Australia Card
The Australia Card was a controversial proposal for a national identification card for Australian citizens and resident foreigners. The proposal was made in 1985, and abandoned in 1987.
The idea for the card was raised at the national Tax Summit in 1985 convened by the then Federal Labor government led by Bob Hawke. The card was to amalgamate other government identification systems and act against tax avoidance and health and welfare rorts. The government introduced legislation in the parliament in 1986, but it did not have a majority in the Senate and was repeatedly blocked by the opposition and minor parties.
In response, Hawke asked the Governor-General Sir Ninian Stephen for a double dissolution, which was granted in June 1987, followed by an election on 11 July. The government was returned, but still without a majority in the Senate. Nevertheless, the legislation was reintroduced, only to be blocked in the Senate once more. The constitutional criteria for a joint sitting of the Senate and the House of Representatives had now been met. Hawke started making plans for a joint sitting, at which the legislation would have been assured of passage due to the dominance of the Labor Party in the parliament overall. However, a retired public servant Ewart Smith noticed a flaw in the drafting of the legislation that nobody in either the government or the opposition had noticed. Even if the bill had been passed by the parliament, there was still no likelihood the Australia Card could be introduced, because certain regulations necessary for the functioning of the system required the concurrence of the Senate, which was hostile to the Card. It is not clear that this flaw was fatal to the scheme, but the government did at that point abandon the idea. It may well have been a convenient face-saving way out of the situation, because by that time very significant popular opposition had arisen from widely disparate groups, although the Australia Card had not figured particularly prominently in the election campaign. [1][2]
Following the shelving of the Australia Card, the Federal Government introduced a new identification system known as a Tax File Number. This unique number, in many ways analogous to the United States Social Security Number, was a means of identifying and cross-refefencing benefits received and tax paid by individuals.
The Australia Card proposal was, and is still, the subject of strong views. The proposal was either an egregious intrusion into individuals' privacy, giving bureaucrats enormous power; or it was an efficient and evolutionary step for a technological age, combating fraud. And its defeat was either a triumph of citizens acting to protect their rights; or irrelevant in the end due to the expansion of other identification systems and data matching.
The Australia Card proposal resurfaces every so often. Most recently[when?], figures within the Liberal Party of Australia - which opposed the card in the 1980s - have voiced support for a national identity card. The Australia Card, say some, would help the government to combat terrorism and address flaws in the immigration system.[citation needed]
Plans to expand the capabilities of the ubiquitous Medicare card were announced in 2005 by Human Services minister Joe Hockey. The Health and social services access card has been criticised by some sectors of the public and relevant interest groups as a step in the same direction of an Australia Card. The government has stated that it has no plans to introduce a national identity card at this stage.
See also
- Tax File Number – its uses are restricted and it has far lesser scope than the Australia Card would have had, despite increased interaction between welfare and tax matters.
- Medicare card – issued to and used by almost all individuals, but just for health services and rebates, not identification in other areas.
References
- Australia Card profile, at Caslon Analytics
- Just Another Piece of Plastic for your Wallet: The 'Australia Card' Scheme, by Roger Clarke (academic and long-time opponent of the scheme)