Voter ID, Again

Dateline: Woking, 13th May 2024.A Very British Solution to Voter IDIn 2004, the former Prime Minister of our United Kingdom, Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson wrote in a newspaper that if he were ever asked to produce an ID card as evidence that “I am who I say I am” in “any other venue, public or private” then he would “take that card out of my wallet and physically eat it in the presence of whatever emanation of the state has demanded I produce it”. This was before his government introduced (pointless and expensive) mandatory voter ID requirements at polling stations. Which is why I would have loved to have been a fly on the wall when Mr. Johnson was turned away from his local polling station after forgetting to bring acceptable photo ID. And I would I loved to have been a fly on the wall even more when he turned up with his driving licence to eat in front of the baffled clerk at the polling station.ShareIDentity Britain doesn’t have an actual ID card, or a functioning digital identity infrastructure, but fortunately Britain doesn’t have a problem with voters being impersonated at the polling station in the first place, so it doesn’t matter. Voter ID in the UK is a sort of security theatre designed to keep everyone happy.A rigorous ID requirement would be problematic, because a quarter of the British electorate lack either of the principal photo ID documents, a passport or a driving licence. Hence when you go to…Voter ID, Again