Exclusive: U-turn on airport ID cards

Tuesday, June 02, 2009

Public Servant Daily has discovered that the Home Office has made a very quiet U-turn on its policy regarding the airport ID card trials. Mike Lowe reports.

As part of the initial roll-out of ID cards, the government announced plans - called the critical worker identity card (CWIC) scheme - for all those in sensitive roles at airports to be issued with an identity card. But when Home Secretary Jacqui Smith officially launched an early-adopter scheme for the citizens of Manchester in May, a much smaller announcement was made changing the rules of the CWIC scheme.

Originally, and against much union opposition, all airside workers were expected to apply for an ID card once the pilot began or potentially lose their jobs. The British Airline Pilots Association (BALPA) were fiercely outspoken on the matter and threatened the government with legal action if it went ahead.

Yet in its May announcement, the Home Office changed the terms so that only those newly recruited as airside workers will be expected to apply for an ID card. All existing members of staff can continue to work without a card.

A spokesman for BALPA told Public Servant Daily that they were given no reason for the change. He also denied that talks between government and BALPA officials had influenced the decision or that it was a concession made to stave off a legal challenge.

But he added that whilst this change applies to the Manchester Airport pilot, once it is rolled out nationally the old rules still apply and "pilots who refuse to have the card will lose their job".

NO2ID's spokesman said the U-turn was more proof that the scheme is not actually up and running "in any form". "It sounds like an attempt to soften the blow with BALPA and head off at the pass any future problems," he added.

According to a Home Office spokeswoman, the decision was made in September 2008 in talks between the former identity minister Meg Hillier and representatives of the TUC and Prospect.

"We have previously said that identity cards will be mandatory for all airside workers, just as other pre-employment checks are today, so that the benefits from the scheme can be realised across the aviation sector," she said to Public Servant Daily.

"We will work with each airport to agree exactly which employees would initially be subject to this requirement and how it would best be integrated into the pre-employment checking and pass issuing arrangements at that airport."