Applying for a British passport? Then (soon) you must attend an interview and give your fingerprints…
The British government’s identity card scheme will involve interviewing people and taking their fingerprints when they register for the scheme. However, initially the government is piggybacking this scheme onto the process of applying for a passport.
On the 26th March, the first of 69 new interview centres will be opened, and from April onwards, some first time passport applicants will find they have to travel to one of these centres to be interviewed before getting their passport.
Later in the year, the collection of fingerprints during this process will commence. Eventually all first time applicants will be called for interview, and then from 2009 onwards the plan is that everyone applying for a new passport will be called for interview, and their details will be entered onto the national identity register. They will also get an ID card unless they “opt out”.
However “opting out” merely means you don’t get the ID card — the info is still collected and store on the NIR. Moreover the government plans to make it compulsory for everyone to register and get a card after the next general election, should they still be in power.
See the following for more info:
- The Identity and Passport Service, in particular this page about interviews.
- Renew for Freedom, No2ID’s campaign to get people to renew their passports before interviews and fingerprinting become compulsory for all applicants.