U-turn on Policing and Crime Bill
originally published:
21st October 2009
The government’s announcement that it has ditch proposals in the Policing and Crime Bill to keep the DNA profile of innocent people on the criminal database for between 6 and 12 years has been given a cautious welcome by human rights groups.
This move means that plans contained in the Bill to give the Home Office Minister the power to determine how long innocent DNA is kept on the criminal database without consulting parliament have been dropped.
Observers say that this latest development has sounded a death knell to the unpopular plans put forward by the Home Office in response to the European ruling to continue to retain innocent DNA on the criminal database, which comes fast on the heels The Jill Dando Institute for Crime publicly distancing themselves from Home Office proposals.
The Institute stated that their research should not have been used to decide the 6 to 12 year time limits as the work was unfinished.
Civil liberties groups point out that this about turn has comes amid concerns by the government that the entire Police and Crime Bill would have been voted down in the House of Lords if they had pressed through with these contentious proposals.
