British liberty Pt. IV

The march of "big brother" continues relentlessly here in Britain. Seems like there's a new scheme every week. Last week there was talk of a mandatory nationwide DNA database. Here's the latest: police will be able to fingerprint people on the spot in order to determine identity. The Beeb article is here. First quote:

"Screening on the street means they [police] can check an identity and verify it." Currently an officer has to arrest a person and take them to a custody suite to fingerprint them.

Heaven forbid the police would actually have to show cause to arrest someone before the fingerprints and mugshots stage. But you see, in Britain, all of these schemes are presented as innocent tradeoffs: CCTV cameras are only there to protect you from crime, for example. And in every case I've seen, the British are willing to make the tradeoff. Yes, they're always willing to trade privacy and freedom for some short-term benefit, and they always trust the government and police not to abuse the new powers they award themselves month after month. In this case, the tradeoff is sold as "convenience" along with a veiled "so we don't have to make your life miserable" threat:

Inspector Steve Rawlings, based in Luton, said it takes two sets of fingerprints and the fingerprints are not retained. "The encounter can be 15 minutes on the roadside rather than three hours in the police station," he said.

I've been ticketed at the roadside and required to show proof of insurance, etc., at the police station. It took about 10 minutes, rather than 3 hours. Note that the police and politicians promise that the fingerprints won't be retained, but how will they build their database in the first place? In order to be useful, they need to have my fingerprints on file -- which they currently don't. I don't intend to provide them unless I'm forced to. This last quote contains the spot-on prediction that I'm sure describes the future of this scheme:

Mark Wallace, who represents the civil liberties group, the Freedom Association told BBC Radio Five Live that he had "concerns" about the scheme. "I don't think we should be reassured by the fact that at the moment it's voluntary and at the moment they won't be recorded," he said. "Both of those things are actually only happening in the trial because the laws haven't been passed to do this on a national basis compulsorily and with recording."

The trial is being conducted in Hertfordshire, where I work. In modern-day Britain's surveillance state, we can be fairly certain that before long it won't be voluntary (what real use would it be if it remained voluntary?), that the fingerprints will be retained, and that the whole thing will probably be justified as protecting us from terrorists.

Add it to the list: pervasive CCTV surveillance, automatic number-plate recognition used to track all car journeys, 'Oyster' cards tracking journeys on public transport, DNA databases, arbitary police stop-and-search powers, anti-social behaviour orders, mandatory ID cards, biometric RFID passports, legally-enforced political correctness, and on and on. What fun.

More on these subjects here, here, and here.