Letter: ID cards the no-fuss way

Sir: Not counting my visiting cards, my wallet contains eight plastic cards, each with some identifying information on it in a form sufficiently secure to allow me access to services from my bank, my grocer, the Automobile Association and other traders and associations. None of them cost me anything to obtain.

In France already, and in the UK soon, these cards will contain chips capable of holding more information more securely. The Royal Bank of Scotland reports that adding a photograph increases the cost by pounds 1.

If we are to implement positive individual identification on a national scale then it would be far more sensible to include the national ID minimum dataset in each card issued by whichever organisations we already need cards from than to impose a new and expensive one upon us ("Ministers accused of ID card stealth", 23 August). Including the data in a public format could even be made a voluntary addition - tick the box on the credit card application to include National Identification if you wish.

Dr A K MIDGLEY

Exeter

Sir: Regarding myself as firstly Scottish, secondly European and only thirdly British, were I to obtain one of the new identity cards complete with Union Flag, I would be misrepresented. It surely cannot have been the Home Secretary's intent to provide me with a false identity - can it?

ALASTAIR GEMMELL

Aberdeen