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Police in Britain hold vastly more DNA samples than any other country
in the Western world, and many are from people who have never committed a crime.
More than three million samples have been added to the national DNA database
- more than 5 per cent of the population. With new figures showing just 1 per
cent of Americans have their genetic information on record, and an average of
0.3 per cent in other European Union countries, ministers were last night accused
of attempting to build a national DNA database by stealth.
The last Tory government established the database, the first in the world,
when Michael Howard was home secretary but the principle has been enthusiastically
pursued by Labour.
Three years ago, police were given the right to obtain and retain DNA samples
from anyone arrested, regardless of whether they are eventually convicted. The
genetic information remains on file for a person's life and is almost impossible
to remove.
The legislation received very little publicity at the time because it was announced
on the second day of the Iraq war. Since then, police have doubled the size
of the database to 3.1 million. The database is predicted to grow by at least
another million by 2008.
Norman Baker, the Liberal Democrat MP for Lewes, who obtained the figures,
said: "This is a constitutional outrage - the Government seems to be seeking
to create a national DNA database by stealth as a way of catching criminals.
If they want to do that, they should come clean and say that is the case.
"This, once again, demonstrates they are illiberal and take a very cavalier
approach to civil liberties."
The database is thought to include the majority of the criminal population
in Britain. But answers to Parliamentary questions show that nearly 125,000
people on the database have neither been charged nor cautioned for any offence.
Questions about discrimination were also raised yesterday after figures showed
that nearly a quarter of those neither charged or convicted were from an ethnic
minority.
Overall, 24 per cent of people on the database are non-white, even though the
black and Asian population of the UK as a whole is less than 8 per cent. Some
estimates have even suggested that that more than a one-third of young black
men have had samples taken.
It has already emerged that the DNA profiles of about 24,000 children and young
people aged 10 to 18 are stored on the database despite them never having been
cautioned, charged or convicted of an offence.
The Home Office argues that serious offences have been solved using the database,
and says names will only be taken off in "exceptional circumstances".
Philippa Jones, a Birmingham teacher accused of hitting a pupil with a ruler
but never prosecuted, fought a long legal battle to have her DNA sample removed.
GeneWatch UK, an independent genetic research group, last night called for
ministers to order the destruction of DNA samples of innocent people.
Helen Wallace, its deputy director, said: "Once this data is kept, it's
really only one or two steps from being made available to a wide range of people."
The biggest databases
Population/Total(%)/Proportion
United Kingdom 59.8m/3,130,429/5.23
Austria 8.1m/84,379/1.04
United States 298.4m/2,941,206/0.99
Switzerland 7.4m/69,019/0.94
Finland 5.2m/32,805/0.63
Estonia 1.5m/7,414/0.49
Germany 82.4m/366,249/0.44
Slovenia 2m/5,782/0.29
Hungary 10.2m/28,278/0.28
Canada 32.3m/75,138/0.23
Croatia 4.6m/10,744/0.23
France 59.3m/119,612/0.20
Norway 4.5m/6,745/0.15
Netherlands 16.1m/14,747/0.09
Belgium 10.4m/4,583/0.04
Sweden 9m/6,115/0.07
Denmark 5.5m/4,084/0.07
Spain 40.4m/2,656/0.01
Portugal 10.3m/0/0.00
Source: Home Office