By James Martin McCarthy

Copyright belfastlive

You know a policy is in trouble when Sinn Féin and the DUP agree on it. Add Alliance to the mix and you’re into unicorn territory. But that’s exactly where we are with Keir Starmer’s grand plan for a “Brit Card” digital ID . Aside from the name having reason to cause division in Northern Ireland, First Minister Michelle O’Neill called the plan “ludicrous.” The DUP warned of an assault on freedom. Alliance’s Sorcha Eastwood took to Facebook to declare she won’t support it. The Ulster Unionists, the SDLP and People Before Profit have also spoken out against the plans. For once, we have seen straight-up opposition from all sides. If Stormont could bottle this kind of unity, we’d have a functioning society by next week. So why does the Brit Card strike such a nerve? Partly because Northern Ireland is hypersensitive to questions of identity. Unionists see London tightening its grip, nationalists have argued that it is a breach of the Good Friday Agreement, and those in the middle just see another attempt to make ordinary people jump through hoops. But underneath the familiar language, everyone is really talking about the same thing: trust. And the truth is, you would struggle to find anyone here who would trust the current government to run a bath, never mind have this much power over their daily lives. The sales pitch from Westminster has been slick. They argue that the card will stop illegal working, modernise public services and make life as easy as tapping your phone for a bus fare. They have pointed to Estonia and Denmark, where the system is already in place, so why shouldn’t we? But the UK isn’t Estonia. Here, ID cards are associated with wartime rationing and overbearing bureaucracy. Tony Blair tried to bring them back and crashed into a wall of public scepticism. The last set was scrapped in 1952. There’s a reason for that, as people don’t like the idea of being asked to prove themselves to the state before they can work or rent a flat. And who can blame them? The British government’s track record on protecting data is dismal. Every other month, it feels like there’s a leak, a hack or a misplaced laptop. Silicon Valley giants with billion-dollar budgets can’t keep our details secure, and yet we’re supposed to believe Whitehall can? Good luck with that. This is why the Brit Card has found enemies everywhere. Everyone from David Davis to Nigel Farage and even the Liberal Democrats are twitchy. That’s quite the coalition. It also explains why digital ID has long been a favourite obsession of conspiracy theorists. They’ve ranted about chips in arms and the “great reset” for years. And while the wilder stuff is nonsense, the mainstream is now voicing a similar anxiety in plainer terms, as once the state builds a system like this, it never stops there. Mission creep is inevitable. Today it’s “right to work” checks; tomorrow, who knows? Stormont’s opposition matters because it shows the problem isn’t just practical or political and that it’s also cultural. In a place where identity is contested every day, forcing everyone to carry a “Brit Card” feels like more than red tape. It feels like control. And that’s a rare sentiment all parties can agree on. Labour insists this is about restoring trust in the system. But trust isn’t built by demanding your papers. Trust is built by showing people you can govern competently without snooping into their pockets. That’s a lesson Stormont could teach Westminster, and it’s not often we can say that with a straight face. For all the latest news, visit the Belfast Live homepage here and sign up to our politics newsletter here.