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Applying for your first UK Passport a Warning.


Bugsy
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Could be, Fulcrum.  However, hopefully we do our best to supress it, if it exists.  It's also our instinct to hunt and kill animals for food but there are some on this forum who would consider that immoral.  Because it's instinctive (if it is) is it right?  I don't think that is what you are saying but if anybody thinks they can use it as a justification for racism in any form (and by that I mean the assumption that a person of a certain colour is naturally predicated towards any specific character trait) then it doesn't hold water.  Hopefully, we've come a long way since we dwelt in caves.  (Although there are days when I wonder....[:)])
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[quote user="Dick Smith"]Fulcrum - do you have any evidence at all for that point of view? How would you explain civilisations like Egypt and Rome which were remarkably non-racist? Which accounts of pre-literate hunter gatherers are you using? I'd like to read them...

[/quote]

I do agree with your comment but a lot has happened since the Egyptians and Romans civilised parts of past civilizations. I did actually write a piece in my original post about the Egyptians and Moores (Not Rome) but ended up deleting it as I wasn't sure of my historical facts. I didn't feel that it was necessary in making my point of view.

Anyway point taken.

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[quote user="fulcrum"][quote user="Dick Smith"]Fulcrum - do you have any evidence at all for that point of view? How would you explain civilisations like Egypt and Rome which were remarkably non-racist? Which accounts of pre-literate hunter gatherers are you using? I'd like to read them...

[/quote]

I do agree with your comment but a lot has happened since the Egyptians and Romans civilised parts of past civilizations. I did actually write a piece in my original post about the Egyptians and Moores (Not Rome) but ended up deleting it as I wasn't sure of my historical facts. I didn't feel that it was necessary in making my point of view.

Anyway point taken.

[/quote]

So what you wrote is completely invalid, then. That's the trouble with so much of this stuff - it's nothing but some idea people have with no real knowledge to support it. We might as well be reading the Daily Mail.

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[quote user="Chief"]

My guess is the interviews will be cancelled in favour of randon sampling as used by many researchers.  Reasons being,

  1. The govt will need to get this in swiftly as it is universally disliked and disapproved of.  Any delays or problems further compound selling it to the public.

  2. Travel industry will collapse into meltdown as people stop booking holidays while they await outcome of the interviews

  3. 70m population (and growing) divided into 10 years (passport duration) = 7m people per year to interview.  7m/52 weeks =    134,615 people per week to interview. Based on a five day week = 26,923 persons per day. Divided between the 500 people they will employ to do it = 53.84 interviews per interviewer per day!!

  4. The cost will be astronomical, and will continue to rise year on year. Once the Govt are committed contractually, the supplier (led by ex-government advisor or cabinet minister) will increase costs as a matter of course

  5. The policy is flawed (but so was Iraq, so i retract this one)

  6. There are no mechanisms in place to correct official error

  7. There are no benefits to the scheme. New York, Madrid and a host of other plaxces have ID schemes and still got bombed.

  8. This government still thinks that a gigabyte is hotdog wagon at Glastonbury

There are plenty more resons i am sure we can come up with.......

[/quote]

 

Well, this would be amazing if true, but as it only applies to people getting NEW passports, not to the entire population of the UK, it's not actually correct.

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Dick

My point of view comes from my genetic makeup, from wherever it came, and certainly not by reading the Daily Mail (whatever that is). There may well be gaps in my historical knowledge but that is down to the UK's educational system of leaving out huge chunks of history and calling them things like the "dark ages". My history lessons ended with the Romans leaving Britain in around 500 AD and then starting again with the battle of Hastings in 1066. There were never any history lessons mentioning what happened, during the period in between, that would account for what really happened. We are only recently able to more easily find out some facts about the muslem influence during that period.

You are undoubtedly more knowledgeable about history but I was merely making a personal observation

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My point is that you make a personal assertion, with the rider that this is 'genetic' - which is a very dodgy statement indeed - and that it applies to everyone, everywhen. There is no evidential support for what you are saying - it only reflects your feelings which you are projecting onto everyone else.

I'm not sure what your last statement "We are only recently able to more easily find out some facts about the muslem influence during that period" means. If you do some research it you will find that a great deal is known about Islamic civilisation in the middle ages, and that although there are different points of view, it is reasonably well understood, and has been for a long time. Not least by Muslims...

The educational system does not set out to teach you everything that it is possible for you to know. You are expected to make a bit of an effort on your own behalf.

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[quote user="You can call me Betty"][quote user="Chief"]

My guess is the interviews will be cancelled in favour of randon sampling as used by many researchers.  Reasons being,

  1. The govt will need to get this in swiftly as it is universally disliked and disapproved of.  Any delays or problems further compound selling it to the public.

  2. Travel industry will collapse into meltdown as people stop booking holidays while they await outcome of the interviews

  3. 70m population (and growing) divided into 10 years (passport duration) = 7m people per year to interview.  7m/52 weeks =    134,615 people per week to interview. Based on a five day week = 26,923 persons per day. Divided between the 500 people they will employ to do it = 53.84 interviews per interviewer per day!!

  4. The cost will be astronomical, and will continue to rise year on year. Once the Govt are committed contractually, the supplier (led by ex-government advisor or cabinet minister) will increase costs as a matter of course

  5. The policy is flawed (but so was Iraq, so i retract this one)

  6. There are no mechanisms in place to correct official error

  7. There are no benefits to the scheme. New York, Madrid and a host of other plaxces have ID schemes and still got bombed.

  8. This government still thinks that a gigabyte is hotdog wagon at Glastonbury

There are plenty more resons i am sure we can come up with.......

[/quote]

 

Well, this would be amazing if true, but as it only applies to people getting NEW passports, not to the entire population of the UK, it's not actually correct.

[/quote]

It will be applied to all renewable passports from 2010. Amazing and true.

 

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Everyone realises that french people have to do just that and as far as I can ascertain have for a long time.

A young'ish, thin and obviously naieve TU in the Mairie, many many many moons ago, whispered to the clerk after the man before me had gone, 'what has he done', as she had finger printed him. She looked confused, and in a very blasé manner said that he was just getting his ID. Some things shock me and this did.

So the french authorities have every french national's  fingerprints. Wouldn't that mean the gendarmes are the plus efficace police force in the world?

 

 

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I, like many others, don't have a problem with this additional private information being taken. As most of us would all like to believe that "if we have done nothing wrong etc, etc". The problem is mis-management of the data and mis-interpretation of that data.

The british government does not have a very good record in either of those fields.


 

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I agree with most of your points except you seem to have accounted for everybody getting/renewing a passport.  Isn't it something like only 10% of the population has a current passport? so that ould mean 5.5 interviews per interviewer per day - still quite a lot for a civil servant
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How would you explain civilizations like Egypt and Rome which were remarkably non-racist?”

 

Hmmn, but they were slave-based societies; throughout history people have not cared much about what races their slaves came from.

I am happy to admit that I know little about Ancient Egypt but always thought that they had a very insular society. When the Greeks started trading with them they were confined to a small area on the coast and the Israelites seem to have had a rough deal.

With the Romans the question was “Are you a Roman citizen or not?” not “What is your ethnic background?” And if you were not a Roman citizen you were fair game to be defeated and enslaved. They were not that fussy who they defeated and enslaved.

In the early days it was their near neighbours like the Sabines moving up to the Carthaginians. After that it was anybody on the edge of their empire. Once a race was conquered it might contribute troops to the Roman army but precious few of its people became Roman citizens. When it all started to fall apart sure they embraced foreign mercenaries but that was from necessity rather than enlightenment.

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[quote user="Bugbear"]

I, like many others, don't have a problem with this additional private information being taken. As most of us would all like to believe that "if we have done nothing wrong etc, etc". The problem is mis-management of the data and mis-interpretation of that data.

The british government does not have a very good record in either of those fields.

[/quote]

My concerns exactly.  Not only do they have a crap IT record, but they would likely abuse the information as well.  Imagine, you become a little vocal about the government of the day, and suddenly your prints turn up at the scene of a robbery or a murder, or in and around the scene of a suspected terrorist meeting place, etc etc.  Probably nothing really to worry about, as they would never dream of imprisoning us without trial, or abandoning trial by jury, or fabricating evidence, or burying bad news, or access to lawyers, family etc etc....so sleep tight.

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