Mr. Tim Duggan:

The Senator is overstating matters. It is also the case that somebody has to have a PPS number to do those things, yet nobody is suggesting that a PPS number is a national identity number. One cannot engage in most public services unless he or she has a PPS number. One cannot get a SUSI grant, a driver's licence, a passport or a social welfare benefit or payment without that number. I do not hear it being described as a national identity number because it is not. The national ID card is essentially the same thing. All the card contains is the public service identity dataset that people have had since they were issued with a PPS number. All that is on that card is basic identity information. In fact, only a subset of it is on the physical display of the card. The rest of it is on the chip, which is encrypted and cannot be accessed by anybody unless my Department provides that access. To date, no one has been provided with such access.

On the issue of the legal basis for the card, as I said earlier, the whole purpose of the card is to verify identity to a substantial level of assurance. If a person is a customer of the Department, we rely on section 247 of the Social Welfare Act to require them to satisfy the Minister as to his or her identity. We do not require them to get a public services card, but rather to satisfy the Minister as to his or her identity by virtue of section 247. We have always told people that that is the basis on which they must go through the safe process. Section 247 sets out that we have to give notice to a person who is receiving a benefit. That is covered by the letter we write to people. If a person does not satisfy the Minister he or she may be disqualified from receiving the benefit. In fact, the section uses the word "shall", so the Department has no discretion under the law. A person may satisfy the Minister as to his or her identity by attending at an office that the Minister designates and provide the information and documents the Minister requires. The items that must be furnished are set out in the notices sent to the people in question. It includes the types of items that one would expect, such as photographic ID and proof of address.

Claimants must have a photograph and provide their signature. The statute gives the Minister the power to retain those, so that they can be reproduced by electronic means in the future. One of the parts of that provision on which people have seized is the following stipulation: "This section shall not be construed as preventing the Minister from using a method of authentication of the identity of a person in receipt of benefit, other than a method referred to in this section, which the Minister considers appropriate to use." People have asked why a passport or driving licence would not be appropriate. I am sorry for being boring about this, but the issue here is that we are trying to verify people's identity to a substantial level of assurance. That is not verification on the balance of probabilities or on the basis of assertion. That section means that the method we use is still intended to verify the identity to a substantial level of assurance. We use alternatives to a face-to-face meeting in Intreo centres or branch offices around the country. In some cases we have used mobile solutions. In these situations a claimant does not have to turn up at our office. We go to them, either in their place of work, in a congregated setting or indeed in their home, as has happened in several exceptional occasions.

In a second variety of case, somebody in a particular set of circumstances is unable to furnish all of the documentation that is ordinarily required to satisfactorily prove identity. For those cases we have an exceptions process, whereby we still put them through an interview, but the interview changes in that we ask for a range of information for which we do not ordinarily ask. We carry out background checks to make sure that their answers hold up. We assign senior officers, rather than normal officers, to reviewing that information and determining whether the identity has been verified satisfactorily.

The third type of scenario is that in which we have used postal processes, in two different ways. The first of these is where somebody who has a passport and is over the age of 66 is paid in cash at a post office, and all of the identity data that the Passport Office has for that individual precisely matches our own data. In those circumstances, the risk is mitigated significantly, and we are willing to offer that person a postal process to effectively satisfy the Minister as to their identity. We write to the person and ask them for any information that we need to verify. We also ask them to provide some security questions to protect their account so that no-one else can pretend to be them. We are willing to furnish them with a public services card, PSC, in those circumstances, having satisfied ourselves that their identity has been verified to a substantial level of assurance. The kickback is that this person turns up at a post office, usually every week, to get their payment, and their identity can be validated. The verification is post-factum rather than before the event. The claimant walks in with their public services card, which has their photograph and signature on it, and they collect their payment.

There is always an element of face-to-face engagement, but the point at which it is done varies. In the last several years, we have done similarly for people who have renewed their driving licence, again where their data precisely matches the identity data held by the Department. Quite a number of people have been able to satisfy the Minister as to their identity and have their identity status elevated to SAFE 2 level as a consequence of going through that process.

As such, there are at least five methods by which we are able to identify somebody to a substantial level of assurance to the satisfaction of the Minister, all operating under that legislation.