As your article (ID card consultancy hits £50m) says, the notional structure of the ID cards scheme has radically changed; though since nothing in the way of specification has been issued, it may be more virtual change than real . Paradoxically this appears to have permitted the Home Office to side-step all the usual controls on government projects. Ought not the new structure to be subject to new Office of Government Commerce gateway project reviews to check that it makes sense? Doesn't a new way of doing it affect what was said in the Regulatory Impact Assessment and Race Equality Impact Assessment put forward in 2004? If not, why not?

Guy Herbert, general secretary, NO2ID