The exposure draft of an Access Card Bill has exacerbated EFA’s opposition to the system. The broad powers to be granted to the Minister and DHS officers facilitates function creep, negates implied promises about limits on storage of information in the national ID database, and possibly even enables the collection of fingerprints, etc. Proposed offences are seriously deficient: some are unlikely to be enforced due to the nature of criminal law, some would criminalise innocuous activity, and some show DHS has no confidence in the technological security of the card system architecture and enable individuals to be prosecuted for events beyond their control.
See EFA’s submission on the Access Card Exposure Draft Bill.