A senior policeman at Scotland Yard has suggested that the DNA of children as young as five could be stored on a database for future crime detection purposes, the Observer reports.
Gary Pugh, the Yard’s director of forensic services who was recently appointed DNA spokesman of the Association of Chief Police Officers, said:
If we have a primary means of identifying people before they offend, then in the longer term the benefits of targeting younger people are extremely large. You could argue the younger the better. Criminologists say some people will grow out of crime; others won’t. We have to find out who are possibly going to be the biggest threat to society.
Shami Chakrabarti of Liberty and the National Primary Headteachers’ Association have both denounced the proposal.
This is not the first time the issue of children’s potential criminality has come up. In June 2005, the Guardian reported that a leaked Home Office paper suggested that nursery teachers should be trained to identify potential criminality in children as young as three. Children’s Minister Beverley Hughes then acknowledged the dangers of criminalising children and said:
I don’t think you can tell whether a three-year-old is likely to become a criminal.
Wonder what she’ll say this time?
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113 Comments
and it reminds of how policemen and scientists promised Hitler how they could identify Jews in the 1930’s.
The infamous Jewish profiling.
Just what kind of country do we now live in. The sooner the Army step in the better.
Oh geez…I’m giving up!!
A self-fulfilling prophecy? You label a child as a criminal at an early age and that stigma sticks with them for the rest of their life causing them to become… um… criminals.
The police really do need dealing with. Why does anyone listen to the institutional racists anyway?
I say cut their wages every time they come out with fascist shite like this.
Colin, would you like to say that to Brian Paddick’s face? We will never ever be in power, nor will we deserve to be, unless we can be friends with the police, without whom we have no liberty whatsoever.
As for the DNA database, there’s really a very simple solution – we ALL go on it at birth. That way, no particular group can complain of discrimination, rightly or wrongly.
Anyone who has a problem with the fact that we have all been individually bar-coded from the moment of conception – maybe take it up with the Almighty?
Funnily enough, being a LibDem, Brian Paddick doesn’t come out with crap like this.
Are you denying the police are institutionally racist, sexist & homophobic?
I forgot incompetent & hysterical.
Yes, I agree with Colin W. Laurence Boyce, I think you’ve got the wrong idea. Paddick has spoken out against the authoritarian nonsense supported by the likes of Ian Blair and connived at by the Tories, several of whose senior figures have supported things like ID cards.
The fact is, we have the framework for cutting crime in place. We just need proper enforcement of the existing laws and the existence of the right social conditions. Paddick has done that, so could a Lib Dem government nationwide. We really are the party of lower crime and more basic civility and decency, as opposed to thoughtless authoritarianism and blind enrichment of oneself at the expense of all else.
Are you denying the police are institutionally racist, sexist & homophobic?
I most certainly am denying that for two reasons. Firstly, as a neighbourhood watch coordinator, I would never be able to look my police friends in the eye again – who are in fact just ordinary decent men and women, trying to do a difficult and essential job. Secondly, if there were any truth whatsoever to your grotesque generalisation, then it would be something to be taken up at the highest level – politically and with the police hierarchy.
It’s interesting that when I denounced Islam (not Muslims, but Islam) for being vile and pernicious, I was called a bigot. I wonder if Lib Dems are going to be quite so swift to descend on your remarks? I doubt it.
It’s just terrific that we have a policeman standing for Mayor. Let’s try not to undo all the good work at once, eh?
Asquith, I’m against ID cards, but I don’t see a DNA database as authoritarian. Just a scientific inevitability – and one we would do better to embrace than resist.
Or we could just microchip them and be done with it.
Laurence Boyce wrote:
“As for the DNA database, there’s really a very simple solution – we ALL go on it at birth. That way, no particular group can complain of discrimination, rightly or wrongly.”
I’m curious. If ACPO suggested it would be jolly useful if we all had GPS chips implanted so that the police knew where everyone was at every hour of the day, would you see that as OK provided it applied to the entire population, so that no one could complain of discrimination?
Chris Phillips
If ACPO suggested it would be jolly useful if we all had GPS chips implanted so that the police knew where everyone was at every hour of the day, would you see that as OK provided it applied to the entire population, so that no one could complain of discrimination?
No I wouldn’t, but it would have nothing to do with whether the police wanted it or not. I’ve written at length on the question of DNA databases. As I indicated above – if you don’t like it, blame God not the police.
Laurence, do try & pay attention. I said the police were INSTITUTIONALLY racist, sexist & homophobic.
Surely even you can see that the police have absolutely no business involving themselves in politics.Anywhere other than a police state, of course.
Laurence, do try & pay attention. I said the police were INSTITUTIONALLY racist, sexist & homophobic.
Yes, that was an unfortunate turn of phrase when it came from the pen of Sir William MacPherson, not least because it was bound to be parroted by anonymous blog critics.
Laurence Boyce wrote:
“As for the DNA database, there’s really a very simple solution – we ALL go on it at birth. That way, no particular group can complain of discrimination, rightly or wrongly.”
Firstly let me say that my DNA belongs to ME. Not you, not some statist politician and certainly not some politically motivated ACPO member.
Secondly, please do not confuse all police officers with the motivations and ambitions of their leadership. One only has to read some of the Police blogs to understand that the front line policeman and woman are fed up to the back teeth with this sort of politicking as the rest of us.
and finally, just remember what J.Edgar Hoover said.
The minute the FBI begins making recommendations on what should be done with its information, it becomes a Gestapo.
Firstly let me say that my DNA belongs to ME.
Well if it belongs to you, then maybe you shouldn’t leave it lying around wherever you go.
Laurence Boyce wrote:
“As I indicated above – if you don’t like it, blame God not the police.”
Evidently, you would need to make a very strong argument to convince people here that the entire population should be forcibly included in a DNA database.
If the inane statement above is the best you can do, you’re not likely to succeed.
Chris Phillips
We have the mechanisms in place for crime prevention and detection, so the fact that crime isn’t being prevented sufficiently, or criminals caught quickly enough and successfully prosecuted then reformed makes no case for the drastic and all-encompassing impostion that a DNA database would have on the general population.
With or without the debatable help of an additional tool to the anti-crime armoury there are lots of things that can be done to decrease crime before this is considered. Even then a blanket introduction of a DNA database doesn’t address the potentiality for increased security breaches and new crime.
Many local Labourites in my area regularly trot out the dogma that “if you’ve got nothing to hide, you’ve got nothing to fear,” which presupposes a benevolent state and excludes the possibility of criminal activity penetrating the institution, for which there are frankly no guarantees.
A politicised police force using one-size-fits-all techniques is against everyones best interests, as it is an attempt to cover-up failures rather than do its job properly or better.
It’s a serious point CGP. The technology is there begging to be used, courtesy of the “creator.” It will in fact be you who will have a job to explain to a public (who are not quite so paranoid on these matters) why criminals should be getting away with murder (literally) for the sake of some precious “liberal principles.”
I would have thought it was obvious, Orange Pan, that fighting crime is not an exact science, and so anything that could be brought to bear on the problem ought to be welcome.
Laurence Boyce Says:
“The technology is there begging to be used, courtesy of the “creator.”
Wow, that really is a quote from 1984. Did no-one ever tell you that 1984 was a warning, not the blueprint.
Have you volunteered your own DNA yet?
Did no-one ever tell you that 1984 was a warning, not the blueprint?
Very good. I happen to think that 1984 is a pretty shite novel to be honest – a sort of “self-preventing prophecy” if you like. But the fact that it was written in 1948, and could never be written today, should maybe tell you something.
Have you volunteered your own DNA yet?
Yes. I tried to volunteer my DNA before Christmas at the Cambridge police station, but was told I would have to commit a crime first. So I’m still trying to decide which law to break. Any suggestions?
“why criminals should be getting away with murder (literally) for the sake of some precious ‘liberal principles.'”
There are lots of principles we have which mean people get away with all sorts of crimes. Innocent until proven guilty, jury trials and the requirement of 10:2 for conviction, conviction only when the case has been proved beyond reasonable doubt.
Which else of these would you be willing to do away with to improve the conviction rate for murder?
‘Fighting crime’ is definitely not an exact science, it is a term which distracts from the real problems of preventing crime and catching and mopping up after criminals. Encouraging a fight is no way to promote law and order.
Maybe someone should point you in the direction of similar arguments about the ‘war on terror’, ‘war on drugs’ etc.
Hywel, not only does DNA convict the guilty, but it acquits the innocent. You should be all in favour of it.
You’d better have a word with party HQ, Orange Pan. The term “fighting crime” features 82 times on the official website.
“Hywel, not only does DNA convict the guilty, but it acquits the innocent.”
This is one of the great fallacies IMO. DNA doesn’t convict anyone as and of itself. Whatever else DNA proves it doesn’t prove that someone eg battered person X with a baseball bat. At most it shows that someone was present at the scene.
However you avoid the question. If you think that we shouldn’t allow “liberal principles” because they result in murders going free which of the other points I outlined do you think we should do away with.
Evidence to the House of Lords in 2004 suggested that the use of DNA profiles that would have otherwise been destroyed provided links (not leading to convictions) to 86 murders and attempted murders.
If say lowering the jury threshold to allow convictions on a 7:5 vote would get more convictions – and I don’t think you can credibly argue that this wouldn’t be the case – would you advocate that change as well?
Well, I’ll thank you for doing it for me.
Yes, as it happens, I am quite uppity about loose language when people want to be taken seriously.
Well it should be obvious that we want sound convictions, not just convictions. DNA evidence is just another tool to be used towards that end. But if DNA is so dodgy, then we shouldn’t use it at all.
In the days when I was an election agent, I analysed canvass returns police flats on one or two occasions (well, two occasions). These revealed more than 90% of persons interviewed expressing a preference for the Conservative Party and no-one expressing preferences for any other political party (there being no National Front candidates). So I think we can have a pretty good idea of where individual police officers stand on most issues.
Most serious criminals (including almost all serial killers and serial rapists) have existing criminal records, so their DNA will be on file. If everyone has their DNA on file, it will then be possible for corrupt police officers and criminals themselves to place their DNA at the crime scene.
Storing the DNA profiles of convicted criminals only, catches the guilty and protects the innocent.
It is now some years since David Icke warned that the Government is planning to microchip the entire population. When he first said this, he was met with haughty derision. Not any more, I think.
Laurence Boyce wrote:
“It’s a serious point CGP. The technology is there begging to be used, courtesy of the “creator.””
.
No – “It is technologically possible, so we should do it” is an absolutely inane argument!
Surely the point of my earlier question about GPS chips wasn’t that hard to get?
Chris Phillips
These revealed more than 90% of persons interviewed expressing a preference for the Conservative Party . . .
Expect that figure to rise after they read this thread.
. . . there being no National Front candidates . . .
This is just terrible.
It is now some years since David Icke warned . . .
Are you Angus Huck?
LB wrote: “Expect that figure to rise after they read this thread.”
It can’t. The Police comprise the most loyal Conservative voting block, as numerous opinion research surveys have shown (always more than 90%). Perhaps you should ask yourself why this is so, LB?
Might it not be for some of the reasons Colin W suggests?
My name is “Sesenco”, which means “little bull” – but big enough to butt you off St Aldhelm’s Head! (joke)
No, CGP, I’m saying we should go for a DNA database anyway. Within a decade maybe. But the technology is going to make the case unanswerable in the fullness of time, and we shouldn’t allow ourselves to be caught napping over a copy of JS Mill.
Laurence Boyce
Do you _really_ not get the point of my question about GPS chips, though?
Chris Phillips
It can’t.
Well, strictly speaking, I think you can rise above 90%.
The Police comprise the most loyal Conservative voting block, as numerous opinion research surveys have shown.
Can you point to just one poll?
Perhaps you should ask yourself why this is so, LB?
No, perhaps we should all be asking ourselves that question. Because, if the data is valid, it surely points to a failure of Labour and Lib Dem as much as anything. And since when has conservatism been intrinsically evil?
Do you really not get the point of my question about GPS chips, though?
Not sure I do really. The public will never (in my view) go for implantable devices, because that is abhorrent and intrusive. The public will (in my view) go for a DNA database, because that is not abhorrent and intrusive, and will help solve crime. But it’s all up to us really. We live in a democracy. 1984 was just a story!
“No, perhaps we should all be asking ourselves that question. Because, if the data is valid, it surely points to a failure of Labour and Lib Dem as much as anything. And since when has conservatism been intrinsically evil?”
OK, Laurence. What should the Lib Dems do to win over policemen?
Bring back capital and corporal punishment? Repatriate black and Asian immigrants and their descendants? Take Britain out of the EU? Reintroduce conscription? Re-criminalise homosexual acts?
All of these would be extremely popular with the boys and girls in blue. But what would it make the Party? (Does a word beginning with “F” come to mind?)
Laurence, the fear that people have about DNA databases is not that there is any malicious intent behind their creation, but that once these things exist, it becomes possible to abuse them. If we could be sure that such abuse would never happen, we could all happily volunteer our DNA. But we can’t, and history suggests that abuse is a common occurrence.
The government that wants our DNA is the same government that thought it could invade Iraq and invent a bunch of reasons why, and… well, you know the list by now, I’m sure. I’m 26 and I can therefore expect to live another 50 years or so, barring disasters. The three-year-olds mentioned in the original post obviously have even longer to go. Can we be sure that at no time during their lifetimes there will be a government which, in some way, abuses the powers given to it? I would suggest that we cannot be at all sure of this, and for this reason should be extremely wary of extending further powers to the government.
I don’t think we should even try to win over policemen now. This thread has blown it completely . . .
Since I don’t do this often, I have to point out that I largely agree with Laurence regarding the police. Some people posting here need to grow up 🙁
Can we be sure that at no time during their lifetimes there will be a government which, in some way, abuses the powers given to it?
Well you phrase this in a way which suggests that one fly in the ointment should be allowed to trump all conceivable benefits. And how do you see this government abuse working exactly? In collusion with the police, the judiciary, the forensic lab, and an agency responsible for the database, say? I mean they’d all need to be Freemasons, for a start.
“The public will (in my view) go for a DNA database, because that is not abhorrent and intrusive, and will help solve crime. But it’s all up to us really. We live in a democracy.”
We’ve managed to go 100+ years without a national fingerprint database
To revert to the technicalities for a moment, is there even any consensus in socio-psychological circles about the ability to predict criminality? The Observer piece was ambiguous, and just said senior police figures were “confident” it could be done.
It sounds like exactly the kind of issue that would be highly contentious within the profession, and subject to faddishness in terms of what the media picks up and takes notice of. Forty years ago there was a serious school of thought that criminality could be detected by studying the anatomy of someone’s face. Surely this can only ever be an inexact science.
For that reason, I am a little worried about the motivations behind the database. It will necessarily be made in the image of the individual prejudices which must follow from the whole thing being an inexact science.
The obvious one would be an ethnic nationalist government, which used racial DNA profiling to target specific minorities.
It’s not inconceivable that, as we discover more about the genetic roots of behaviour, cognitive ability and so forth, it might be possible to use this database to identify individuals with certain genetic characteristics, so as to treat them differently from the rest of society.
Of course, this would begin innocently enough – the government might identify people whose genes suggest an increased likelihood of depression, or drug addiction, or impulsive behaviour and lack of self-control, and might want to have them educated separately, or pre-emptively treated with drugs to ‘correct’ their genetic predisposition. And that’s only the things that I can easily imagine – they’re probably possible now and might even appear normal within a decade. 30-40 years on, the situation will be beyond what we are presently capable of imagining. The decisions we take now have huge long-term consequences.
Once you have the database set up, you need only to have access to the information contained upon it. The opinions of the police officers who made the arrests, the judiciary who passed the sentences and the labs that extracted the DNA are irrelevant by that point. No amount of virtue on their part makes the slightest difference.
“And how do you see this government abuse working exactly?”
It needn’t even be government abuse. The other week Thickie Smith made that binge-drinking crackdown announcement, and gave police power to take alcohol away from kids even if they weren’t drinking it, which is already confiscation of property. Suppose someone claims you can use psychological/social profiling to predict which people will start binge-drinking young. A DNA database with personal details attached would allow them to identify and target certain people with a specific view to confiscating their private property.
Or, even more mundanely than that, we know now that thirty or forty years ago there were cases of police tampering with evidence to secure convictions. What’s so unlikely about that trend returning? All institutions go through cultural change and progress towards the liberal ideal is not guaranteed (hefty dose of John Gray on Saturday; always works a treat for scaring the bejesus out of one).
Oddly enough, someone I know who works alongside the police mentioned to me that lots of them actually are freemasons.
Once you have the database set up, you need only to have access to the information contained upon it. The opinions of the police officers who made the arrests, the judiciary who passed the sentences and the labs that extracted the DNA are irrelevant by that point. No amount of virtue on their part makes the slightest difference.
Not quite sure I get this. Surely the only thing you can do with the database info would be to regenerate the DNA from the figures, and then plant it at the scene of the crime. And this is ridiculously difficult. Why don’t you outline your abuse scenario?
The one great fly in this big pot of ointment, which none of you have mentioned is the need for incredible accuracy in the DNA profiling and database if everyone in the population was in it.
To be sure of a conviction on just DNA grounds ( a dangerous prospect itself) the system would have to be better than one in 60million.
That is 99.99999% accurate. I think the present PNC database is less than 90%. Cant be done.
And we we haven’t discussed low copy number DNA (fragments).
You’re missing the point a bit. DNA isn’t like fingerprints. If you have someone’s fingerprints, all you know about them is what the ends of their fingers look like. If you have someone’s DNA, you know their ethnicity, gender, ancestry, who they are related to (since you have the DNA of their relatives, too) and, increasingly, you may be able to make statistically-informed assumptions about their cognitive capacity, propensity towards certain diseases, behavioural traits and so forth.
Seriously, the amount of information that can be inferred from DNA samples now is far in advance of what was possible even five years ago. And we’ll probably make the same leaps in another five years.
So, my examples are not really examples of DNA evidence being faked. I’m not sure if that’s possible with present technology (though we can bet that one day it will be, and then what?). My fear is on a somewhat larger scale – that knowledge of our genetics might enable a future government to take decisions ‘for our own good’ based on what it knows about our genes. And that’s a fairly benign scenario. A worse scenario would be, as I outlined, the use of this information to identify minority groups and to treat them differently in some way.
I dimly remember that Keith Joseph’s fall from political grace was caused by a speech in which he lamented that the ‘wrong’ kind of people were breeding too much, a remark which cost him a shot at the Conservative leadership in the mid-70s, though it didn’t stop him serving as Margaret Thatcher’s Education Secretary. It is absolutely not inconceivable that we could have a government programme of eugenics at some point – it’s certainly possible enough to take seriously.
If you have someone’s DNA, you know their ethnicity, gender, ancestry, who they are related to (since you have the DNA of their relatives, too) and, increasingly, you may be able to make statistically-informed assumptions about their cognitive capacity, propensity towards certain diseases, behavioural traits and so forth.
Apart from gender, and relatedness, there’s no way you can deduce those things from a standard DNA fingerprint which typically consists of a handful of sample points taken from non-coding regions of DNA (aka junk). It’s true that in my article, I speculated about a time when we might store the full human genome for medical reasons, but that is still very much science fiction at the moment.
It is absolutely not inconceivable that we could have a government programme of eugenics at some point – it’s certainly possible enough to take seriously.
Well I think that government sponsored eugenics has probably had its day. But what of a different sort of eugenics? The one where you eye up some nice ladies, and decide you prefer one over another. What are you going to do about that?
“Well I think that government sponsored eugenics has probably had its day”
Erm, that’s the whole point, Laurence, how on earth can we be so glibly sure of that? There’s an episode of Yes, Minister in which Jim Hacker exclaims, aghast, “You want British citizens to carry identification papers?” and the audience laughs because it’s such an obvious vote loser, so obviously ridiculous, poor Jim that he’s been backed into this corner etc. Twenty years on, and, hm, dang me if it isn’t actually on the table. And here we’re talking about fifty years into the future. S’all right for you and your comfy baby boomer generation for whom things have only ever got better, house prices have only ever got higher, governments have only ever got more liberal…
“But what of a different sort of eugenics?”
What of it? The (if you like) “instinctive eugenics” that operates in human procreation isn’t a reason to allow a state organism to consciously do something similar. Presumably I have misunderstood your argument.
I’m sure I don’t need to explain the difference between individual choice and the decision of a central planner, do I?
Whether the data stored right now is enough to deduce the full amount of information about a person is a moot point. The technology is improving constantly, such that samples that we give now for limited purposes might be used for entirely different purposes at a later date. What we need to examine is the question of whether we want to allow such data to be taken, and under what terms that might be acceptable. I have no problem with allowing others access to my genetic information if I feel that it might benefit me – for health screening purposes, for example. But I think that it is entirely legitimate to have grave concerns about handing such data (or being forced to hand over such data) to the government without any real control over what they will do with it once they have it.
You’re taking an extremely short-termist view. Today’s science fiction is tomorrow’s science fact, and I’m not willing to base important decisions on the fact that you ‘think’ that government-sponsored eugenics has ‘probably’ had its day.
Sorry, last comment was in reply to Laurence, I just took forever to write it 😀
The sense in which eugenics has had its day is that we have all moved on from the “family of the year” competitions of the early twentieth century. In those days, eugenics was championed by the liberal-left as the key to all social progress, before Hitler gave it such a bad name. I guess I’m just bemused by this continued portrayal of “the government” as some malevolent shadowy force, and not as the thing we just elected five minutes ago. But to be honest, if there was some strong genetic reason why I shouldn’t have children, well I think I might actually quite like to know about it. As for performing ethnic profiling using DNA data, that’s called doing it the hard way.
The hard way as opposed to looking at someone’s skin colour? As with the rest of your arguments, it seems to come from before the dawn of any kind of modern technology (DNA matching aside). The data might be difficult to work with on an individual level, but it’s far easier to work with on a mass scale. And we now have the computing capacity to do this much more easily than, say, sending someone out to make a list of all of the people of a certain ethnic minority in a particular area.
Yes, I happily confess to holding a dim view of what the state might be capable of at its worst. I am not arguing that today’s government, for all its faults, is about to propose a new final solution. But I’m sure that few people ever see such things coming, and it might be wise to ensure that safeguards are in place to ensure that it doesn’t – the ultimate safeguard being to make sure that too much power is never accumulated in the hands of too few people.
“we have all moved on from the “family of the year” competitions of the early twentieth century.”
Gah! That’s exactly my point – why should it be so inconceivable that we move BACK there again? Or, more probably, towards a different sort of ideal, probably more based on the individual and their contentment/usefulness to society ratio or some such. Honestly, if I can come up with that concept over my Frosties, I don’t see why you think it so unlikely that anyone else could who had the power and inclination to act on it.
““the government” as some malevolent shadowy force, and not as the thing we just elected five minutes ago”
Right. But suppose one day we haven’t elected it five minutes ago? Suppose martial law has been declared during some terror-related emergency, and people very much like Brown, Smith et al, basically good people with no concept of liberalism under exceptional stress, take it upon themselves to decide that martial law should be extended for the common good, and by and by it becomes the norm?
I’m intrigued by the idea that you might be so genuinely locked into the mindset of your generation that you overlook the fact that just because things have been this way for fifty years, doesn’t mean the trend will continue. Your experience is that governments turned out not to be the shadowy malevolent forces of 1940s science fiction after all – well, good for you! But not only are there no guarantees for that to continue – the indicators are actually the other way.
The ability to process and manage data confers huge opportunities to exercise power, but you’ve got to question how it benefits anybody except the data controllers.
Admittedly it is, intellectually speaking, almost impossible to withstand calls to aid policing, especially in today’s political environment, yet we should all be wary of the requirement to ensure adequate checks and balances are not waived. We don’t need to create opportunities for criminals.
As the unbiquity and volume of data gathering gains pace it presents large-scale challenges and a risks to both individuals and society. While I can’r but see how it is impossible to prevent the advance of techniques to analyse, deal with and market this information it is imperative we structure a framework that ensures legal practices aren’t inverted or that society suffers as a result.
A DNA database may sound not only safe, but also like an aid to security. Yet when it comes to combining it with your health records, Experian credit rating, bank statements, upyourstreet, oyster card, tesco club card and myriad other sources it creates a vast behemoth.
Of course there is nothing scary about this, at first, but before long any individual and consumer choice becomes effectively dictated by the process model in place. Not only can conformity be monitored more efficiently, but uniformity becomes easier to emplace.
US electoral strategy has been weighed with the application of Voter Vault and other systems (which the conservatives are leading the way in introducing over here – shush, it’s their secret get-the-vote-out weapon), which not only profile, but track and geo-target too. Allied to the bureacracy of central government and planning regulation, synergies envisaged include communities designed around, and bound together by commonalities as trivial as a shared taste for pizza toppings or coffee brand. Not so much eugenics, but societal engineering to purely capitalist ends.
Data analytics leads directly to a pro-active producer-driven society, a recentralisation of social infrastructures, encourages the division and ghettoisation of whole settlements, and in the worst case leads to levels of societal disintergration only hinted at so far: the Peasant War rewritten as the Consumer War.
How any of this eith addresses the causes of crime or actually helps security in the long run is beyond me, it only moves the goalposts of policing priorities and furthers the case for additional powers to restrict individual freedoms, debasing the laws that ordered rule depend upon.
My own feeling is that we should urge caution, allow time to develop a tested methodology behind how any database is used in the public sphere, while ensuring scrutiny and feedback controls within the systems are of primary importance – we don’t need an influx of Inspector Gadgets taking over, we need PC Plod at his post ready to respond.
Alix, we’ll be all right. Just trust me on this one.
Tsch. We’ve had this argument before, of course, Laurence (was that the one that ended up with us having posts deleted for calling each other names? I forget), so for you to label system abuse as “the fly in the ointment” when it’s already been explained to you that abuse can mean long-term, large-scale systemic abuse is pretty frightening. What is it about the concept that life in fifty years’ time could be very different from now are you finding difficult to grasp?
There is a problem with the DNA database that none of you have mentioned yet – the issue of ‘false matches’.
People have been arrested, interrogated, detained, their houses searched, because their DNA profile matched DNA from crime scenes, yet other people are subsquently convicted of those crimes.
That seems a very practical reason why 60m of us shouldn’t be on the database.
Then there are some legal issues: why the database exists without statutory authority even though the right to take samples does; on what basis Chief Constables may remove samples; why there is no independent supervision of the database.
*Sigh*
Laurence, have you listened to a single word I’ve said?
I find it VERY interesting that more than 30% of serving police officers have REFUSED to allow their DNA to be taken.
Guess what. This refusal has the full backing of the Police Federation.
We call this HYPOCRISY. The sort of hypocrisy that allows you to shoot someone in the head eight times & then go on holiday.
Laurence, have you listened to a single word I’ve said?
Not this afternoon Alix – it was all I could do to stand up straight. But just chill, love. We’re into a new paradigm, right? Web 2.0 and all that. They can’t get us now. In fact we’ll be getting them! Big time. It’s gonna be great . . .
Ukliberty is quite correct that the usefulness of a DNA database is undermined by false matches… and the larger the database, the more false matches.
The big danger is that the police will forget how to actually solve crimes and just ‘go with the DNA’. Even if someone was fifty miles away with a cast-iron alibi, they’ll still get arrested if Computer says yes. I suspect this sort of dumbing down of policework is already happening thanks to CCTV.
Civilization is based on replacing humans with machines, but that doesn’t mean doing so in every case or on a large scale.
I can’t decide if Laurence is actually perpetrating the greatest parody ever or… well, the alternative doesn’t bear thinking about much 🙁
I think that he has run out of good arguments in favour of his pet project but hasn’t quite figured out how to disconnect his typing hands.
I asked:
“Do you really not get the point of my question about GPS chips, though?”
Laurence Boyce replied:
“Not sure I do really. The public will never (in my view) go for implantable devices, because that is abhorrent and intrusive. The public will (in my view) go for a DNA database, because that is not abhorrent and intrusive, and will help solve crime.”
My point was that if there were a technologically feasible way of logging the location of every citizen, for every hour of the day, it would make conventional crime a thing of the past.
But, as you said, you wouldn’t think that was OK.
Reducing crime is not the sole criterion by which the acceptability of policies is judged.
Maybe another example would help. No doubt torturing criminals to death, in exquisite agony, would do wonders for the crime rate. But no one in their right mind supports that, because there are other considerations.
So these issues need to be discussed on their merits, not on a nonsensical argument such as “It’s technologically feasible, so we should do it”, or even “It would reduce the crime rate, so we should do it”.
Chris Phillips
Yes, but in my opinion, the other considerations are generally exaggerated or don’t add up to much, and will therefore not outweigh the benefits. Just my opinion – we’ll never know for sure until we try it. But my hunch is that we’d never look back.
What I said I thought was abhorrent was implanting a device under the skin. But now you’re talking about the principle of tracking in the abstract. This often comes up more in the context of tracking cars, which could bring a number of benefits including crime prevention.
All I can say is that I personally would not have any objection to having my car tracked. However, I can see that this might make me feel uneasy if I were having an affair.
Oh, I see. You only objected to GPS chips because they were to be implanted under the skin?
In that case, feel free to discuss a bracelet or an anklet or something like that, if you prefer.
But please don’t restrict it to tracking the movements of cars. The question is whether it would be acceptable for every member of the population to have his or her movements tracked, against his or her will, every hour of the day and night.
Chris Phillips
Centralised state bureacracy is notoriously inefficient at undertaking what we might desire of it, and it creates a method to take short cuts for those who might be so inclined, which then leads to short-circuits.
It’s one reason devolved responsibility is worth promoting.
If you wanted to create an unbiased profile of those who are most likely to cause damage to the functioning of society with general roguery, wouldn’t you start with people who have the means, motive and opportunity ie civil servants, politicians and the police themselves?
The question remains: who watches the watchers?
In that case, feel free to discuss a bracelet or an anklet or something like that, if you prefer.
Well those things are also intrusive. I really don’t think it is going to be possible for tracking to be as non-intrusive as giving a DNA swab once in your life, so that’s always going to be an important practical consideration.
The question is whether it would be acceptable for every member of the population to have his or her movements tracked, against his or her will, every hour of the day and night.
But if you really want me to consider the question purely in the abstract, then I can’t resist the following observation. Isn’t what you have described precisely what we are told God does? You are coming dangerously close to saying in effect that a religious belief is abhorrent, so I should desist if I were you before someone calls you illiberal or a bigot.
So LB is in favour of satellite surveillance of motor-vehicles?
Surprise, surprise, surprise, surprise!
I didn’t say I was in favour of widespread use of vehicle tracking, I just said I wasn’t personally opposed to it. The point is that we live in a democracy, so ultimately it’s all up to us. But I’m not sure that everyone on this thread does in fact believe that we live in a democracy, and so much heat is generated.
No, I think you’re missing the point Laurence. We pretty much live in a democracy now but that is no guarantee that we will live in a democracy forever. Indeed, there’s no reason for us to believe that a democracy won’t impose some of the horribly illiberal things mentioned above (and that I mentioned on the other thread), because democracy really just means majority rule, and if the majority are convinced that something is a good idea, it could still happen. Hell, look at the Iraq war! We did that, and they didn’t even manage to convince us it was a good idea.
Well exactly. The Iraq war has been a total disaster and is entirely our fault. And if we throw away all our liberties through the democratic process, then that will also be entirely our fault. But I don’t think we will throw away all our liberties. Or rather, I only think that we we throw away all our liberties in the minds of libertarian fruitbats.
I suppose it depends on what you mean by “throw away” and “liberties”. There certainly have been a number of infringements on our liberties, to the extent of detention without charge and house arrest.
But it’s good to see you draw the line somewhere.
Laurence Boyce wrote:
“The point is that we live in a democracy, so ultimately it’s all up to us.”
If that’s your response to any argument about political principles, it’s rather pointless trying to have a discussion in the first place.
Let alone dragging in religion at every conceivable opportunity …
Chris Phillips
The fact that democracy enables legislatures to extinguish liberties is the reason why other democracies (though not ours) have entrenchment.
Professor Sir William Wade used to hold that entrenchment could not be effected in the UK (not “without another revolution”), but post-Factortame he is not so sure.
The fact that elites (through the mechanism of the Murdoch press) have shown themselves capable of persuading the public that they should trade freedom for security demonstrates the urgent need for entrenchment as a core component of any constitutional settlement.
If that’s your response to any argument about political principles, it’s rather pointless trying to have a discussion in the first place.
Not really. The argument is about what we should or should not enact. If you are saying that a DNA database should be off limits because that violates some core principle of liberty, well I have to say I find that rather undemocratic. Why don’t we just have the debate without having all these trump cards stuffed up our sleeves?
Let alone dragging in religion at every conceivable opportunity.
Sorry. But it’s a rather good point, don’t you think? Why do Liberal Democrat Christians worship a God who is the big-brother surveillance-society nightmare made flesh?
Well, freedom is not synonymous with democracy.
Laurence Boyce wrote:
“But it’s a rather good point, don’t you think? Why do Liberal Democrat Christians worship a God who is the big-brother surveillance-society nightmare made flesh?”
Since you ask, I think it’s one of the most fatuous arguments I’ve ever read.
As an argument, “You worship a God who does it, therefore you can’t oppose the government doing it” is almost as inane as “It’s technologically feasible, therefore the government should do it”.
Chris Phillips
Another important point to make about the DNA database and Laurence’s support for democracy is that there is no statutory basis for the existence of the DNA database – ie we haven’t ‘democratically’ decided that there should be a DNA database, the authorities simply decided that there should be one. (Nor is there any statutory basis for the removal of samples from the database).
There is a statutory basis for taking samples – that’s it.
I couldn’t care less about the technical implications – those are things that can be solved, and basing an opposition on this is merely a delaying tactic.
My concern with a DNA database is with the fundamental shift in attitude towards the civilian, from that of an individual to be respected to a resource whose details are to be searched whenever any crime is committed.
Yes, it’s an airy-fairy liberal concept. Still, there is a line to be drawn – even if yes, it means someone died because we were not willing to give up another liberty. If ‘saving a life’ is the balance against which any loss to liberty is weighed, we’ll give up everything.
Incidentally, forget the GPS chips. What if an advanced blanket CCTV network could track every citizen’s movement’s in realtime across the country? Would that still be ok?
Jherard, those are very good points, especially the last.
Since you ask, I think it’s one of the most fatuous arguments I’ve ever read.
Chris, it’s not an argument. It’s a question. Directed at Christian Lib Dems. Though if past experience is anything to go by, I might have to wait a while for a coherent answer.
. . . is almost as inane as “It’s technologically feasible, therefore the government should do it.”
And I didn’t say that either. But sometimes technology does force the pace of change. It doesn’t mean that the government should do anything, but it might make it harder to argue against. For example, recent advances in digital technology make it quite hard to argue against plans for a digital broadcast switchover by 2012. So the government is in part being driven by the technology. But there’s still no obligation to have the switchover. I don’t even have a television, so personally I couldn’t give a stuff.
Laurence Boyce wrote:
“And I didn’t say that either.”
.
What you said was: “if you don’t like it, blame God not the police”.
What does that mean, if it doesn’t mean that the mere fact that an action is technologically feasible absolves us of any responsibility for deciding whether to carry it out?
And it is sheer nonsense. Clearly everything that goes on in the world is technologically feasible. That doesn’t mean that everything that goes on in the world is desirable!
Chris Phillips
How do you manage to comment prolifically on ‘Question Time’ without a television, Laurence?
You can get BBC news and politics plus most of Channel 4 off the internet.
Clearly everything that goes on in the world is technologically feasible. That doesn’t mean that everything that goes on in the world is desirable!
Yes, but I think that a DNA database is both desirable AND technologically feasible!
Laurence, I contest the opinion that a DNA database is completely desirable or completely feasible technologically or systematically.
Of course it is in theory, and some quarters would say that that is enough, but you’ve got to go as far as providing details of the practises which assuage the concerns of those that don’t, as well as proving that the benefits outweigh any negative impacts, that the costs are minimised and affordable and that the potential applications are reliable and risk-free, otherwise you are just taking a debating position.
You can’t get away from the experiences of other large databases and you also can’t escape the dangers inherent in compulsion, then you’ve got to address the human weaknesses in any system (from cock-ups to criminal conspiracies).
So try not to get ahead of yourself, please.
I don’t think a DNA database is either desirable nor realistically feasable.
The technology exists to do it, but to be able to make it safe, secure and reliable would make it prohibitively expensive.
Even if all of that could be solved and we’d happily pay the vast quantity of money required to do it, it’s not liberal and certainly not desirable to have such a database.
Once the government has this information what is it going to do with it? You might accept that our current government won’t do anything overtly illiberal with it, but that doesn’t mean the next government won’t. What if the next government is really short of cash and decides it’s a good idea to sell the DNA data to insurance companies. Those companies then decide that they won’t sell insurance to you. What if the DNA is sold to employers and they decide your genes indicate your not a team player and will never give you a job.
What if the government believes a scientific study that links a propensity to commit violent crimes to certain genes. It’s a quick to quickly trawl the DNA database for people with matching genes and then ording them all put under surveillance or put in special schools or have them all tagged with transceivers to track them.
Just because we don’t think the current government will do anything too nasty with our data doesn’t mean a future one won’t. We’ve seen government mission creep on their various systems all the time; where will this one creep?
What about something much more mundane than all these future possibilities. What happens once criminals start randomly dropping DNA (cigratte stubs, hair and skin samples they’ve picked up earlier that day) at their crime scene. The forensics teams collect them, run them through the database and hey-presto innocent person is now linked to the crime scene. If they spent the night at home alone, they are now guilty for no other reason than having had their DNA entered in a database.
It will happen. You’ll see. 🙂
(I’m really just posting this to test commenting which seems a bit awry.)
Laurence Boyce
This really is getting tedious.
If you’re arguing for it because it’s _desirable_, then it’s not “God’s fault”, is it? It’s the fault of people like you who are advocating it.
It’s only “God’s fault”, and not ours, if you take the line that we have to do it just because it’s _technologically_ _feasible_.
Please don’t make me point this out again. It must be even more boring for everyone else than it is for us!
Chris Phillips
Forget God – she doesn’t exist. It’s nobody’s “fault” as such. I’m in favour of a DNA database. So are lots of other people. It will happen. By 2020 at least. That’s my hunch.
You’re just being fatalistic. Just because you feel something is inevitable, doesn’t mean it’s right or even a good and desirable thing.
I’d argue that most people “in favour” are actually people that “don’t object to” the DNA database, which is a very different stance. I’d also argue that most people haven’t thought through the implications yet. Just as with ID cards “most people” were in favour, until they started learning about all the implications, now most people aren’t in favour. Also ID cards looked certain a couple of years ago, they don’t anymore.
According to the metro the other day 1 in 500 people in this country are being detained “At Her Majesty’s Pleasure” for criminal, mental or immigration reasons. He have the highest per-capita prisoner population in Europe (2nd only to the US in the western world, if I recall correctly). Do you think this DNA database will decrease this number?
The DNA database presumes that everyone is a criminal, they just haven’t committed their crime yet, so we’ll store their DNA for the day when they do. Why don’t we just lock everyone up straight away after birth and be done with it?
As to fault, it’s the fault of a population that’s letting itself be more and more controlled and monitored by the government because of a climate of fear inspired by a media that (quite understandably) dwells on the most awful and horrible and frightening stories; giving the impression those are the norm, not the exception. We need to help people better understand risk assessment and consequently allow people to realise that a 1 in 1000 chance of being “whatevered” also means a 99.9% chance of not being “whatevered”.
Laurence Boyce Says:
‘The public will never (in my view) go for implantable devices, because that is abhorrent and intrusive. The public will (in my view) go for a DNA database, because that is not abhorrent and intrusive’
I FIND THE WHOLE CONCEPT OF BIG BROTHER BEING ALLOWED TO STICK A SWAB INSIDE MY MOUTH TO GET A DNA SAMPLE – IRRESPECTIVE OF WHETHER OR NOT I MIGHT HAVE DONE ANYTHING WRONG – UTTERLY ABHORRENT AND INTRUSIVE.
(caps lock on deliberately)
Oh and I can’t trust big brother not to misuse the data.
It’s not that bad Lois. Just think of it as a trivial medical procedure, which might even save your life.
Laurence Boyce initiated an extremely tedious argument (on 16 March) by writing:
“if you don’t like it, blame God not the police”.
Laurence Boyce has now evidently thought better of it, and says:
“Forget God – she doesn’t exist. It’s nobody’s “fault” as such.”
Is it asking too much that you’ll avoid wasting everyone’s time with such patent silliness in the future?
Chris Phillips
Is it asking too much that you’ll avoid wasting everyone’s time with such patent silliness in the future?
Probably. But I think that rather than continuing to take shots at me, you really ought to make your own position clear. I am perfectly well aware of the fact that liberty and democracy are two separate things, and that liberty needs some sort of special protection. So, for instance, if the majority of a population wish to persecute homosexuals (which is pretty much how things have been throughout most of history) then that is wrong. In short, democracy is not a mechanism for allowing a majority to exert a tyranny over a minority.
Now, are you seriously telling me that a DNA database would come into that category? I only ask, because it isn’t altogether clear. Suppose 60%, 75% want a DNA database? Can we have one? If not, then at what percentage? I’m just talking broad brush principle here. It’s time we wised up to the fact that the public at large do not necessarily buy into the civil liberties agenda so beloved of Westminster liberals. When it comes to DNA, street cameras, even ID cards (which I’m against by the way), people are quite able to imagine how these things might even protect their liberties, not threaten them.
I think that on DNA and other issues, we are very much in danger of going down some self-indulgent path of political purity, leaving the electorate to vote for parties with sensible practical alternatives.
What if the next government is really short of cash and decides it’s a good idea to sell the DNA data to insurance companies. Those companies then decide that they won’t sell insurance to you. What if the DNA is sold to employers and they decide your genes indicate your not a team player and will never give you a job. What if the government believes a scientific study that links a propensity to commit violent crimes to certain genes.
We really are getting too far ahead of ourselves here, Martin. There is no way on earth you can get these things out of a DNA fingerprint which consists of about a dozen locus points. The fingerprint identifies the person – that is all.
I’m puzzled, Laurence – why are you against ID cards? You don’t buy the “bulwark against future evil government” argument, you don’t seem to have problems with database Britain, so why?
I’m basically against ID cards Alex, because I see them as being a bit of a waste of money which could more usefully be put towards a DNA database.
Laurence Boyce wrote:
“I think that rather than continuing to take shots at me, you really ought to make your own position clear.”
? ? ? ?
My position is that I’m against your universal DNA database.
Had I not made that clear enough for you already?
Chris Phillips
Sure I know you’re against the idea. But if a majority of the population were to decide they want a universal DNA database, you’ll concede the point with good grace, and queue up to have your swab taken? Or will you invoke some higher principle of liberty and refuse? That is what is not quite clear.
MartinSGill makes the excellent point that fear of crime has been whipped up by the media in collaboration with politicians – “Tough on Crime, Tough on the Causes of Crime”. New Labour took a deliberate view that the party would not be outflanked by the Tories on policies towards criminality, hence the ratcheting up of rhetoric, the 3000+ new ‘crimes’ and the whittling away of our liberties. There is a synergy between the mass media and unscrupulous politicians: standing up and arguing against that perversion of the truth about crime and against the putting in place of the mechanisms of a repressive state is not “some self-indulgent path of political purity”, but rather, I would have thought, our duty as liberals.
Laurence Boyce asked:
“But if a majority of the population were to decide they want a universal DNA database, you’ll concede the point with good grace, and queue up to have your swab taken?”
What are you asking?
Whether I’d change my mind and support it, in the hypothetical circumstance that a majority of the population supported it? Of course not.
Whether I’d disobey the law, if I was legally obliged to provide a DNA sample? No, I shouldn’t.
But none of that has any bearing on the argument. Whatever your question means, it seems like a diversionary tactic to me.
Chris Phillips
. . . in the hypothetical circumstance that a majority of the population supported it . . .
Not quite so hypothetical.
Whether I’d disobey the law, if I was legally obliged to provide a DNA sample? No, I shouldn’t.
I’m glad to hear it.
Whatever your question means, it seems like a diversionary tactic to me.
My question didn’t mean anything more than it said. No need for diversions, though I don’t think I have a great deal more to say on the subject.
Tony, I’m not sure the public are quite so easily led these days, whether by media or government. And as New Labour slogans go, I really liked, “tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime.” Of course the reality has been somewhat disappointing, but as a principle it is surely excellent – that we should come down hard upon criminals while at the same time address some underlying causes. In fact, I’m trying to make a similar argument in the religious context – that we should come down on the extremists AND attack the theology in the abstract.
Had Blair’s brain not been so befuddled by religion, I think he might have made one of the great PMs. But I’m afraid he completely blew it.
“I don’t think I have a great deal more to say on the subject”
Thank heaven for small mercies!
Chris Phillips
Tell me how you can distinguish between a DNA swab that’s for a fingerprint and one that’s for an entire genome map?
The point is that once the government has the swab what’s to stop it doing additional tests on it? “He take a swab anyway, might as well test for condition X, Y, Z while we’re at it.” All it would take is a quick vote in parliament by a majority government and it’s law and there’s nothing the public can do about it. The first tests might be for something beneficial like tendency to alzheimers or diabetes, to help the NHS in planning and assigning resources. Then more and more tests are added and more and more information like that is stored.
Or, more likely destroy it. If your DNA is picked out of the database you’re a suspect in a crime. That’s the whole point of it isn’t it? Once criminals start deliberately contaminating crime scenes with random DNA we’ll get masses of false positives (we already get quite a few nowadays, DNA fingerprinting isn’t the exact science it’s made out to be on TV, it can only give probabilities of a match, sometimes as low as 1 in 10, or 1 in 20).
The problem I see with the DNA database is that it removes the presumption of innocence. If your DNA is matched then you are guilty until you can prove you’re innocent. The police and CPS won’t be forced to explain why your DNA is there, you’ll be forced to explain why it shouldn’t be there. You’re guilty… and if you can’t show an alibi, you’re off to jail, even if you’re innocent.
It’s quite hard to argue against the idea that the government might do something bad in the future, or that safeguards might prove to be insufficient, or that mistakes might be made at some point.
I mean why do we allow witnesses in court at all? Has nobody considered the possibility that they might lie?
The problem is inherent in DNA itself.
If you have fingerprints it’s a lot harder to harvest fingerprints and move them to crime location.
There’s also the issues that a finger print is just that, a finger print. DNA is considerably more. You cannot tell gender, race, propensity to disease, psychological tendencies and various other factors from a finger print that you can from DNA.
My DNA is everything I am, everything I have been and everything I will be, or could be. I’d be a lot less concerned about a fingerprint database than I would be about a DNA database. But, my liberal instinct still insists that having such a database for innocent people is highly illiberal and just plain wrong.
I think a liberal society is one where the focus is on making sure that an innocent person is never wrongly convicted and the price for that is that sometimes the guilty walk free. The universal DNA (or just a fingerprint) database is a step in the direction of reversing that attitude; you’d rather give up your rights to make sure criminals are caught. Instead of the police figuring out who could have done it then using DNA evidence to prove it, they just look you up in the database and if you can’t prove you weren’t there you’re guilty. The state no longer needs to prove you guilty, the burden is now on you to prove yourself innocent. A fundamental reversal of the principles of our society.
Well all I can say is that if we’re going to lock up all these innocent people, then we had batter start building some serious prison space now.