Non-Driver's Drivers Licences
Kelly Bert Manning
I recently heard a sociologist with an interest in surveillance bring a
large audience to laughter by commenting that advocates of mandatory
government ID had proposed non-drivers driver's licences as one way of
achieving their goal of having everyone in the country carry government
issued ID at all times.
So what exactly is so novel or so amusing about the concept?
Sometime in the 1970s my province replaced it's old Liquor Board photo
ID cards with a drivers licence card which had a restriction code
indicating that the person it was issued to wasn't allowed to drive.
That was of interest to me because I didn't get a licence to drive
until I was 20 and got tired of being asked to produce my non-existent
driver's licence in pubs and liquor stores. There had been a gap when
there was no government issued photo ID available to non-drivers.
This has since been replaced by a provincial ID card issued by the same
body that issues driver's licences. They are available for free to
people who are surrendering their licences because they don't plan to
drive and can be used in any situation where a driver's licence might
be requested as identification.
Our premier will probably be getting one. His licence expired on
Jan/12, shortly after he was arrested for DUI and other driving
offences. He can't get a new licence for at least a year.
The speaker also raised the issue that the so called western
demoncracies seem to be moving toward the same sort of population
surveillance and monitoring that existed in communist countries and in
control societies such as South Africa under apartheid.
I remember regularly hearing opponents of communism boast that we
didn't require citizens to carry internal passports and have snoops in
every apartment building and transportation node monitoring the comings
and goings of innocent people. Now that the Cold War is over that seems
to be less of a bedrock distinguishing trait of what used to be called
"the free west".
The whole issue of so called smart ID cards seems like a recipie for a
huge waste of money and pointless hassle by a Federal Government that
wasted a gigabuck developing a firearms registration system and wants
at least $500 million to "fix" it.
What is the point of having a thumbprint on a card? In the first place
a bit of household gelatin can let someone match any thumprint they
need to. Secondly how is a thumbprint any more reliable than a photo
for ensuring that an ID card has not been forged?
If you don't retrieve a ditital copy of the photo or thumbprint from a
central DB how can you ensure that such a card was ever issued, let
alone that the person presenting what is purported to be a valid ID
card is the actual person who was issued a valid card?