The BBC are reporting that "Motorists who get stopped by the police could have their fingerprints taken at the roadside" and "pedestrians could also be asked to give prints if they are suspected to have committed an offence".
Considering that anyone can be suspected of anything, this opens the gates for totally random fingerprinting in the street. We already have random checks and detentions for the flimsiest of reasons. Consider the 34 year old woman labeled a terrorist for walking along a cycle path, the stopping and searching of an 11 year old girl near an RAF base, "the detention of a 21 year old student for taking pictures of the M3 motorway for a web-design company", the ejection of an 82 year old man at the 2005 Labour Party conference, and the detention of an 80-year-old man carrying an anti-Blair placard, for example. If you refuse, the precedents set by the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000, Terrorism Act 2000, and Prevention of Terrorism Act 2005 would ensure it unlikely you'd get off scott-free but instead become more of a suspect.
Still, I'm not going to do anything about it other than keep a record here, as is my wont. In another 50 years when I'm eating my Soylent Green in my 29th-floor bugged apartment, I can pull out ruffled print-outs of my blog, and think back to a time when at least my bowel movements weren't RFID tagged and scanned for prohibited substances.
This is being trialled as of today in Bedfordshire where I live (in fear). It really scares me. The justification on from the police on Today on radio 4 this morning? "If you've done nothing wrong, you've nothing to fear". The refrain of dicatorships throughout history.
Possibly the scariest bit is that any fingerprints taken are recorded on the police's fingerprint database with your details and you cannot have them deleted if you are cleared of anything. Great.
So a law abiding member of society, with "nothing to fear", is scared of the police force created specifically to protect said society and the members thereof. I hope, if I do get pulled, that I will have the guts to refuse to have my fingerprints taken.
I have a horrible feeling that the only thing that is going to stop this creeping destruction of civil liberties is massive civil disobedience, and it might be too creeping for that.
Posted by: Niall at November 22, 2006 03:45 PMSo how much is it going to cost to roll this out to the rest of the country?
Isn't prevention better than cure? How about passing a law stating, 'If you're caught providing false details with regards to yourself, expect a minimum of a £1000 fine or 7 days in prison.'.
It's a worrying state of affairs in the UK. Our present government has the mentality of believing that if they can track everything, they can control everything. Scarey stuff.
Posted by: Garth at November 22, 2006 08:02 PMThe technology involves looks reasonably simple to me, and using standard GPRS for the connectivity.. it's probably not prohibitively expensive to roll out.
If you're caught providing false details with regards to yourself, expect a minimum of a £1000 fine or 7 days in prison.
I like the sentiment, but the problem is that the poor (usually the people trying to scam the police) will get off scott free because the courts don't want to enforce large fines properly. And there aren't enough prison places for all of the offenders. Therefore, I guess the theory is that it's best to imprison everyone with technology than physically ;-)
Posted by: Peter Cooper at November 22, 2006 08:19 PMReturn to the homepage.
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