Please can you let me know what you think did happen? I’m always open to being contradicted if confronted by reality.

As it happens, the fact that terrorists have had access to DVLA records (oh, look it up) doesn’t make me more flippant about the possibility of the state grabbing a whole new lot of information about me that they can leak. Rather, less.

Your mileage obviously varies. That’s fine by me, of course: I have no objection to you putting all your intimate personal information on the web a la Clarkson. But I’d rather that there were fewer laws from a government which force me to give up information that, on present form, they are going to lose sooner or later.

“Chinny reckon,” as they used to say.

If you need to salve your fears by imputing them on others, that’s your own business. If that extends to infringing my civil liberties, I suggest finding alternative remedies.

You reckon? Blimey, I thought I was supposed to be the naiive one. A whole separate discussion, that one.

The point is that a DNA database, like a biometric national identity register, is a honeypot for bad types with nastiness on their mind. Think what [insert name of famous organised crime boss here] could do with this kind of information.

Or your credit card details? Or your national insurance number? Or you passport? Or your fingerprints? Or your DVLA records?

A DNA database doesn’t contain our actual DNA, you know? It’s a centralised database with a record of our genetic fingerprints. I’m struggling to think of a whole lot that your crime boss could do with this, at least easily? For example, if he wanted to implicate you in a crime, he would need your DNA, not a readout of what your gneetic fingerprint looks like. I’m not saying that it would be terrific if he got hold of such data, but I can think of half a dozen other dbs to which the same logic could be applied. In fact, I’d rather he had details of my DNA than, for example, my bank details. Wouldn’t you?

Nobody was worrying about Nazi Germany in 1922.

Look, I take the point. But if a truly malevolent government came to power, I think we’d have other things to worry about than what they might be planning to do with our DNA records.

1) The Gestapo happened upon them, in Vienna, right after the Anschluss

2) pIRA got a look at them.

The point is that a DNA database, like a biometric national identity register, is a honeypot for bad types with nastiness on their mind. Think what [insert name of famous organised crime boss here] could do with this kind of information.

These honeypots can also fall into the hands of bad sorts who didn’t even exist when they were created. Nobody was worrying about Nazi Germany in 1922.

I’m not especially concerned about government fit-ups with DNA evidence: I’m concerned about the database turning up for sale on a Belarusian ftp site early one Sunday morning. Have you been reading the UK papers at all recently? Watching TV news, perhaps?

Maybe. The assumption is that this would be used well. I don’t see that including the pool of suspects or persons of interest to “everyone whose genetic material was at scene X” will necessarily mean better investigative work. Would there be more exclusions of persons than inclusions? Does a lack of DNA evidence mean that person Y was not there?

Would you trust the institution of such a database in Pakistan? Would you trust it in the UK? How about Italy?

Chris,

On the first, I have no idea. On the second, I probably have a better idea than you do, but I still don’t see your point. Both of these events happened without a DNA database, so you’re proving what, exactly? You appear to be arguing that the more information that might be available to the police or any other investigating authority, the more likely we are to be fitted up. I think the reverse is likely, given advances in DNA technology and other forensic practices mean it is more likely the police will get their men and women, meaning there will less motivation to fit up than there is currently. And you, too, appear to be ignoring the potential for the defence to use DNA evidence to clear a defendant, or provide him/her with an alibi that might otherwise be impossible to provide. This cuts both ways, does it not? I think with the proper judicial scrutiny and oversight there is little to fear.

Are you happy that we’ve reached a point where science and technology has taken us as far as it should in the efforts to bring criminals to justice? The answer here is not some luddite approach to criminal investigation, but the dilligent application of minimum stadnards and practices that ensure our rights as citizens are safeguarded.

And Alex, I tihnk if sonmeone accuses me of not being capable of boarding a train without shiting myself, I’m entitled to give something back. The Tesco remark was meant to indicate that I wouldn’t have to board a train to work there. Most people who work in Tesco are local and don’t travel in by train, I’ll wager.

As a son of a former USDAW official, I’m hardly likely to be snotty about people who work at Tesco.

Sainsburys is another matter entirely.

Borwnie (thinly re-spelt banned troll?); thinks suggesting that someone is working-class is an insult.

And I think that’s all we need to know about Borwnie.

Why? Isn’t it more dubious that everyone else can be snooped on apart from the people who make the rules? I understand the concerns raised by Daniel and others, but at the same time it seems like yet another instance of one rule for ordinary people and another for our lords and masters.

What about my general point regarding the balance of power between the individual and the state though. Have you put your mind to that one?

Find out, and you might realise why some of us – who may well even trust this government – don’t trust everyone else who might get their hands on our data some time during the next century.

I travel into London by train 3 or 4 times a week. I have a vested interest. Since when was the desire to ensure our sec servs had the best possible shot at forestalling atrocities evidence of being chicken shit? If I were chicken shit, I’d come to work with you in Tescos.

So let me get this straight: because previously people have been fitted up, introducing a system that would make it vastly easier to fit people up is a good thing for the innocent? Wow, that’s some logic you’ve got working for you.

Bur you never did “get it straight”, so your analysis and conclusion are illegitimate. DNA evidence at most indicates a person was in a particular place at some time previously (and even then there is secondary transfer, etc.) or in contact with another party. It’s no easier (and perhaps harder) to plant DNA than it is a gun, a knife or any other piece of incriminating evidence. DNA evidence by itself will almost never be enough to convict anybody of anything. And you appear to be totally ignoring the fact that DNA evidence could be cited by defence counsel to add weight to unsupported alibis of defendants. There’s no sense in which DNA evidence is and could only ever be a tool for the prosecution.

My support for a DNA database stems from a belief that it will, in the round, help judges and juries get more decisions right in the future than we do currently. Radical, eh?

If you create the presumption that MPs are exempt from surveillance, then MPs will be more willing to authorize surveillance.

The extent of surveillance in the UK has massively increased over the last couple of decades. Some of that increase has been authorized by Acts of Parliament which MPs actively supported. Much of that increase was authorized by Orders in Council, which MPs only passively ratified. But in all cases, the support of Parliament was necessary and it is not being unduly cynical to assume that had MPs thought they might be the subjects of the surveillance they authorized, they had been less eager to support it.

Certainly the row suggests they attach some importance to their immunity.

If so, you and I (I only on the increasingly rare occasions I visit the land of my birth) are less secure as a result of the (misinterpretation of the) Wilson Doctrine.