Bankers' Association
BT
Callcredit
Cap Gemini
CBI
Cherry Corporation
CIFAS
Cogent
Consult Hyperion
CoreStreet
Datacard
De La Rue
Director of Foundation for Science and Technology
EDS
Equifax
Eye Ticket Corporation
Experian
Finance and Leasing Association
The Football Association
Fujitsu Microelectronics
Generics Group
Giesecke and Devrient
Hewlett Packard
Idenix
IFTO
Infineon
Intellect
Indian
Lasercard
London City Airport
NERA Consulting
Oberthur
OCE
ORGA
OVD Kinegram
Passenger Shipping Association
Precise Biometrics
Premier Electronics
Prudential
Royal Bank of Scotland
Setec
Sharp Corporation
SMARTRAC
St Microelectronics
Visa Europe
Meetings have also been held with
Small Business Service
Inland Revenue MPPC Payroll Group
Financial Services Authority
where private sector organisations have been in attendance.
For the purposes of this answer, the following definitions have been used. "Conference" means an event organised by an external organisation where a member of the Programme Team has been invited to participate or attend. "Seminar" means an event which was arranged by the Programme or by an external organisation where identity cards was the only or principal item of discussion. "Meeting" means any other meeting which involved a private organisation, where identity cards were the primary subject. Meetings with organisations which are currently providing services to the Programme team or with organisations which at the time were bidding to provide services to the Programme Team have been excluded."
Comments
Great Work!!!! thanks. however - i am also interested in knowing what lobbying orgs the government has talked to. at first i though holy crap there are no enlightened citizen rights first organizations on the list. but the question only asked about private sector. i mean this makes it look like a big brother shoe-in but perhapos thats unfair
Posted by: James Governor | January 28, 2005 4:20 PM
Just to be clear, the information above is as the result of a "normal" Parliamentary Question from a Member of Parliament, nothing yet has happened with our Freedom of Information Act request.
A couple of other Written Answers to Parliamentary Questions shed a bit of light on the £6.5 million plus being spent on PA Consulting and others
Although it is now more than 6 months ago, the Home office refused to attend the "Mistaken Identity" ID Card meeting held at the London School of Economics on 19th May 2004 (same day as the "purple flour" was thrown by amateur protestors in the House of Commons Chamber, despite the multi-million pound "security" screen)
They did, however, manage to attend and "officially support" an industry event the week after.
Posted by: Watching Them, Watching Us | January 28, 2005 5:12 PM
I made this point to David Blunkett from the floor of that IPPR event (you know, card-burning outside etc) that it wasnt much of a consultation when the same week sees Intellect and the Home Office meet (without any representation from civil society) and then LSE hosts a PI/FIPR event with Law Society, Lord Philips etc but no-one from HO any barely anyone from industry.
It's also worth working out which public relations firms have been engaged. I quizzed one PR woman at the IPPR event but she was reticent.
Posted by: William | January 29, 2005 5:14 PM