Jill Saward v Davis Davis
In 1986, Jill Saward was raped by burglars who had broken into her home. Her father, the Vicar of Ealing, and her boyfriend were badly injured.
After nearly two decades of working in victim support, Jill Saward has entered politics. Specifically, she is running against Davis Davis.
Her particular gripe with the former politician is this:
Another “erosion of British liberty” [identified by Davis] is the national DNA database. According to David Davis, neither this, nor the other security measures he now fights against, will make us safer. In fact, he describes it as “a myth to believe that we can defend our security by sacrificing our fundamental freedoms.”
David Davis appears to be very concerned about “British liberty.” But what does it mean? I want men and women - including children - to be at liberty to walk the streets of our towns and cities without fear of violence in general - and sexual violence in particular; and to feel safe in their own homes and workplaces.
And part of that “British liberty” is to expect the law enforcement agencies to use every tool at their disposal to catch the people responsible for the attack - and to never give up.
The National DNA Database has done just that. There have been numerous occasions when rapists have been convicted years after the attack - simply because, when the trail and investigation had gone cold, the DNA profile of the attacker had been retained. And when the rapist had been arrested years later, for something completely unrelated - the routine DNA test had provided a match.
Surely this is a good thing? This ensures our freedom, and our liberty. But Mr Davis wants to do away with it. If anything we should be expanding the national DNA database so that everybody’s DNA is on it.
DNA can rule people out of investigations as well as pointing the finger.
Here she is blogging at CiF.
If I lived in Haltemprice and Howden, I think I would vote for Jill Saward. I am not a supporter of 42 days detention, because I think that Government did not make a convincing case for it. I am generally not madly enthusiastic about ID cards and so on: but largely because I think they’re expensive and inefficient.
I have some sympathy with people who don’t want the State to know “things” about them, and who are prepared to make a fuss if government agencies insist on collecting information on individuals. Unfortunately, if you want the State to do lots of “things”: such as paying benefits, organising education, providing health care, and so on, the State needs a lot of information, which it uses to ensure that those services are delivered appropriately. If you’re an anti-Statist libertarian, then fair enough. Campaign for a minimal State, where information gathering isn’t required, because the State does next to nothing. Play by the rules until you win.
However, a national DNA database presents a very minor infringement of privacy. I do accept that DNA databases are not a panacea. However, they are an extremely useful tool: which can equally help to free the wrongly accused, and to convict those who are guilty.
I’m not really sure what the big fuss over a DNA database is about. Possibly, like a savage encountering a camera and a photograph for the first time, Davis Davis thinks that if the state has a record of your DNA pattern, it has stolen your soul.
Apparently, Jill Saward’s great grandfather “was Captain Henry Kendall notable for being the first person to use radio to capture a criminal (Dr Crippen)”. Perhaps, back in 1910, there was a national debate on whether using a radio to capture a murderer was unsporting, and a gross abuse of our right to privacy. I don’t know.
Comments
| 1 July 2008, 12:23 pm |
Sue R -
You can volunteer your DNA for the database, if you so wish.
| 1 July 2008, 12:24 pm |
“I’m not really sure what the big fuss over a DNA database is about.”
As far as I’m concerned, two things. (1) I don’t want the State to have the power to force me to give a DNA sample - presumably by a swab? I don’t know - when I have committed no crime. (2) It would be, in the decades ahead, an immensely powerful tool with applications far beyond criminal justice, some of which we have probably not conceived of yet. I don’t trust a future Government with that information.
| 1 July 2008, 12:30 pm |
I’m perfectly willing to oblige. Say I was drowned while swimming off the coast of Cornwall with no identification. My bereaved family would be able to know what had happened to me, when my body was washed ashore in Calais. Anyway, if the Government is going to use DNA for nefarious purposes, they can fake other things as well.
| 1 July 2008, 12:55 pm |
The choice seems to me seems to be between a database with everyone on it, or just those convicted, or none at all.
Those who fear the State should also realise that a full DNA base would prevent arms of the state from fitting up people like Stefan Kizko for example.
Some of the anti’s arguments would also apply to photographs.
| 1 July 2008, 1:11 pm |
Jill Saward’s great grandfather “was Captain Henry Kendall notable for being the first person to use radio to capture a criminal (Dr Crippen)
Which so neatly brings us to this week’s headlines that this link between Saward and Cap Kendall seems like a kind of dream poetic justice.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/crime/article4232359.ece
Pace David Aaronovich’s piece today casting doubts on the DNA testing, this DNA evidence would have been sufficient to make Crippen’s conviction unsafe and spare him the noose.
| 1 July 2008, 1:13 pm |
Excellent points, David T. David Davis has been badly shown up by this. Shame the media don’t really care though.
I am curious; why do you always call David Davis twice by his second name? Is this a joke?
| 1 July 2008, 1:18 pm |
I don’t knowd why people are against a national DNA database.
Can I have your bank account details as well? After all, you’ve nothing to fear if you’ve got nothing to hide.
| 1 July 2008, 1:21 pm |
“I’m not really sure what the big fuss over a DNA database is about. ”
All the usual concerns about big government databases from bad data and incompetent management through corporate and criminal compromising of the system to evil laws coming in. Plus the real-world examples of DNA being planted by criminals and by rogue law enforcement. Plus real-world examples of false positives.
Brown’s claims on DNA catching offenders are suspect as well. See here.
Like fingerprints, you leave your DNA everywhere.
| 1 July 2008, 1:22 pm |
Because it is a clear case of the state overstepping its boundaries: it is intrusive, invasive, and potentially could be put to all manner of malign purposes.
It is not the state’s business to hold biological data of those who are subject to it.
That way lies totalitarianism. Indeed, that is a clear shove towards totalitarianism.
Thank God for David Davis
| 1 July 2008, 1:26 pm |
Not clear logic, Morgoth.
Its crystal clear, Mike. The state CANNOT be trusted with any personal information (the DVLA were caught selling driver details to wheel clampers for example). If Sue is happy for the utmost personal details about her (her DNA) to be given to the State, then she could be consistent and give out her bank account details as well.
And as for the hysterical Jill Saward, well, soon she’ll be arguing that all men should be castrated. That would cut down domestic and sexual violence as well. Her whole post is the equivalent of screaming “Think of the Chilllldddreeen! THINK OF THE CHILD-REN!!!!!!!!!!!!!”.
| 1 July 2008, 1:28 pm |
As a sweaty bloke my DNA is all over the place. In weather like this it falls off me like rain. They could fit me up for loads of crimes.
They’ll have to pry my double helix out of my cold dead hands…
| 1 July 2008, 1:30 pm |
Like it or not your DNA gives considerable insight into your current health, future health, fitness, personality, intelligence, fertility and many other traits. Do you really want a government to have this data, lose it or sell it to third parties, like insurance companies? The state may not own your soul when it has your DNA, but it will have the ability to learn far more about you than from a fingerprint. Such a thing would represent a gross invasion of privacy, not a minor one.
| 1 July 2008, 1:32 pm |
Venichka what are you on? A national DNA database would stop serial rapists after their first offence. In my view that alone is enough to justify it. For the government to have a record of my DNA is no more an intrusion on my privacy than for them to know the colour of my eyes.
And what is all this bilge about the rozzers framing Crippen. They were going to drop the case as they thought he had done nothing wrong when he scarpered. There was no public outcry about a murderer on the loose a la the Ripper until they found the body parts. So its ludicrous to say they planted them to qualm public fears about someone else getting away with murder…
| 1 July 2008, 1:36 pm |
Yeah, a rape victim supporting a DNA database is so much more hysterical than relatives of murder victims supporting capital punishment.
| 1 July 2008, 1:39 pm |
There’s another problem - criminals respond to changed circumstances. There’s a new and deeply horrible trend in sexual assault, where the assailant uses corrosive materials, often drain cleaner, to try to remove DNA evidence from their victim. This has happened after they have killed the victim, and also when they have not added murder to rape. One schoolgirl in North London suffered this earlier this year and the burns left more severe injuries than did the rape. These corrosive materials are poured into all orifices.
I’m afraid a national DNA database might have unintended bad consequences, in addition to the more obvious bad consequences that have been remarked on by libertarians and do not need repeating here.
| 1 July 2008, 1:42 pm |
Re crippen and his innocence what I caught on the radio seemed to be rather convincing that the trial did not have all the evidence at least.
Two pieces of evidence for this that stood out for me were - the remains of his wife that were found were male (which they could not know at the time due to the limits of science at the time) and his wife had withdrawn all their savings days before going missing.
The rights and wrongs of using radio to capture him aside it sounds like one of the most notorious murderers of the twentieth century may well not have been a murderer after all but may have been framed by his wife (and other?)
| 1 July 2008, 1:45 pm |
“Surely this is a good thing? This ensures our freedom, and our liberty. ”
No it doesn’t.
| 1 July 2008, 1:45 pm |
I must say that I look forward to NuLab’s impending defeat more and more with every passing day.
They have no respect whatsoever for human dignity or privacy, the right to differences of conscience from their own perverted and corrupt and dated worldview, bugger all respect for civil liberties and a naive belief in perfectability of man (so long as he/she/it follow the prerogatives and perverted views they favour) progress that, last time it was tried, led to the GULag.
Time to go
(I am not even close to being a libertarian, but rathera moderate conservative: I don’t think objections to the state overstepping its role , not least those based upon recent experience of systems based around this leftist arrogance, per se have anything to do with libertarianism, which to my mind is an amoral and deluded set of ideas, possibly even more dangerous should they be implemented that what this lot of scoundrels unfortunately in government at the moment are about).
I sympathise with the position of someone like Jill Saward, but the solution she proposes is far too extreme, cutting off the head to save an eye
| 1 July 2008, 1:47 pm |
Yeah, a rape victim supporting a DNA database is so much more hysterical than relatives of murder victims supporting capital punishment.
The National DNA Database is a presumption of guilt covering the whole population. Capital Punishment is a specific measure covering an individual following due process in law.
Normally, you’ll find no greater feminist than I (c.f. my position on Abortion and so on), but in this case, Seward is guilty of hysterica clouding her judgement. It reminds me of the post-Dunblade orgy of “Ban Handguns! Think of the Chilllllllddddddddrrrrreeeeeeeennnnnnn!” and utterly sickening renditions of Bob Dylan songs on TOTP.
| 1 July 2008, 1:52 pm |
Its crystal clear, Mike. The state CANNOT be trusted with any personal information
I’m very happy for right wing libertarians to make this argument.
I am also happy for individuals to opt out of providing some information to the state, as long as they also agree that the state will be under no obligation to provide them with services.
| 1 July 2008, 1:57 pm |
I am also happy for individuals to opt out of providing some information to the state, as long as they also agree that the state will be under no obligation to provide them with services.
And for them to opt out of those portions of tax from which the services they’re opting out of, and therefore now need to provision for themselves, woulod have been financed?
| 1 July 2008, 1:58 pm |
I am also happy for individuals to opt out of providing some information to the state, as long as they also agree that the state will be under no obligation to provide them with services.
So….all or nothing it is then. You’re with us or against us. No respect for differing viewpoints, do as we say in all things, follow our command, or sink or swim.
How perfectly Stalinist.
Maybe the sensible thing to do for any Brits who care about liberty would be to emigrate to Poland or the Czech Republic (or, I daresay, in fact, the USA) or some country where the sheer utter evil of Marxist false religion THAT KNOWS NO LIMITS OR RESTRAINT (that still, sadly, permeates so much of the “élite” in this benighted land) is in everyday consciousness, and so, rightly , abhored and excoriated.
| 1 July 2008, 2:07 pm |
Venichka, New Labour are rightly not taking part in this stunt so you will not be able to defeat them. You will defeat rape victims like Jill Saward and the monster raving loony party.
| 1 July 2008, 2:07 pm |
And for them to opt out of those portions of tax from which the services they’re opting out of, and therefore now need to provision for themselves, woulod have been financed?
Sure, if you can persuade people to vote for a Government that allows this, why not?
| 1 July 2008, 2:08 pm |
Whoever gave Venichka a password to post blogs on this site must have been off their nut.
| 1 July 2008, 2:10 pm |
Sure, if you can persuade people to vote for a Government that allows this, why not?
I think opt-in is a more workable solution - private refuse collection with a safety net for the poor, for example. But I was just curious to see whether you’d accept this part as well, and you do. Good stuff.
| 1 July 2008, 2:11 pm |
So make an argument, Morgie, and desist calling women who were gang-banged in front of their fathers and boyfriend crazy-wombed. Given that you support the arbitary execution of minors for non violent offences (and being gypsies), I’ll take your appeals to liberty as worthless.
| 1 July 2008, 2:15 pm |
So make an argument
I have. A two fold argument actually. Its not my fault you’re hard of understanding.
| 1 July 2008, 2:24 pm |
All this talk about opting in. Wouldn’t it lead to the death of civilization ie the cost of the provision of services such as rubbish collection will become extremely expensive and many people will chose not to pay and just dump their rubbish on my front garden. (Enfield where I live has a big problem with fly-tippers). No, as it says in ‘High School Musical’, ‘we’re all in this together…’.
| 1 July 2008, 2:24 pm |
No, Morgie, you’ve reduced a rape victim with 20 years of experience in victim support to a hysterical man hater. Even if this were true, guess what, she can run in whichever constituency she likes. Try to learn the meaning of free speech.
| 1 July 2008, 2:32 pm |
I am concerned about the use of any government database, my privacy and the security of the database. I was one of those who had my bank account details lost in the child benefits fiasco last year and this carelessness with our data still has not been addressed. I don’t want government employees to be able to access all information on me, including information that is largely irrelevant to their work. Consequently, I am opposed to the centralisation of our personal data by the government, although I accept the government has to record data on us or it would be impossible to govern. I am also worried about the way in which the relationship between citizen and state is being changed. No-one in the government is speaking about where the limit should be drawn on government intervention and I am worried about where this is all leading. Until there is some cast-iron guarantee that the state will not go beyond certain bounds and that the citizen’s rights are strengthened, I would oppose all databases, including the DNA database.
Specifically in relation to the DNA database, I would imagine it would be horrendously costly to record everyone’s DNA. It is not a perfect crime-fighting tool and could be easily circumvented (a criminal could plant DNA at a crime scene in order to put the police onto a false trail). The money could be better spent elsewhere on other methods of evidence gathering and detection that are as effective, less political and less costly.
I fully respect Jill Saward’s stand and she is certainly more courageous and offers a more thoughtful opposition to David Davis than the cowardly retreat from debate by the Labour party. If the majority of constituents agree with her, they should vote for her.
| 1 July 2008, 2:33 pm |
Anonymous Constructor of Strawmen, where have I said that she shouldn’t be allowed to stand?
And whilst you’re at it, what’s with the gypsie bollocks upthread?
| 1 July 2008, 2:35 pm |
SueR, the amount of collection would be much the same, so there’s no reason why it would be more expensive. In fact, the absence of a controlling bureaucracy and the introduction of competition into provisioning might reduce the price.
But fly tipping would certainly be a problem.
However, the Irish example suggests this isn’t civilisation-threatening:
Most local authorities provide waste collection services. However, private waste collectors are becoming more common. If you decide not to make use of organised waste collection, you can dispose of much of your own domestic waste by recycling, home composting and use of civic amenity centres. There’s also pay-as-you-go refuse bag tagging.
| 1 July 2008, 2:36 pm |
I must say that I look forward to NuLab’s impending defeat more and more with every passing day.
Because the Tories will be such “Champions of liberty” that they will restrict compulsory DNA profiles to anybody living in a council house maybe?
| 1 July 2008, 2:57 pm |
Would that not include David David’s mum, Graham?
| 1 July 2008, 3:05 pm |
Well, if so, it would include MY mum, Graham.
(NB: expressing delight at the removal of the incumbents does not equate to thinking unqualified joy at the advent of an administration made up of the present day Tory party, or, worse still, and as seems more likely, a Tory-Lib Dem coalition)
| 1 July 2008, 3:06 pm |
Venichka what are you on? A national DNA database would stop serial rapists after their first offence.
And what are you on?
If an inidividual only has one conviction for rape, then you’re hardly a serial rapist.
“Serial” means multiple.
People convicted of crimes, in particular crimes of violence, should have their DNA stored in a data base for future references, if needed.
The rest of us should be left alone in peace AND in privacy!
I’m tired of being pricked, probed, swabbed, scanned and frisked for doing absolutely nothing at all.
Canada’s airports recently installed new sets of security scanners that can see right through your cothing, and so for a distance of about 5 feet everyone now becomes a nudist and is forced to show their naughty bits, and this, even for economy class.
Where will it end?
Will boarding procedures soon require flight attendants to peer up the bared assholes of all passengers just to ensure that their hats are on straight?
Or will hats be banned altogether?
I’m a believer in profiling. I think that those groups most likely to engage in terrorist acts, be they for religious or nationalist reasons, should be targeted and their communities subjected to greater scrutiny.
What is the point of subjecting everyone to the same security procedures when everyone knows that most of the danger comes from one community in particular?
And it’s a community that, to boot, vehemently objects to showing its naughty bits.
It is a waste of resources, time and manpower, but most of all the massive numbers of people targeted means the effort is ineffective and fruitless.
| 1 July 2008, 3:10 pm |
Yeah, Morgie, because when you were painting Davis as St George fighting the NuLab worm and Saward as a crazy-womb, it was all a laugh. You’re as po faced as Shami Chakrabati. Are you snogging?
And it’s Fred Barras.
| 1 July 2008, 3:11 pm |
Saward does make the mistake of thinking that one can be free ‘from’ something:
[i]David Davis appears to be very concerned about “British liberty.” But what does it mean? I want men and women - including children - to be at liberty to walk the streets of our towns and cities without fear of violence in general - and sexual violence in particular; and to feel safe in their own homes and workplaces.[/i]
But can one be free from risk? Of course not, and it is disingenuous of Saward to try to do distort the context in which ‘freedom’ is being discussed here. Fear of the dark is ironically making us embrace even darker things. I’d like to be free from state interference and from being treated like a criminal, personally.
| 1 July 2008, 3:22 pm |
What a thoroughly depressing thread this is. One the one hand we have crazed reactionaries arguing that a national DNA database is a step to the gulag, on the other New Labour lickspittles arguing “if you don’t support this you support gang rapists getting away with their crimes, so there”.
However, there are grounds to worry about the likely cost (anyone care to give us an estimate?) and efficacy of such a system. On past form the prospect of this scheme turning into an absurdly expensive boondoggle which doesn’t have that much impact on conviction rates is not a worry I’d dismiss likely.
But I think DavidT does get to the heart of the matter with his comment ‘Unfortunately, if you want the State to do lots of “things”: such as paying benefits, organising education, providing health care, and so on, the State needs a lot of information, which it uses to ensure that those services are delivered appropriately’.
The thing is, if you want the state to ‘do things’ you have to ask if the state is best equipped to do the things you want. And, in this case, there is an equal obligation upon the state to ensure that a register of everyone’s DNA will not be misused, that proper safeguards will be in place to ensure that employers, insurers etc will not be able to get at this information, nor that criminals and fraudsters will be able to misuse this information.
On current form, I’m not convinced that I really trust the state enough to ensure this. Not with the current lot, nor the near-certain Tory government next time. I might be convinced that these fears are groundless, but most supporters of a DNA database seem unwilling to even address these and prefer hurling abuse in the fashion of Mike or ChrisC.
| 1 July 2008, 3:23 pm |
And it’s Fred Barras.
Who was a serial criminal and who was engaged in criminal activity at the time he was shot.
How do you equate that to gypsies in general, Anonymous Strawman Constructor (or should I say, Mike?)
| 1 July 2008, 3:29 pm |
If the gang-rape’s a reference to me, you’re wrong. It’s purely Morgie I’m ranting against.
| 1 July 2008, 3:35 pm |
Yes, Morgie, you were positively gleeful about the arbitary execution of someone who didn’t dwell in a proper house.
| 1 July 2008, 3:36 pm |
Well, Bill may indeed be being just a little bit silly, if the “crazed reactionary” is supposed to be a pejorative way of referring to me.
None the less, I AM right. And I have no doubt that the antecedants of those presenting the arguments for a Big Brother State here are precisely those who would have presented “progressive” arguments for eugenics and “social hygiene” (aka abort and contracept the working class to death, because after all they commit crimes and offer nothing positive to civilisation) in the 1920s. And we all know how that turned out
| 1 July 2008, 3:43 pm |
The government knows my: date of birth, car registration number, parents’ causes of death, address, income level and its sources, occupation, route to work today, blood group and marital status.
Precisely what incremental risk of abuse of my liberties would I be running if they knew my DNA profile too?
Oh and case for the prosecution: Crippen installed his girlfriend in his house the day after his wife disappeared and provided her with the wife’s jewellery. Portions of a dead body (including a scar from an operation the wife had had) were found buried in his cellar and considered by forensic experts to have been placed there during his brief period as tenant. I think that outweighs some dodgy DNA result 95 years after the event with all the risks of contamination in the meantime.
| 1 July 2008, 4:01 pm |
Have the supporters of a universal DNA database given much thought to how such a database might be compiled. I think there are only three ways.
Big bang compulsion. Set up hundreds of registration centres and people are ordered to turn up at the centre for swabbing. Risks large scale passive resistance, which in practical terms the authorities could do little about. Would probably appeal to the pro-DNA headbangers here, but would be rejected by anyone with two braincells to rub together.
The long game. Start registering babies as they born. Will cause some dissension and an increase in the popularity of home birthing but significantly less impact that ‘Big bang’. Means that it will close on 100 years to get everyone on the database.
Parasitic vitality. Make access to various public services and privileges dependent on being swabbed. Efficient administration would be dependent on the National Identity Register being up and running for some time, containing a ’swabbed’ status, and being integrated without state databases. PDS, DVLA, IPS. Allows the goverment to claim that it is ‘voluntary’ but could hoover up the 80% with driving licences and passports over 10 - 15 years. There still scope for major civil disobedience, just lkike the forced registration of ID Cards, so in no way an easy route.
The ‘long game’ would probably have the least impact and cause the fewest political problems but not very appealing for a government that wants some bullshit votes for being ‘tough’ on law and order. And it’ll only be their great grandchildren that ‘benefit’.
No wonder a universal database is still not official Labour policy.
| 1 July 2008, 4:01 pm |
Yes, Morgie, you were positively gleeful about the arbitary execution of someone who didn’t dwell in a proper house.
Barras could have been the Queen of England for all his residental occupancy mattered - what did matter was that he was a serial criminal engaged in criminal activity and had no right to be in Martin’s house.
Anonymous Coward’s attitude sums up ZaNuLabour in a nutshell - more concerned with the rights of criminals than with the rights of victims of crime. And that’s one more reason why Broon et al will be kicked out on their arses soon.
| 1 July 2008, 4:20 pm |
“But I think DavidT does get to the heart of the matter with his comment ‘Unfortunately, if you want the State to do lots of “things”: such as paying benefits, organising education, providing health care, and so on, the State needs a lot of information, which it uses to ensure that those services are delivered appropriately’. ”
What, sperm samples before you pick up your benefits? Blood tests if you want to see youR GP? I don’t think you can seriously argue that the only way to deliver these services effectively is via DNA database.
| 1 July 2008, 4:29 pm |
http://timesonline.typepad.com/comment/2008/07/10-people-they.html
On Crippen and other innocent/guilty disputes
| 1 July 2008, 4:34 pm |
Anonymous Coward’s attitude sums up ZaNuLabour in a nutshell -
Ooo, touched a nerve, have I? Not even close.
more concerned with the rights of criminals than with the rights of victims of crime.
That doesn’t even make sense in view of everything you’ve said.
| 1 July 2008, 4:36 pm |
I’m not really sure what the big fuss over a DNA database is about. Possibly, like a savage encountering a camera and a photograph for the first time, Davis Davis thinks that if the state has a record of your DNA pattern, it has stolen your soul.
As is usual with David T, he willfully caricatures his opponents. The protection of civil liberties is about constant vigilance. Gradually, democracy and civil liberties have been eroded in the UK. The DNA database is just one element in that. David T no doubt could make a good case in support of every infringement that there has been. But its the bigger picture of the erosion of democracy and the change in the relationship between the individual and the state that is key here.
One Labour Party figure recently said that no individual in the UK has right to privacy; a worrying statement - indeed authoritarians’ typically barely recognise privacy. However, privacy is fundamental of liberty - without it we are simply licensed by the state like animals.
David T gives us the usual big government paternalistic blackmail; if you want to state to do nice things, like pay benefits, have the NHS, then dutifully accept your barcode. I agree this is leftist authoritarian viewpoint, the standard one - David T is your bog standard left authoritarian in that sense.
But libertarians of all ilks, including left leaning ones, reject such blackmail, which is simply a milder version of Communist China’s. And there are countries with welfare systems every bit as good as the UK’s - probably better - which have better protections of civil liberties.
| 1 July 2008, 4:37 pm |
That doesn’t even make sense in view of everything you’ve said.
It makes perfect sense, AC.
You’re just too dumb to see it.
| 1 July 2008, 4:43 pm |
Peter Risdon: Have you hard of the economonies of large scale production? It’s cheaper per unit to provide lots of a thing than to have individual small amounts.
| 1 July 2008, 4:50 pm |
Would that not include David David’s mum, Graham?
Oh yer old mum is safe enough from the cops on a council estate or anywhere else but I bet that nice Mr Cameron discovers fairly quickly after Davy’s stunt is all played out that DNA testing (like the sus laws) is fine in certain areas….
| 1 July 2008, 4:53 pm |
I’m tired of being pricked, probed, swabbed, scanned and frisked for doing absolutely nothing at all.
I can’t help it - when JP comes out with a statement like that I can only visualise Charles Hawtrey.
| 1 July 2008, 4:56 pm |
What, as if f’ing Labour - who, inter alia, racked with envy and petty-minded self-righteousness, as usual, the party who destroyed that part of the education system that actually benefited the working class, and enabled social mobility - ie grammar schools - , and who created the soulless hells of countless new towns and sprawling council estates, are the allies of people who live on council estates, as if they could be trusted with DNA legislation that would doubtlessly be enforced in exactly the same way and against the same victims of their crazed statist schemes.
The left-wing are allies of no minority or oppressed group. In fact they are their greatest enemies
| 1 July 2008, 4:59 pm |
Implicit in David T’s argument about welfare and the NHS is the reversal of the individual’s relationship with state. In democratic liberal societies, the power is with the people, which they lend to the state under strict supervision.
Under Davis T’s system, as he outlines, the state has the central role, handing out goodies under condition that you accept all these invasive measures, and be happily grateful. Hence the state strictly supervises - licenses, with the threat of sanction - the individual. Hard fought for reforms, that use taxpayers money, and were once progressive - some sort of benefits system, the NHS - are now used increasingly as a form of control. This is just the beginning.
Let’s look at China. They have different words for this authoritarianism, of course, and it’s a notch or two up in intensity, but it’s essentially the same bullshit. Goodies are handed out to the people (who are required to be deeply grateful) under the condition that they meekly accept the biggest and most invasive surveillance system ever known to man - or soon will be - being built with the heavy involvement of the US companies, incidentally.
| 1 July 2008, 4:59 pm |
Where are these countries that have welfare systems ever bit as good as the UK’s, but respect individual privacy? Not Sweden, where NOT inviting the whole class to your birthday party is looked upon as discrimination against the uninvited.
| 1 July 2008, 5:24 pm |
One Labour Party figure recently said that no individual in the UK has right to privacy; a worrying statement - indeed authoritarians’ typically barely recognise privacy
Actually I think it was the ineffable Andy Burnham, a couple of years ago; he actually said that a individual has no right to anonymity. Though I’d argue that it’s a nice distinction, as anonymity puts the individual in charge of his privacy rather than ceding it to the discretion of the state.
| 1 July 2008, 5:40 pm |
What, as if f’ing Labour - who, inter alia, racked with envy and petty-minded self-righteousness, as usual, the party who destroyed that part of the education system that actually benefited the working class, and enabled social mobility etc
I didn’t need a grammar school to achieve social mobility and didn’t you just argue (and I quote:)
NB: expressing delight at the removal of the incumbents does not equate to thinking unqualified joy at the advent of an administration made up of the present day Tory party, or, worse still, and as seems more likely, a Tory-Lib Dem coalition
So why does it mean my joy at Labour remaining in power must be “unqualified”? The only way you can think the left are enemies of minorities and oppressed groups is by believing (contra to all evidence) that there was once a world where such people were not quietly garroted when they got in the way of their betters.
As for your equating the present government with the Webbs and their flirting with eugenics - that is about the whackiest thing I have heard all year.
| 1 July 2008, 5:54 pm |
Well if your unemployed or claiming any form of benefits the state has got your bank details.
I have no doubt that the state has The nut case David Davis’ bank details on fiule so that they can pay him his wage, and the expenses he clams. - Yup I can ee it know DD not taking any pay or expenses in order to protect his liberty - What an arsehole.
GW
| 1 July 2008, 6:59 pm |
I think my concern is the habit all these measures have of creeping away from their original limited use, as it is presented to the public and MPs, and finishing up a long way from its original stated intention. Do we really need the highest concentration of public surveillance by CCTV cameras in Europe, and apparently without any restriction of licensing of their use?
Or the anti terrorist legislation, everytime a new restrictive measure is introduced we get a load of guff about how it will only apply in a few cases, only on the Minister’s authorisation etc, and a few years down the line the law is being used by local government functionaries to check on people putting out their rubbish on the wrong day.
Once passed these measures seem to be abandoned and not properly controlled. The usual suspects spout about needing to make law to prevent the worst kind of criminal cases, but law made to apply to millions when it is based on a handful of incidents and an infinitessimally small population sample, is frankly bad law.
And then there is the absolutely reckless and careless way government tosses about our personal data. It has already been mentioned that the DVLA provides personal information about car ownership to any dodgy clamping firm who pays for it. Why?
Nor does it end there. The government pays no attention to the Data Protection Act, indeed in some areas seems to think it does not apply to government. While anyone who has read the reports on the lost IR files sent to the NAO will know that when it tripped up ministers took to the air blaming junior employees, quite unfairly and untruthfully. Nor are the police much better, look at how they screwed up over Soham. That wasn’t just down to not having Ian Huntley’s dna, it was due to a complete misinterpretation of the DPAct.
If I could be convinced the police and government were capable of handling my data responsibility and not sending it all over the place in the post, in a reckless manner and allowing all sorts of junior staff in local government access to what they hold on file about me, I would be more reassured.
Do all the supporters of giving unrestricted access to the government to hold and circulate their personal data as it thinks fit, want to hand over their NHS records on the same basis?
| 1 July 2008, 7:13 pm |
Much as I respect her view, on this occasion, Jill Saward is wrong.
http://armchairnews.co.uk/2008/07/01/crime-victim-is-wrong-on-liberty/
| 1 July 2008, 8:08 pm |
The reason that the national DNA database is scary is because once you’ve given your DNA you can’t take it back. Therefore you have no protection against what any future government will want to do with it. This is compounded by the fact that DNA is a science in its infancy and we don’t know what DNA will be capable of revealing about an individual in the future.
Unlike any other information the government holds about you (fingerprints, bank accounts, salary, marital status, car registration number) DNA is a predictor of future events. Today for example DNA can predict the likelihood of developing certain types of cancer. Treating cancer is expensive and early intervention a) greatly increases the sufferers chance of survival and b) generally reduces the cost of treatment. Therefore in a world of taxpayer funded healthcare there is a social benefit in identifying potential cancer victims, monitoring them and potentially providing intervention treatments that prevent or delay the onset of the cancer. Is this kind of thing an appropriate use of a national DNA database?
If we can identify potential cancer victims why is it wrong for say insurance companies to use that information to properly assess their risks and adjust premiums accordingly?
We also cannot prevent future governments from using DNA to segment the population that aren’t likely today. How do you protect a future anti-semetic government (hopefully an unlikely prospect) using a DNA database to identify every Jew in the country?
I do understand the attractions of a national DNA database and there is a lot of force in those arguments. I also accept there is a lot of merit in David T’s point that the government needs a certain level of information about the individual to provide services.
I just haven’t seen any explanation of why the fears of future misuse are unfounded from those who champion such a database.
Why isn’t a national DNA database a statement of trust in ALL future governments?
| 1 July 2008, 9:04 pm |
[i]How do you protect a future anti-semetic government (hopefully an unlikely prospect) using a DNA database to identify every Jew in the country?[/i]
I assume you meant “prevent”. I wouldn’t want to protect such a government.
If so you’re quite right. And come to think of it we can’t prevent a future homophobic government using our medical records to identify gay people preparatory to their execution. So presumably you’d also like the NHS’s records to be deleted in order to protect our liberties.
Of course we could either (1) assume the British people have a strong enough track record of commitment to liberal democrat
I don’t knowd why people are against a national DNA database. Taking a sample is an uninvasive procedure, it’s just a sample of your cheek cells. No cutting, no scraping. You are so right in saying that society needs information to function. I get fed up with those people who go on about individual liberty and privacy all the time. Unfortunately, they don’t live in supreme isolation. Incidentally, I see there is a programme on telly this week, arguing that Crippen was innocent. (don’t know on what grounds). Perhaps if science had been sufficiently advanced in his day, there would be no doubt about his guilt!