Spending on UK identity scheme hits £215m

Alan Johnson unveiled a version of an ID card today

The government has spent £215m so far on the National Identity Scheme, leading to accusations of waste from the Tories because they say they will scrap the ID cards section of the scheme should they win a general election next year.

The news comes as Home Secretary Alan Johnson today unveils what ID cards for early adopters in Manchester will look like.

The government estimates that the £5.4bn scheme will cost £1.3bn for identity cards and £3.6bn for biometric passports, with some other costs shared between.

The Home Office did not say how much of the £215m had been spent on ID cards and how much on biometric passports.

But contracts have been issued for ID card and passport manufacture, as well as the biometrics database and an application and enrolement system that could both be used to support ID cards and biometric passports, making it likely that most of the money has been spent on common systems.

Last month home secretary Alan Johnson said the cards would never become compulsory, and a £500m contract for manufacture of the cards will not now be awarded before a general election, leading to Opposition claims that the government has frozen the scheme.

Some 50,000 cards have been issued to foreign workers, and the new cards unveiled today will be used for a small voluntary pilot scheme in Manchester.

Shadow home secretary Chris Grayling told the Financial Times: "The government has already wasted £200m that we cannot afford. The scheme will cost hundreds of millions more, even if the cards are voluntary. It is time it was completely scrapped."

In a recent debate Grayling claimed the Conservatives were committed to scrapping ID cards and the national identity register, though they did not rule out a central database for passports.