you already need to show a passport/photo id or your digital visa to get a legitimate job.
This isn't true.
While having a photo ID does make things easier to process, you can use other means to prove identity such as your birth certificate + a handful of other things, but you generally need 2-3 items and it can be a bit of a pain in the bum.
Most UK citizens of working age have a paper trail in the system which can be used as verification of identity to varying degrees. I've had to process job applications from people without driving licences of passports in the past, while having neither of the two is admittedly rare it's far from unheard of. There actually is a "Gov" photo ID you can apply for which I rarely see used but is a current option. A birth certificate + bank statement/energy bill etc showing proof of residence and a document showing your NI number is generally sufficient.
Regardless, I'm vehemently against this personally. I do not want more government oversight, and while I will not make this political I frankly don't trust any current or future parties to not make a mess of things or worse abuse them. I've never had much faith or trust in the whole "if you've nothing to hide, you've nothing to worry about" arguments regarding government access to individuals and feel this leans into that area. If by some miracle a genuinely impartial third party did a mass auditing/investigation into the entirety of our gov/civil service/police/NHS etc I'd happily make the trade but that's never going to happen.
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