Home Office stonewalls ID findings

How's never? Is never good for you?

The Home Office is refusing to release 'research' it carried out which was meant to prove just how very keen young people in the UK are to get hold of a delicious ID card.

The department blew almost £80,000 setting up a site to find out what people aged between 16 and 25 thought of ID cards. The site operated from July to mid-October and was run by Virtual Surveys. It suffered some early teething problems when admins were accused of censoring comments.

Alongside a survey the youths were also asked to give their opinion of the project in 200 words. Many managed to do so in less than 200 words. "Don't need, don't want and won't have one. Catch terrorist's my ****. One word: Control." was one of our favourites.

Originally the survey results, and the summaries, were to be published on the mylifemyid website.

But when the site was taken down in October 2008 we were promised the data would be published once it had been analysed.

The Home Office said: "The written research findings will be published on the IPS website. This qualitative report will explain the range of views expressed on the site, the structure of those views, and will illustrate what underpins the hopes and fears expressed by the participants."

So it was with bated breath that we contacted the Home Office today to ask just what a year's worth of number crunching and editing had produced. But sadly we might have to restrain ourselves a little, or a lot, longer.

A spokesman for the Identity and Passport Service (IPS) gave us this epigram: “Mylifemyid was one of a number of pieces of work undertaken with young people. However, as our work with young people is still continuing, it was decided to wait and publish a full picture of the insights gained at the end of the process.”

We've asked the anonymous spinner when the end of the process is likely to be, and whether the people concerned will still be young. They've not got back to us yet. We'll get back to you when they do...

Hat tip to Reg reader Michael for keeping better track on the Home Office's parallel reality than us. ®