"Kieran Mansley" wrote in message
news
On Fri, 20 May 2005 12:23:15 +0100, Mary Fisher wrote:


"Kieran Mansley" wrote in message


My point is that there are many other things that we could spend that
money on that would be much more likely to result in a benefit. Why
risk such a large amount of money on something when there are so many
other better uses for the cash?

Such as?

We - the population - won't feel it.

3bn could make a huge difference to many people's lives, but instead you'd
rather waste it on ID cards? Can you really not think of a single public
organisation, charity, or government department that couldn't make better
use of the cash? Pensions? Schools? NHS? Power generation? Transport?
Poverty? All of these, we are constantly told, are chronically under
funded.

Yes, and I can think of a lot of other spending which I'd rather hadn't been
undertaken.

If you had 3bn at your disposal to be spent for the public good, I very
much doubt you'd go out and buy the country a national ID card scheme:
you'd be much more likely to do something that would actually benefit the
world in some way.

I'd like to think so - but it's never going to happen and I'm not an
armchair - or any other kind of - expert.

If there were a potential very large reward,

For what?

To the world for us having ID cards, whether financial or otherwise.

then the risk might be worth it, but there is no potential very large
reward that I'm aware of, so on balance I don't think the risk is worth
it.

We're not all money minded ...

Of course not, but none of us want to see it wasted either, especially
when such a lot of it is at stake, and when there are so many other better
uses for that money.

I honestly don't think that's the reason most people here object to it:-)

Mary

Kieran