Good points on the relevance. If anybody needs to know more about the pros, cons and practicalities of introducing, and more importantly, maintaining a UK ID card scheme, I can recommend 'The Blunders of our Governments' by Anthony King and Ivor Crewe. The chapter 'ID Cards Swiped' gives a sobering account of the UK's last attempt, from hitting the Statute Book in 2006 to quietly being scrapped in 2010, at an estimated cost of £300 million.