Damian Green writes on CiF about the downsides of DNA retention for the police.
Among those who contacted me were magistrates, former army officers, compliance officers for IT firms, solicitors and many other businesspeople. In other words the respectable backbone of any healthy society. The sort of people who never have any trouble with the police, and are instinctively willing to help police officers when needed. The ones who wrote to me are now extremely angry, and many of them make the point that they now regard the police with suspicion and fear. If this carries on, the police will find that their job is much more difficult than it ever has been, because they cannot rely on the co-operation of the respectable majority. That would be a disaster for policing in this country.
Quite so. The authoritarian desire to catalogue us all and keep the most personal of information on a database, to treat us all as suspects who have not yet committed a crime – or not yet been caught – is corrosive and self defeating, irrespective of the civil liberties aspects of the debate.
What is interesting is the nature of the the lines of debate. A Tory front bencher is writing for a left-wing rag and is, for the most part, receiving supportive comments.
There is always the idiot factor though; the twat who thinks we should all be tagged because it’s a jolly fine idea. Step forward Colbey.
If the police want to take my DNA sample I’ll walk down to the station myself and hand it over.
This inevitably elicited the obvious response when faced with such idiocy.
Off you trot then , why wait for the Police to ask you , if you have a wife and kids take them down The Police station as well
Indeed so. I am not aware of police stations being overwhelmed with conscientious citizens volunteering their DNA because the have nothing to hid, therefore nothing to fear. No, because, rampant hypocrites that they are, what they really mean is all you other proles can give your DNA.
Anyway, fuckwit Colbey responds…
facetiousness is all nice, however how about a reason for the police not to have my DNA
Er, if you want to give it to them, go ahead. However, as for my DNA they have no reason to have it because I have not committed a crime, have not been involved in a crime and, therefore, it is none of their damned business and I intend to keep it that way. I’d have thought it obvious, but not for totalitarian freaks like Colbey, it seems.
There’s a pleasant surprise. A lot of politicians say something sensible but there’s usually a big “but” and then they ruin it.
.-= My last blog ..Insurance =-.
The police no longer CARE whether decent law-abiding people support them or not. Many of them are uniformed thugs who enjoy bullying harmless people. The award of a New Year honour to the senior policewoman who was in charge of the bungled Stockwell Brazilian plumber-bagging operation says it all.
This reminds me of a conversation I had with someone saying how willing he would be to pay higher taxes. What’s stopping you, I asked, you can send the Inland Revenue a cheque any time you like, so go ahead. Oh no, he told me, this was completely different.
Well of course it’s different. You didn’t realise this? 😉