Originally Posted by
studentff
What are Australia's laws and culture with regard to national-ID and papers-please-style ID checks? Are citizens required to carry ID at all times? Are police allowed to arbitrarily stop people on the street and ask for ID?
Requiring photo ID in a country with that kind of culture isn't surprising or that concerning to me, because IMO the personal liberty ship has already sailed from there.
But if it is like the US, where nobody is required to have an ID, you can actually live your life without ID (getting harder in the US), there is no national ID, and there is no requirement to present identity papers to police when not engaged in a licensed activity, it is a much bigger concern.
I also would urge any Australians on the fence about this issue to read up on the US (and Canadian) no-fly lists (NFLs) and how the NFL has resulted in repeated delays, detention, and harassment of tens of thousands of innocent citizens. You can search on "Robert Johnson" and "David Nelson" too. A "simple ID check" is never just that; it will eventually move to some sort of blacklist check, and blacklists are notorious for being erroneous and being hard to get off of.
There is no "national ID" in Australia, nor is there any requirement for people to carry an ID at all times. The only time I regularly have to show an ID is at the post office when I mail a package overseas, and even there the clerk only signs a form saying that they've seen my ID - they don't record the details. And I needed ID to open a bank account. But having lived in both countries, Australia is far LESS of an ID-obsessed culture than the USA.
For domestic travel, I OLCI, drop my checked bag at the self-serve system and show my BP to get on the flight, all without anyone verifying that I am the person named on the BP. At the hotel, I don't have to show an ID (just a credit card
), nor have I ever been asked for ID when paying by credit card (anywhere in Oz).
With that in mind, I don't believe that the recommendation to present photo ID for domestic flights is a prelude to a No Fly List in Australia. It appears to be an effort to fight organized crime and drug trafficking where people are traveling under false identities.
That said, I'm not sure it would be effective - for all the reasons that have been discussed elsewhere in this forum about the ineffectiveness of ID checks. And I'm not convinced that the benefit in law enforcement would be worth the inconvenience to the vast majority of innocent passengers. But I don't see a NFL conspiracy here.
Originally Posted by
*A Flyer
The issue seems to be that the Senate Committee that prepared this report wants ID checks to be done at checkin which with OLCI, self-check in, etc, is basically impossible. it seems to me that the only way this works is with mandatory ID checking at boarding. I do hope that they do not instigate the check at security as I like the current policy of allowing non-travellers to enter the sterile area.
Agree completely.