ConDems backtrack on DNA commitment

The Telegraph points out that today’s announcement of a government ‘change’ in its previously stated commitment to end the “indefinite storage of innocent people’s DNA” marks the fourteenth policy u-turn since the ConDems took office.

The Protection of Freedoms Bill, which Nick Clegg introduced in January, will no longer contain a provision for wiping out the DNA of more than one million people who have been arrested but not convicted. Instead, the authorities will be able to retain “anonymised” samples.

However, and as the newspaper states, this means that the names and other identifying features will be removed from the police database but kept elsewhere, enabling agencies with the right expertise to join the pieces of data together again and identify the DNA. So much for Court of Human Rights judgements, it seems.

It will be revealing to see just how many Lib Dems in particular offer up mealy-mouthed rationalisations for this abandonment of a very clear manifesto commitment.

Update: Quote of the week (so far) from Isabella Sankey, policy director at Liberty, who stated, “The minister’s assurance that criminal offences under the Data Protection Act are sufficient safeguard against DNA being re-identified is like saying that phone-hacking offences protected people’s privacy from the News of the World.”