UK prime minister Keir Starmer avoided mentioning the mandatory digital ID scheme in his keynote speech to the Labour Party conference amid calls for him to put meat on the bones of the plans or risk it failing fast.
Referring to the gangs that organize unauthorized immigration to the UK on small boats, Starmer said: “We will stop this, we will smash the gangs, we will crack down on illegal working, we will remove people with no right to be here and we will secure Britain’s borders.”
Last week, Starmer said his government’s new digital ID plans would tackle illegal working through its mandatory use for right-to-work checks by the end of this Parliament, but he did not refer to this policy yesterday.
On Monday, Peter Hyman, a former communications adviser to Starmer, told a meeting at the Labour Party conference that digital ID was a significant policy but “no one’s going out there to explain it” and as a result its opponents were “motoring” ahead.
“At this rate, ID cards will be dead in the water in six months’ time,” he said.
A parliamentary petition against digital ID had been signed by more than 2.6 million people by late afternoon on September 30.
Starmer did discuss the benefits of IT to the National Health Service in his conference speech.
“Artificial intelligence is transforming healthcare. I have seen it for myself. I have spoken to patients alive because of it,” he said, citing stroke patients where AI is used to identify the precise location of blood clots.
He highlighted the NHS Online service for remote appointments with consultants, as announced by health secretary Wes Streeting.
“For the vast majority, a face-to-face consultation is right and we will never take that away from those who want it,” he said, but online appointments could benefit time-pressed single mothers and older people in rural areas, he claimed.
“Why not have a doctor see you at home in your living room, on an iPad, talking to you? No queues, no three-hour bus trips, no cancellation letters arriving after the appointment date,” the prime minister said.
Patients would be able to access the best consultants in the country rather than just those working in their area, he added. Medical professionals have already raised questions about the project.
In a closing section aiming to show how Britain is not broken, Starmer claimed: “Tech companies [are] queuing up to back this country, saying that we are indispensable for the AI future. Those companies can invest anywhere in the world but they are choosing us, they are choosing Hartlepool, Warrington, Belfast, the East Midlands.” ®