Don't put IDs on computer

The person writing in Friday's newspaper "Money is wasted on computer systems" is absolutely correct.

Given the Government's pitiful record on large scale IT projects, it seems inevitable that costs will rise, to the benefit of no-one apart from the private companies with lucrative contracts to build the system.

As estimated costs are already approaching £20 billion, more than £330 for every man, woman and child in the country, and are sure to rise further, is there nothing better that this money could be spent on?

The ID card scheme seems to have all the signs of a disaster in the making, both in a financial and security sense - imagine if the 25 million records lost by Revenue and Customs had included fingerprint, photograph and iris scan details.

Along with a record of the time and location of every use, the prospects for identity theft would be enormous. And as we have seen, such a security breach seems almost inevitable.

Indeed, the think-tank Demos is now urging the Government to abandon the whole ID card project, advice which Gordon Brown would do well to heed.

Our identity details must be kept secure and the best way of doing this seems to be to keep them out of Government hands, not put them all in one central computer.

Thomas Gape, Powys