A nice little earner

It will cost £5.4billion (and that's a million million) to set up and run a national identity scheme according to a release today by the UK government. Without having seen any of the detail it does strike me that the government hasn't said how much it will cost to track down and prosecute those involved in the manufacture, distribution and (mis)use of fakes. And it hasn't said how much untaxed revenue will be accrued by the manufacturers and distributors which will then be ploughed straight back into the country's economy, by-passing the depredatory Inland Revenue and Customs & Excisemen, in the form of conspicuous consumption.

See, they can't even get their act together and give us a proper economic impact statement.