Once hailed as the largest security print contract ever to go to tender in the UK market, the ID card scheme slowly unwound as trade unions and opposing political parties heaped pressure on the Labour Party over the controversial scheme.

As a result, the campaign, which was initially expected to have been rolled out to 80% of the population by 2013, launched today with just 1,386 expressions of interest out of an eligible population of 1.7m.

Home secretary Alan Johnson said that the ID card, which is intended to be available nationwide by 2012, could be used by young people "as a convenient proof of age".

The government had previously argued that ID cards were necessary to help tackle the threat of terrorism and had planned to make the cards compulsory for all 200,000 UK airside workers this year.

However, it was forced into a series of climbdowns following pressure from the TUC and a promise by the Tories and the Lib Dems to scrap the scheme if they came to power.

This led the initial rollout to be downscaled to airside staff at just two UK airports, London City and Manchester, before the compulsory scheme was scrapped altogether in favour of the current voluntary scheme.