Question Time BBC 2nd July. David Dimbleby questioning Labour deputy leader Harriet Harman on the subject of I/D cards:
Harman: then there is the question about the airside, which is the airport people working on the side where the aeroplanes are, at two airports which was going to be a pilot scheme...
Dimbleby: Well you've abolished that.
Harman: No we haven't. What we've done is Manchester...
Dimbleby: You've dropped plans to make them compulsory.
Harman: Well I'm just telling you what we're actually doing...
Dimbleby: And I'm just telling you what your Government said they're doing..(applause from audience)
Harman: So basically the idea is that to improve airport security we were going to have two pilots - one in Manchester and one in City Airport London and there was objections from the staff about it being imposed in the airport so what we said is we will cooperate with them if the airport managers and the people who work in the airports want to introduce a system of I/D cards... and if you're a pilot who's got ten different I/D cards... (unfortunately Dimbleby then interrupts her, saying she's gone off track, but Harman persists..)
Harman: we said we'd do foreign nationals, then we'd do airside, then if it was to be extended to British citizens who weren't working in airports we wouldn't do that without we actually took it to the House of Commons and had a vote, and that remains the same as it ever was.
So make of that what you will. There is no cause for celebration yet, this thing seems very much alive even if by another name. Effing c
