SIR Jacob Rees-Mogg has said digital ID cards will not do anything to combat the number of people coming to the UK illegally.

Speaking on GB News, he said: “As Pitt the Younger warned more than two centuries ago, ‘necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom: It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves.’

“Reverend Starmer is back, teasing the instruction of digital ID cards in the latest lukewarm bid to tackle illegal migration.

“The Prime Minister did not confirm whether IDs would be compulsory, but said the government is considering the technology. And the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, Pat McFadden, recently said that Britain is behind the curve and should adopt digital IDs.

“Number 10 has previously dismissed the idea – another U-turn alert – despite pressure from figures such as Tony Blair. But as is commonplace in this government, the stance seems to be changing.

Jacob Rees-Mogg GB News 4:9.jpg

“However, ID cards have long been a solution in search of a problem. They’re certainly not a novel idea, either. They were used during the Second World War and were subsequently put forward by Lord Blunkett in 2002 but dropped on civil liberties grounds by the Conservative-led coalition government.

“Illegal migrants already work for employers who knowingly bypass ID checks and pay below the minimum wage, exploiting people. Why? Because they have no legal recourse.

“The landlords who house them often ignore the existing rules as well, so adding another layer of bureaucracy in the form of ID cards, even digital ones, will do nothing to change that behaviour. Instead, it will just make life more difficult for ordinary law abiding citizens.

The Prime Minister has said such ID cards may even not be compulsory after all, which renders the whole initiative even more futile.

“Civil liberties advocates warn that such a system would fundamentally alter the relationship between the individual and the state.

“In Britain’s common law tradition, citizens are free to do whatever is not expressly forbidden. ID cards were abandoned after World War Two, following Clarence Willcox’s challenge to the police’s right to keep on demanding them when the wartime necessity had ended.

“Although his conviction for failing to produce an ID card stood, popular anger that followed it led to a change in the system, and the abolition of ID cards followed.

“Unlike continental countries, many people here are under no obligation to carry identification or prove their status to officials on demand. If we are obeying the law, no one has the right to stop us. The King is under the law, it’s a basic principle of our system whereas on the continent, the state is the law.

“So to oblige every citizen to register with the state and carry proof of identity would be a fundamental change in that relationship.

“More practically, it’s fanciful to think that illegal migrants who have already paid thousands of pounds to people smugglers, overstayed visas and broken multiple laws, would suddenly comply with ID requirements.

“Previous attempts to restrict access to work and services through the hostile environment policy led directly to the Windrush scandal affecting people who were legally here.

“Repackaging the same idea with a digital gloss is unlikely to be any more effective and risks repeating the same injustices.

“What is really needed is not a national ID card, but a competent government capable of securing Britain’s borders and enforcing the laws already in place.

“Punishing citizens for a governmental failure to secure Britain’s borders is no solution.”