I’ll confess I am not actually listening to the Prime Minister’s speech to Labour conference, as I have far more important things to do, including biting my nails and feeding the cats.

However, a quick refresh of Twitter shows that quite a lot of my friends are. And some of them have even been a little taken in by Brown’s ID card commitment.

If Twitter is right – and I can’t be bothered to check – he said, “there will be no compulsory ID cards for British citizens in the next parliament”

My goodness, but you can drive a double decker bus through the wiggle room in the loopholes there!

• There will be no compulsory ID cards for British citizens in the next parliament

So there will still be pointless, wasteful ID cards then?

• There will be no compulsory ID cards for British citizens in the next parliament

All those here on visas and work permits will still have to queue up to give more personal data to the UK government than is currently demanded from sex offenders, then?

• There will be no compulsory ID cards for British citizens in the next parliament

They’re not ruling out compulsory ID cards at all – just putting them on hold for a wee while.

This entirely disastrous Government IT project has wasted millions already and threatens to waste billions more. It will eventually require the entire population to travel then queue up one at a time to hand personal data to a Government that doesn’t know why it wants it, but is misguided in its belief as to exactly what problem this solution will cure. And it requires technologies that don’t exist yet.

It’s a massive (sorry Millennium) White elephant, and only one party has consistently opposed it (it was a Tory idea in the first place, even though they’ve now come around to our way of thinking). Vote Lib Dem for an end to them!

So, dear reader, what did you think of our dear leader’s speech?