The UK government plans to issue all legal residents a digital identity by the end of the current Parliament, which could run until August 2029, with its use required to get a job.
“Digital ID is an enormous opportunity for the UK,” said prime minister Keir Starmer. “It will make it tougher to work illegally in this country, making our borders more secure. And it will also offer ordinary citizens countless benefits, like being able to prove your identity to access key services swiftly – rather than hunting around for an old utility bill.”
The government said that digital IDs will be held on people’s phones and will build on existing work to introduce a government digital wallet including driving licenses. It said it will ensure the scheme works for people who cannot use a smartphone, with a public consultation engaging with digitally excluded, homeless, and older people.
Reported plans that digital ID would be compulsory when renting accommodation do not appear in the announcement.
Starmer justified the new identity scheme, which his government had ruled out a year ago when it was proposed by former prime minister Tony Blair’s institute, as part of tackling unauthorized immigration.
“There is no silver bullet, but we must enforce every possible measure to deter migrants from entering British waters,” he wrote in an op-ed for the Daily Telegraph.
Culture secretary Lisa Nandy told BBC Radio 4’s Today that everyone will have to accept a digital ID but would not need to carry the means to show it at all times. “They won’t be required to use it on a daily basis,” she said. “This is not like an ID card where you would be asked to show it as you are moving around.”
Asked by presenter Nick Robinson what would happen in the event of a check on whether those working for an employer had the right to work, Nandy said: “You wouldn’t be required to have that with you at the time, but you would be required to have a digital ID and produce that.”
When Robinson pointed out that employees can already be asked to produce documents showing they are entitled to work, she replied: “It’s a much more rigid system. At the moment, for example, you give your National Insurance number to prove you have the right to work in the UK. That’s not linked to any photo ID or anything else.”
Beyond National Insurance numbers, current rules already require employers to check then retain copies of identity documents such as passports for two years, or use an online system to check that someone has the right to work.
Nandy said that digital ID will not be required to access benefits or the National Health Service. The scheme will “have benefits to the UK population, people being able to access services and verify their identity much more easily if they choose to,” she said.
“But we’re not proposing that we move to a system where everybody in the UK will have a digital ID and be required to show it to access all services.”
Earlier on Today, Conservative shadow secretary for work and pensions Helen Whately said the scheme would not tackle employers who already fail to carry out right-to-work checks, adding that the government’s proposal would “make law-abiding people have to jump through more hoops and employers have more red tape, while in the grey economy illegal working will just go on.”
Silkie Carlo, director of campaign group Big Brother Watch, said: “Plans for a mandatory digital ID would make us all reliant on a digital pass to go about our daily lives, turning us into a checkpoint society that is wholly un-British.”
She said it would do nothing to stop unauthorized immigration. “Starmer has no mandate to force the population to carry digital IDs and millions of us will simply not do it.” ®