Personal ID's, how is it in your country?

[VetLegion]

In Croatia:

You are obliged to get one after you are 16 years old, but you can get it earlier. You have to carry it with you non-stop and everywhere. Police is authorised by law to ask your ID at any time, and you have to show it to them.

Penalty:

If you get checked for ID and you don't have it with you the fine is about 15 Euro, plus you may get taken to the police station for identity check or the policeman trying to check you can do it by radio if you provided him with personal data.


________

My comment: the enforcement of this is not very orwellian, usually policemen don't ID people for fun. They're mostly polite when they do and after you show them your ID card they go away. Still, many people here, me included, find the practice undefensible. Free people should not be coerced by the state to carry ID's all the time, like branded cattle. Many bring out examples of USA to demonstrate that a society can function without personal ID cards completely, or without them being compulsory (France).

So I am interested about both theory and practice in your country. Both, because it can happen that some country has very strict ID regulations but they are not enforced at all, or there can be a country that is a police state without personal ID cards, using other methods. Thanks for replies. You can also vote in the poll, it's quick and messy, so please provide replies too.

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

I fail to see why I should be required to carry some bureaucratic stamp of approval to go about my lawful business in Britain.

If the police want to stop me, I suggest they wait until I actually do something worth stopping me for.

[VetLegion]

You are set to get them in 2007 I think, so just wait and see.

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

Aha. They're starting to chicken out of making them compulsory.

[VetLegion]

[Locutus]

This year they passed a new 'anti-terrorist' law in the Netherlands (can you say Patriot Act?) and now everyone of 14 years and older must carry ID. Officially the police is only allowed to ask for it when they have a very good reason, but already in a week time dozens of fines have been handed out for people not being able to identify themselves. You're not telling me the police had very good reason to suspect all those people (plus all the ones who were asked for their ID and did have it with them) of having done something illegal

Those stupid christo-fascist f*ckwits Harry Potter & friends that call themselves our government can go play Quidditch in hell I refuse to cooperate with this new law It reverses the whole basic principle of a justice in a modern society: instead of being innocent until proven guilty, we're now guilty until we can prove we're innocent :puke:

Already a few days ago they threw a 14-year-old girl in jail for almost a day because she forgot her Ausweis. Yeah, that'll teach those damned terrorists

[Eli]

personal IDs issued by the government exist in my country I have to get one at certain age
I have to provide a picture
There are authorised persons to whom I HAVE to show it if they ask

Probably : I can be checked for any reason, free estimate of such person.

And legally I have to carry it with me wherever I go but no one actually does that.

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by VetLegion
You are set to get them in 2007 I think, so just wait and see.

No, we're set to watch Blair make embarrassing climb downs and policy reversals for an ill thought out knee jerk reaction in the absence of any intelligent responses.

It has long been a tradition in this country that your identity is your own business, not the state's, the monarch's nor the police's, and that they have to provide a reason for enquiring after your identity.

Any forms of identity that you HAVE to carry are linked with things such as entering restricted areas (private businesses, some government buildings, army bases).

If I am a law abiding citizen, going about my lawful business, the state can go and f**k itself frankly, before it demands to know who I am with no just cause.

[yaroslav]

Re: Personal ID's, how is it in your country?

Originally posted by VetLegion
In Croatia:

You are obliged to get one after you are 16 years old, but you can get it earlier. You have to carry it with you non-stop and everywhere. Police is authorised by law to ask your ID at any time, and you have to show it to them.

Penalty:

If you get checked for ID and you don't have it with you the fine is about 15 Euro, plus you may get taken to the police station for identity check or the policeman trying to check you can do it by radio if you provided him with personal data.


________

My comment: the enforcement of this is not very orwellian, usually policemen don't ID people for fun. They're mostly polite when they do and after you show them your ID card they go away. Still, many people here, me included, find the practice undefensible. Free people should not be coerced by the state to carry ID's all the time, like branded cattle. Many bring out examples of USA to demonstrate that a society can function without personal ID cards completely, or without them being compulsory (France).

So I am interested about both theory and practice in your country. Both, because it can happen that some country has very strict ID regulations but they are not enforced at all, or there can be a country that is a police state without personal ID cards, using other methods. Thanks for replies. You can also vote in the poll, it's quick and messy, so please provide replies too.

Well, in Spain it's in the lines of what you are saying. I believe the mandatory age is 18, thus. ID (called DNI - Documento Nacional de Identidad - National Document for ID) includes a picture and fingerprints. The police can ask you to show it, but I have been asked only one time and it was o.k in my opinion (i was visiting the house of an local important politic here in Spain and the police was expecting ETA to attack that day).

The ID is also used in near all transaction with burocracy, although many times you can alternatively present a passport. Another common uses of it:

-With your credit card in order to show that you are the REAL owner of that card (so if you are stolen your credit card the thief can't use it)
- In any private transaction or contract to identify the person who is signing.
- I can also use the ID to travel to any Schengen signing country
- When you check in a hotel you are forced to show your DNI, so no one can fake a check in a hotel (anti-ETA measure)

I understand the problems a ID migth casuse but I am very used to it and the police is not crazy or arbritary about it.

[molly bloom]

Re: Re: Personal ID's, how is it in your country?

Originally posted by yaroslav


I understand the problems a ID migth casuse but I am very used to it and the police is not crazy or arbritary about it.

Yet.


However the point is that in the United Kingdom it is being offered virtually as a panacea for the ills of international terrorism, and the negative aspects are being blithely brushed aside by governmental lickspittles.

We all saw how well identity cards worked in the battle against international terrorism in the 70s....

[yaroslav]

In Spain it has been mandatory many many years and the police has never been crazy about it since democracy started in Spain (in the dictactorship of stupid Franco it was another issue, though)

I understand that is tiresoming to be forced to carry a document (although this one is a small card), but there are also advantages on it. For instance, in Spain a electronic version of it is being offered so people can pay taxes online, we're very advanced on the whole taxs-over-internet thing.

I am afraid I am not aware about ID in britain against terrorism, but I believe in Spain it has been hepful against ETA, although it was not the reason that created it.

The ID in Spain dates back to 1943.

[Locutus]

Originally posted by yaroslav
I understand that is tiresoming to be forced to carry a document (although this one is a small card), but there are also advantages on it. For instance, in Spain a electronic version of it is being offered so people can pay taxes online, we're very advanced on the whole taxs-over-internet thing.

There's a difference between owning a document and being forced to carry it around all day. I've had a passport all my life, it's a simple necessity if you travel as much as I do. And I'm all for electronic passes and the like to facilitate financial transactions and the like. But when I'm taking a stroll to get some fresh air, doing my groceries or going out to watch a movie, I don't want to be forced to have to carry around Ausweis like I'm a criminal or terrorist who's up to no good.

I am afraid I am not aware about ID in britain against terrorism, but I believe in Spain it has been hepful against ETA, although it was not the reason that created it.

Until recently Britain has had the same problems with the IRA that Spain has had with the ETA. Mainland Britain (for once) serves as a shining example for the rest of Europe (and the world) in that it shows that you can perfectly well fight terrorism and still maintain freedom for your citizens at the same time.

[yaroslav]

Originally posted by Locutus
There's a difference between owning a document and being forced to carry it around all day. I've had a passport all my life, it's a simple necessity if you travel as much as I do. And I'm all for electronic passes and the like to facilitate financial transactions and the like. But when I'm taking a stroll to get some fresh air, doing my groceries or going out to watch a movie, I don't want to be forced to have to carry around Ausweis like I'm a criminal or terrorist who's up to no good.

What is Ausweis? The ID? Were the terrorist or criminals forced to carry a ID in the Netherlands before thtis law?

Until recently Britain has had the same problems with the IRA that Spain has had with the ETA. Mainland Britain (for once) serves as a shining example for the rest of Europe (and the world) in that it shows that you can perfectly well fight terrorism and still maintain freedom for your citizens at the same time.

I know about IRA I don't know though the reference to ID and the 70's. How are they related?

[Thorgal]

How exactly freedom is affected by having an ID?

[yaroslav]

Not by having it but by being forced to carry it.