The seeds are being sewn for total State control.


Top minister backs judge's calls for DNA database registration for all

Last updated at 12:52pm on 5th September 2007
Comments (15)
Lord Justice Sedley

A senior Government minster has publicly backed a top judge's call for the whole population and every visitor to Britain to be registered on the DNA database.


Earlier today Lord Justice Sedley said the database which holds DNA from crime suspects and scenes is "indefensible" because it is unfair and inconsistent.
He said the only option was to expand the database to cover the whole population and all those who visit the UK.
Home Office Minister Tony McNulty told the BBC Radio 4 Today programme: "I think we are broadly sympathetic to the thrust of what he has said. There are no Government plans to go to a compulsory database now or in the foreseeable future.
"There is a logic to what Sir Stephen is saying. I have said that myself in the past, that there is a real logic and cohesion to the point that says 'Well, put everybody on'.
"But I think he probably does under-estimate the practicalities, logistics and huge civil liberties and ethics issue around that."
Gordon Brown backed the DNA scheme but stopped short of backing Lord Justice Sedley's proposals for compulsory DNA registration.
A spokesman for the Gordon Brown said: "The Prime Minister is very supportive of the DNA database which has been very successful in tackling crime, but there are no plans to introduce a universal compulsory or voluntary national database."

Lord Justice Sedley said an expanded database would aid crime prevention.
Critics say those who commit certain offences should have their details removed after a set period.
The DNA database - which is 12 years old and, with four million profiles, the largest in the world - grows by 30,000 samples a month taken from suspects or recovered from crime scenes.
The data of everyone arrested for a recordable offence - all but the most minor offences - remain on the system regardless of age, seriousness of alleged offence, and whether or not they were prosecuted.
It includes some 24,000 samples from young people between 10 and 17 years old, who were arrested but never convicted.

Sir Stephen Sedley, who is one of England's most experienced appeal court judges, told the BBC: "Where we are at the moment is indefensible.
"We have a situation where if you happen to have been in the hands of the police, then your DNA is on permanent record. If you haven't, it isn't... that's broadly the picture.
"It means that people who have been arrested but acquitted - some because they are innocent, some because they are just lucky - all stay on the database.
"It also means that a great many people who are walking the streets and whose DNA would show them guilty of crimes, go free."
He said reducing the database would be a mistake because he knew of cases where an offender who had escaped conviction had ultimately been brought to justice by DNA evidence.
A new profile is added to the national DNA database every 45 seconds



"Going forwards has very serious but manageable implications. It means that everybody guilty or innocent should expect their DNA to be on file for the absolutely rigorously restricted purpose of crime detection."
But Professor Stephen Bain, a member of the national DNA database strategy board, warned expansion would be expensive and make mistakes more likely. "The DNA genie can't be put back in the bottle," he said.
"If the information about you is exposed due to illegal or perhaps even legalised use of the database, in a way that is not currently anticipated, then it's a very difficult situation."
A Home Office spokeswoman said: "The DNA database has revolutionised the way the police can protect the public through identifying offenders and securing more convictions. It provides the police on average with around 3,500 matches each month."
She said there are no Government plans to introduce a universal compulsory, or voluntary, national DNA database, but that the Home Office is currently undertaking a review of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act (Pace) 1984, which sets out the powers to take and retain biometric data.
Last month it emerged that a new profile is added to the national DNA database every 45 seconds. Current thresholds allow only for samples to be taken from individuals arrested for a "recordable" offence, usually a crime punishable by imprisonment.
Anyone picked up for a non-recordable offence cannot have a sample taken without their consent to confirm or disprove their involvement in that offence, or to create a record in a national searchable database.
But a summary of responses to the Home Office review of Pace said that a number of respondents "welcomed the ability to reduce the threshold, including to the extent of allowing for the taking of fingerprints, DNA and footwear impressions for non-recordable offences for the purpose of offender identification and searching databases".
Also last month, the Human Genetics Commission (HGC), the Government's advisory body on new developments in human genetics, launched a Citizens' Inquiry into the use of DNA and genetic information to fight crime.
Baroness Helena Kennedy QC, the HGC's chair, said: "The police in England and Wales have powers, unrivalled internationally, to take a DNA sample from any arrested individual, without their consent.
"We want to ensure that the public voice is heard on issues that people think are relevant.
"The Citizens' Inquiry is likely to grapple with issues such as whether storing the DNA profiles of victims and suspects who are not charged, or who are subsequently acquitted of any wrongdoing, is justified by the need to fight crime."
She said that the current database stored a preponderance of samples from young men, including the samples of one third of British black males, and that under current law it is very difficult to have your sample removed.
But she added that the database was helping to bring people to justice over a "steadily increasing" number of serious crimes, including murders and rapes.
According to statistics released in June, the DNA fingerprints of 108 children aged under 10 have been stored and there were a further 883,888 records of people aged between 10 and 17.
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15 people have commented on this story so far. Tell us what you think below.
We will soon be in a totally policed state. If we had a visible PC Plod on our streets like we had many years ago and parents taking more responsibility for their off spring, more citizens would learn to respect the law.

- Geoff, Salisbury
That's the tourist trade down the pan, who wants to spend their holiday in the airport?

- Dee, Birmingham
Yet another judge who thinks he knows what he is talking about.

Where do they find them?

- Andy, Warsaw, Poland
It's very worrying when the independant judiciary start calling for measures like this that are more apporopriate for a police state.

- Adrian, Reading, UK
Absolutely not. By branding us electronically, as if we were animals relegates us to mere chattels of the state. I was born free and intend to remain so.

- Alta Blue, London
First bit of sense I've heard a judge come out with for ages.

- Mike, Cornwall, UK.
This is far too open to abuse. How easy would it be for someone to obtain the DNA of someone else and 'place it' at the scene of a crime to shift suspicion from themeselves?

It would also be very easy for the Government to murder a weapons inspector and frame someone. Not that they really need such a facility to get away with it.

- Mark, Maidenhead
Lord Justice Sedley said the databasewhich holds DNA from crime suspects and scenes is "indefensible because it is unfair and inconsistent".

Yes it is, why should I be on the database having done nothing wrong? If someone commits a criminal act, they then have no say in the matter, as I have not, I do not deserve to be treated the same!

He also said an expanded database would aid crime prevention.

No! it may aid in crime detection, not prevention, perhaps the Police should stop trying to hit targets and actually do their jobs!

Not only are we all intended to be on this database, the EU member police forces, whom are not without corruption of some sort, are to be allowed access to the information!

Let me make this clear; my identity is just that, mine. It is not yours, it is not the states, it is mine and mine alone. It is up to me to decide who will be privy to information about that identity, not an obsessive government, who are not to be trusted in any case!

- A Connor, Blackpool, Lancs
This clown has got to be kidding!

After the 'sexing' up of a report to take the country to war, etc, I wouldn't trust this or any government with this DNA base as far as I could kick them!

- Pc, Merseyside
Beware! - the real Big Brother is coming! To carry out an invasive procedure such as forcibly taking a blood sample without the person's informed consent is a serious violation of the existing human rights legislation, and the judge should know this. It is exactly to prevent such extremist practices that the existing human rights legislation should be maintained. Does anyone think tourists, particularly American tourist, would submit to procedures like this? The tourist industry would collapse. The judge should go back to school, or better still take early retirement.

- Dave, Southampton, UK
So we allow this to happen and Gordon, ever willing for the quick buck, let's the Insurance companies 'buy' access.

And suddenly YOU find that you are unable to insure yourself or you family. Why? Because in your DNA there is a marker that 'proves' you 'could' end up with heart disease.

Then we find that a certain gene is responsible (possibly) for causing a form of delinquency or it makes you prevalent to passing bugs and diseases, beware, you may end up walking around with a mark displayed on you.

All holding every one's DNA on file will do is to introduce various 'sub-cultures' into the population, people who are uninsurable, unemployable and more criminally intent.

We need eternal vigilance against this 'creeping' of what the state wants to control else we are heading toward anarchy with the people challenging the government in every way

- John, Middle England
Logic in this barmy statement where? The whole population prisoners in their own country? Tourists being DNA tested? Who would bother visiting Britain? How could this be implemented? The cost and manpower needed would be astronomical.

- Sheila Bown, Josselin, France
The worrying thing about this is that 50% of the people in your poll think this is a good idea. What is it about the British and obedience to the demands of the state? They are the most supine people in the world. The state has far too much power as it is.

- Michael Rigby, Blackburn England
It's a moot point anyway. The current custodians of the database do not, and never will have, the capacity to process 58 million samples. And the costs are prohibitive also.

- Joan, London
I have no problem with this at all, why should I? I have never committed a crime and am never likely to. If it aids in the conviction of offenders then I approve.

- Mike, Spalding, England

Add your comment

"I have no problem with this at all, why should I? I have never
committed a crime and am never likely to. If it aids in the
conviction of offenders then I approve" - Joan, London
This is out of the same stable as "if you've done nothing
wrong then you have nothing to fear" - a favourite saying with
control freaks everywhere. Have you never heard of
'miscarriage of justice'? Joan, I have a sneaking suspicion you
might be in the feminista - right?

"Yet another judge who thinks he knows what he is talking
about. Where do they find them?" - Dee, Birmingham
Precisely! Where??!!

Do the British want to keep people away or something? Security cameras everywhere, mangina politicians as far as the eye can see, some of the most venomous attempts to throw men in jail on woman's say-so, and now mandatory DNA samples!

Scary.