Publicans of Hamilton's 10 pubs gather tomorrow at a meeting of the Hamilton Liquor Accord to discuss implementing the idEye ID-scanning system, and they'll be looking to introduce the system as a network. ID scanning is a powerful tool in a single pub, and at Warners Bay, for example, it has reduced assaults by more than half, but as a networked system it comes into its own.

The idEye scans a driver's licence, an RTA-provided photo card or a passport and stores that information, the result being, of course, that people in a pub or nightclub can be readily identified. Combine that ID with CCTV film and police have a useful tool for bringing offenders to justice quickly.

Being aware of that is likely to discourage someone who may otherwise be violent, and there is one other important contributor to the lowering of assaults. Drinkers who behave badly are barred, with no hope of getting past security staff who don't recognise them, and at Warners Bay, for example, that period of exclusion for assaulting staff is 10 years. Where the idEye system is networked, as it is likely to be at Hamilton, a drinker barred for violence at one hotel will get a red flag when he presents his ID for scanning at one of the others. Not only will the hotels and their patrons be better off without him, so will the precinct.

At long last accountability is rising above privacy, although privacy gets a nod with guarantees that the scanned data will not be provided to anyone other than police and others in the network, that it can be accessed only by senior staff, and that it will be held for only a limited time.

I'm happy to present ID as I enter a pub, and indeed I'll be happier to be in a pub where ID must be presented, because I'm happy to be responsible for my behaviour in the pub. Are you?