CNet News reports that the cost of a National Identification Card program in Great Britain is so high that a senior British government agency official quipped that it would be cheaper to buy iPods with digital certificates and give them out to everyone.

The cost of issuing an ID card to every British citizen could rise to almost 500 pounds (about $884), due to the cost of integrating the IT infrastructure with other government departments and public sector bodies, according to recent data from the London School of Economics.

“It (an iPod with a digital certificate) would be cheaper than the ID Card scheme,” Cooper said.

To give everyone in the U.K. an iPod Nano could work out at roughly 139 pounds, or about $245, each, even before factoring in the kind of discount that Apple Computer might offer for a bulk purchase of 60 million units.

Earlier in the article, Patrick Cooper gives us this gem (emphasis mine):

“If you had a mobile phone with a digital certificate, you could dock it into your PC. An iPod with a digital certificate would also work,” Cooper said. “My boss would give everyone in the U.K. an iPod. That would also mean there would be no reason for anyone to steal one, because everyone would have one.“

I suppose no one would ever want to steal credit cards, either, since almost anyone can have those, too.