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MPs call for EVERYONE to be added to the national DNA database

Dna197 Last Friday, the government published its new Freedom Bill.  Included in the document was a commitment from the government to delete the majority of the data belonging to innocent people from the national DNA database.

Sadly, Conservative MP Laurence Robertson does not agree with his party's own position on this issue.  Indeed, in comments to his local paper in Gloucestershire, he has gone one step further and called for everyone to have their details stored on a central database.

"At the moment, only the DNA of people arrested can be taken and stored. I know some people object to this, but others are of the view there should be a full databank of everyone's DNA.

"In no way does having DNA stored restrict freedom – quite the reverse, if storing and using DNA helps to prevent crime."

Astonishingly, Liberal Democrat MP Martin Horwood – a man representing a party who have consistently opposed the storing of innocent people's DNA – backed Robertson's position.

"I am quite sympathetic.

"I think there's an argument for more people to be on the DNA database but the problem has been discriminating between different groups.

"If everyone was on it, that would be less of a problem, but we would need to persuade the public that wasn't a threat to our collective civil liberties".

Erm, perhaps Mr Horwood would like to explain how the creation of a vast, central database of the intricate biological data of every British citizen can be squared with any conception of civil liberties?

Posted on February 17, 2011 by Big Brother Watch Posted in DNA database
  • Sok

    That means ‘everyone’, except MP’s etc then?

  • Jamie Davis

    Wow. That kind of sugar coating just makes my blood run cold. The idea of a universal DNA database is surely one of the most extreme intrusion into civil liberties.
    From there is a short step to GPS based bio-tagging. Then we can know where you are at any time.

  • Richard Craven

    “Erm, perhaps Mr Horwood would like to explain how the creation of a vast, central database of the intricate biological data of every British citizen can be squared with any conception of civil liberties?”
    Thank you for highlighting this. It is insane, and cannot be allowed to happen.

  • http://blog.rac.me.uk Richy C.

    Well, I think we should start off by having all MPs and their immediate family (parents, partners and children) on the database first. After 6 months, extend it to their extended family, 6 months after that he “backers” consistencies voters and then slow spread it across the country. Therefore any problems will be sorted out quickly with a relatively small sample set.
    Oh, you mean MPs will probably be exempt from this… I wonder why.

  • Peterloo

    Why do people believe that DNA matching is infallable? There are many papers in the public domain that conclude that DNA matching is not 100% accurate – whether by false-positive, result mis-interpretation or sample mis-handling.
    Widening the sample pool to all UK citizens only serves to increase the possibility of error from false-positive or mis-interpretation.
    I think Mr Horwood’s constituents should have a quiet word – oh my mistake, I was under the delusion that that would make a difference.

  • IG

    @Richy C. “Well, I think we should start off by having all MPs and their immediate family (parents, partners and children)…”
    Don’t forget the pets ;-)

  • noway

    It is frightening how out of touch MPs are with the rest of us – is it something that happens when they get elected?

  • CL

    I have just had an email conversation with him and his justification makes scary reading. Would you believe he refers to civil liberties as “a vague concept”?
    This kind of misguided view goes much deeper than just DNA testing the population.
    With regard to his constituents, I have sent his reply onto the Gloucester Conservatives for their opinion.

  • Richard Craven

    I hope and trust that Messrs Robertson’s and Horwood’s constituency parties will immediately instigate de-selection procedures.