MPs attack plan for police access to ID database
Independent [UK]
02/21/07
The Government’s plan to bring in identity cards has run into further problems after it emerged that the police would be able to use the national database to check fingerprints found at crime scenes. Tony Blair was accused of contradicting previous assurances that the police would not be able to go on ‘fishing expeditions’ when the scheme takes effect. He said ID cards would help to solve crimes, in an attempt to reassure 28,000 people who signed a petition against the cards on the Downing Street website. In an email to the signatories, the Prime Minister argued that the scheme would help the police bring people guilty of serious crimes to justice. ‘They will be able, for example, to compare the fingerprints found at the scene of some 900,000 unsolved crimes against the information held on the register,’ he said. Opposition parties claimed Mr Blair was ‘changing his tune’ and that they never realised the police would be able to use the database in such a way...
http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/politics/article2290049.ece
Informant: Thomas L. Knapp
02/21/07
The Government’s plan to bring in identity cards has run into further problems after it emerged that the police would be able to use the national database to check fingerprints found at crime scenes. Tony Blair was accused of contradicting previous assurances that the police would not be able to go on ‘fishing expeditions’ when the scheme takes effect. He said ID cards would help to solve crimes, in an attempt to reassure 28,000 people who signed a petition against the cards on the Downing Street website. In an email to the signatories, the Prime Minister argued that the scheme would help the police bring people guilty of serious crimes to justice. ‘They will be able, for example, to compare the fingerprints found at the scene of some 900,000 unsolved crimes against the information held on the register,’ he said. Opposition parties claimed Mr Blair was ‘changing his tune’ and that they never realised the police would be able to use the database in such a way...
http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/politics/article2290049.ece
Informant: Thomas L. Knapp
rudkla - 21. Feb, 14:50
