On the Digital ID Question

We Must Oppose The Latest Version Of This Blair Inspired Scam

It is no secret that Keir Starmer’s operation — with the fingerprints of the Tony Blair Institute all over it — has long been interested in implementing digital IDs. It is no mere administrative tweak but an idea nurtured by parts of Britain’s security establishment and the murkier corners of the tech sector — including companies like Palantir — who have been salivating over this for years.

Mandatory IDs are not a new idea. They weren’t conjured up at Davos or dreamt into existence by Tony Blair. Britain’s first national ID system was introduced in 1939 as an emergency wartime measure. By 1952 it was scrapped — not only because it was expensive, but because the public saw it as a dangerous expansion of policing powers.

The idea resurfaced under Margaret Thatcher, who tried to push compulsory IDs to tackle ‘football hooliganism’ in the 1980s. It came back again under Blair after 9/11, this time justified as a counter-terrorism measure. That attempt provoked the famous No2ID campaign of the late 2000s, which generated such a backlash that the incoming Conservative–Liberal Democrat coalition repealed the scheme outright.

Today’s push for digital IDs arrives at a time of widespread unrest, rising poverty, inflation, and endless foreign entanglements. It is no coincidence. When the ruling class feels its system is fraying, it turns to surveillance and control. Digital IDs would give the state — and its corporate partners — unprecedented power over ordinary people’s lives.

This is not about protecting the public. It is about disciplining it.

The ruling classes have always cloaked these schemes in whatever issue is topical at the time. In the 1980s it was football hooliganism and, implicitly, the Hillsborough disaster. In the 2000s it was terrorism after 9/11 and the London bombings. Today it’s illegal immigration. The excuses change, but the agenda — to normalise mandatory identification and surveillance — stays the same.

They know it’s unpopular. That’s why they look for scapegoats or crises to ride.

Remember Rishi Sunak’s disastrous compulsory national service idea? Floated before the 2024 election, it was widely mocked and only deepened his unpopularity. The election wasn’t about real change; it was about rotating one servant of the ruling class for another.

Starmer may be caught in the same trap. With other bourgeois politicians such as Farage, Badenoch and Corbyn positioning themselves as critics, and the considerable backlash following reports about it in September 2025, (despite rumours swirling since June) the depth of public hostility is obvious.

If Blair couldn’t make it stick in 2007, why would Starmer succeed in 2025? The more plausible explanation is that this is a policy designed to blow up in his face — perhaps even as part of a plan to ease him out and install another ‘acceptable’ manager of the status quo.