"So if the Privacy Impact Assessment is obsolete, then so are the government's cost estimates. Then we were told that the privacy impact assessment report could not be released because it was Cabinet-in-confidence. But then again so was the KPMG report, and the government was happy to release bits of that report - bits that were positive, anyway."

Johnston also called for more clarity between the government and the Access Card Consumer and Privacy Taskforce chaired by Professor Allan Fels.

She is suspicious the government has already rejected a key recommendation of the taskforce.

The recommendation is that a personal identifying number will not appear on the card.

Johnston said inclusion of the identifier is the single biggest factor in the card becoming an "all purpose national ID card".