ID Cards, ILR and Starmer, the human rights lawyer seemingly incapable of defending human rights

It’s coming to something when the Prime Minister has this column on the same side as the unhinged racists who want to see the world burn.

And yet Sir Keir Starmer has set himself on collision course with an electorate that simply does not want ID cards.

How can a human rights lawyer get it so wrong about human rights so often?

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Remember back in November 2023 when he had shadow ministers ready to resign rather than vote against calling for a ceasefire in Gaza, which Starmer had refused to back?

This has been the week when, despite his own willingness to appease the online right with xenophobic rhetoric - before and after last year's General Election - he has had the brass neck to denounce (correctly) Reform policy as racist.

Even as this column was being written on Monday, Starmer's Home Secretary, Shabana Mahmood, was trotting out yet another policy to soft mirror Reform - doubling the time to qualify for indefinite leave to remain from five to ten years.

Do Labour want anyone to vote for them?

Now Starmer wants to convince us to embrace digital ID cards - an infringement on our civil liberties - as an antidote to a confected immigration crisis.

There is statistical evidence proving most people remain unaware that the numbers of migrants here legally vastly outnumber those who are not, by some distance.

There is zero evidence to suggest digital ID cards will stop an underground economy. Or stop a single boat.

Not one person employing, say, a cash in hand builder or cleaner will suddenly demand to see an ID card and go with someone else if one isn’t forthcoming.

Its as ludicrous as the propagandist garbage that Reform leader Nigel Farage is on course to win the 2029 election because a few polls suggest people are buying into his lies, misinformation and half-baked policies.

We are just over a year into a government with a three-figure majority.

It’s like suggesting Liverpool are on course to win the 2029 Premier League because they are doing well this season.

And yet normally sane, sage political judges and platforms appear to be on a social conditioning exercise to convince everyone that an extremist with form for racist, divisive language is ready for Downing Street.

Then again, this has been the week in which Farage, the bloke with just five MPs, went onto a mainstream radio station to lie that Sharia Law is likely to come to Britain - because a taxi driver told him so.

Farage was also allowed to belch the weapons grade garbage that eastern European migrants have been eating swans from royal parks.

It should never have needed the royal parks to issue a statement denouncing it as a steaming pile of horse manure. But, as I say, it has been that kind of week.

And yet Starmer ends it in most peoples’ crosshairs, leaning into more Reform talking points with an ID card move that even Reform have denounced.

Had Starmer been in opposition, he’d have been condemning it as a government mechanism to monitor, shape, control and restrict our rights.

For goodness’ sake, on the very day it was announced last week, the data on more than 8,000 children was stolen in a nursery hack.

The hackers posted profiles of 10 children online on Thursday and a further 10 on Friday, threatening more unless they were paid.

Co-op, Marks and Spencer, the NHS, Google and even Heathrow have all had data breaches.

In August, the personal data of up to 3,700 Afghans was left exposed after a cyber-attack on a company working with the MoD.

Voters have genuine concerns over their medical privacy and their financial transactions a reason.

Don’t be fooled by the many people insistent that they aren’t worried.

Yes, we do hand over lots of data every day. But that’s our choice. We can refuse if we want to.

Mandatory ID cards removes that choice. It hands the power to a digital eco-system that, as we can see, if far from secure.

Ignore, too, those claiming it is scaremongering to suggest ID cards will lead to an abuse of power.

Tell that to the pensioners peacefully protesting the situation in Gaza who were arrested under anti-terror legislation.

It defies belief that Starmer would surrender our security in the manner that he has. No wonder he is feeling the heat from within.