Labor swift to dump Access Card

THE Labor Government has moved quickly to scrap the Howard administration's controversial $1.1 billion Human Services identity card.

The federal Government has shut down the Office of the Access Card and closed its website, honouring its election promise to scrap the controversial program.

The $1.1 billion project - intended to provide every Australian with a unique health and welfare number and biometric photo on a smartcard - opened a year ago, with two key tenders attracting strong bids from IT and card supply companies keen to secure a role.

The project has languished since mid-year, after an all-party Senate committee rejected the draft enabling legislation as wholly inadequate and lacking in protections against the card's use as a de facto identity card.

Bidders are understood to have spent millions on preparing their tenders for systems integration and card issuing; while the department spent more than $50 million on consultants, administration and advertising.

The Howard government also spent an undisclosed amount on establishing the Consumer and Privacy Taskforce to manage public consultation; its resulting reports provided recommendations that were ignored by the then minister, Senator Chris Ellison.

One participant notes with frustration the "diverted efforts from other agencies' activities, and the time wasted by people responding to the disordered consultation process".

However, the bulk of the cost lay in completing the processing and registration of some 18 million Australians while the card was rolled out over two years to 2010, and Labor plans to use these savings elsewhere.

The deadlines for the technical and administrative parts of the Access Card regime were widely seen to be highly ambitious and driven by a political timetable rather than a scheduled nationwide rollout.The scope of the project and card capabilities also varied wildly as former Employment and Workplace Relations minister, Joe Hockey, talked up plans for the private sector to piggyback applications on the smartcard for secondary, "consumer friendly" purposes.

AustralianIT, Karen Dearne December 07, 2007