SEVERAL months back, Jacqui Smith MP wrote in the Redditch Advertiser saying she had conducted a poll in the town that showed residents were profoundly in support of compulsory ID cards in the UK.

I recently obtained copies of the surveys carried out from Ms Smith's office and was fascinated by what I read:

Do you agree that ID cards should be introduced to help us take on fraud, ensure that benefits are going to the right people and help us know who is in our country?

Do I agree with the above statement? If that were all ID cards did and was a fair representation of the impact they would have, it would be hard to disagree.

The fact is, this statement is loaded, argumentative and blatantly pushing an agenda.

Even the seemingly innocuous question in a second survey was accompanied by a large photograph of a children's disguise kit and the phrase, "Who is using your wallet?''

In actual fact, all of the survey material (presentation and content), has been designed to produce a desired response.

The fact 80 per cent of constituents who returned the poll card supported the introduction of ID cards made me wonder who exactly had been polled to begin with.

When I pressed for how those polled where chosen - was it a carefully selected, proportionally representative demographic of Redditch's communities, taking into account age, race, religion and sex, as it should have been - I was led to believe this was not the case.

The media and the Government in equal measure have been throwing around the term "ideology" a lot recently, very rarely in anything like the correct context.

However, the blatant attack on civil liberties in the name of freedom and democracy the ID card represents is but one of numerous such attacks that seem to be fracturing further the fragile democratic ideology that such ideas are supposedly meant to protect.

What is needed is informed debate, not Ms Smith's brand of persuasion through the back door.

I would urge the residents of Redditch who oppose the introduction of compulsory ID cards to voice their opinion directly to Ms Smith before it is too late.

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