Compulsory 128 mile trip to your nearest Interview Centre

More details of the proposed operation of the governments much ridiculed National ID Database Scheme have emerged this week.

People will be forced to travel hundreds of miles, at their own expense, and in their own time, to attend one of the Government ID Interview Centres. That's after you have paid for the privilege of obtaining the compulsory ID card.

Once there, they will then be forced to submit, willingly or not, to a series of biometric tests, the results of which will be stored permanently, and made available to thousands of Government Departments and private corporations and individuals.

Stranraer residents face a 128 mile trip to Kilmarnock to their nearest ID Interview Centre, and people living in Cambridge will be forced to make a 62 mile round trip to Bury St Edmunds.

Shadow home secretary David Davis has also criticised the government's plan to make people travel to interview centres to provide a biometric for the national identity card.

Davis branded the proposals an "outrage", and repeated the Conservative pledge to abolish ID cards if they get into power.

"It is bad enough that we will be forced to pay for an ID card, but to have to pay to go to a government centre to be interviewed and fingerprinted is an outrage," he said.

"The costs will hit low income families and pensioners hardest. Conservatives will abolish this costly plastic poll tax."

A Home Office spokesperson said "This has always been the case and we have been open about it."

The spokesperson said the decision to take fingerprint biometrics (for all 10 fingerprints) and store them in the National Identity Register was outlined in the action plan published last year.

From 2010, all passport applicants, even if they are simply renewing their old one, will also have to apply for an identity card. Fingerprints and iris scans are also required for second generation passports, due out in 2009

Former police officer Christopher John Snow is a paedophile

Former Police Constable Christopher John Snow, of Nettleton Chase, Gawthorpe, was recently found to have 859 images of child porn on his Personal Computer, one featuring a girl as young as seven with her hands and feet bound while another young girl held a carving knife over her naked body.

There were 667 images at level one – the least serious level of images on the court’s scale – 94 at level two, three at level three, 28 at level four and 61 at level five – the worst category. Additionally, he also had seven movie clips.

The average age of the girls in the photographs was estimated at 12 but some were as young as three and the oldest was 14. The dates of the offences ranged from October 2004 to December 2004.

“At the time he was a serving police officer with West Yorkshire Police Force. He resigned on July 4 this year (2006) after these charges were brought,” said the prosecutor.

What sort of sentence would you have expected this former police officer to have received?

Actually, Christopher John Snow walked away from court with a suspended sentence, a slap on the wrist essentially, for what would appear to be some very serious criminal activity.

Victory for Ryan Stupples against the Food Police

This is Ryan Stupples, a young man who has recently won a victory over Food Fascists.

Recently, young Ryan was subjected to humiliating behaviour, at the hands of his school head teacher, Mr Malcolm Goddard, of Lunsford Primary School in Larkfield, Kent for the heinous crime of : Possession of a piece of chocolate cake and a packet of cheese biscuits. They were 'discovered' during what appears to have been a routine, and quite illegal, search of students lunch bags.

Ryan was ordered from the school dining hall, and subsequently banned from using the dining facilities.

Ryans father, Michael, complained to Kent County Council about the actions of the school, who took up the complaint with the schools governors.

Ryan has now been allowed back into the dining hall at his school

Mr Stupples said: "The headteacher is not allowed to remove any food from my son's lunchbox.

And the teachers are not allowed to look inside and see what he has brought to eat.

I'm glad that I have stood by my feelings on this.

Ryan has a perfectly acceptable lunch as far as I am concerned and nobody has the right to touch it or take things away — or make him eat all by himself away from his friends."

Well done, the Stupples.

Arrested for not speaking Urdu in a British School

This is Antony Edkins. He is the Headmaster at Harrop Fold High School in Worsley, Greater Manchester.

Recently, Mr Edkins had a school girl, one of his pupils, arrested.

Codie Stott, the Schoolgirl in question, was attending a GCSE Science class.

As part of the class activities, Ms Stott was placed into a smaller discussion group with a number of other pupils.

After a short time, Ms Stott had asked, very reasonably, that her teacher consider the possibility of altering the group arrangements.

Why?

Well, 4 out of the 5 other pupils she was supposed to be in the 'discussion' group with were unable to speak English. After a brief period, all 5 of the other pupils were holding the 'discussion' in what is believed to have been Urdu.

When Ms Stott pointed out to her teacher that she was unable to comprehend a single word of the 'discussion', the teacher "started shouting and screaming, saying 'It's racist, you're going to get done by the police.'"

Ms Stott was then held in isolation, in the school, for the remainder of the day.

Antony Edkins, pictured above, then decided that he would notify the police, and notified the community police officer who is based at the school.

Over a week later, Ms Stott was arrested.

She was taken to Swinton Police Station, where she was arrested, and the police took fingerprints, photographs and a DNA sample from the 14 year old school girl.

Codies mother, Nicola, says "Codie was taken to the police station and kept in custody for over six hours while they questioned her."

Ms Stott was released without charge.

Last night Robert Whelan, deputy director of the Civitas think-tank, said: "It's obviously common sense that pupils who don't speak English cause problems for other pupils and for teachers. A lot of these arrests don't result in prosecutions - they aim is to frighten us into self-censorship until we watch everything we say."

The school had the worst GCSE results in the entire Salford LEA last year with just 15 per cent of pupils achieving five good passes including English and maths, a third of the national average.

Gary McKinnon taken to hospital

Gary McKinnon, a UK national, was taken ill at his Appeal Hearing against his extradition to the US, on Wednesday, the 14th of February, 2007.

It is reported that Mr McKinnon has suffered from 'heart palpitations', as a result of the stress under which he has been placed.

Mr McKinnon is accused of hacking into 97 US computers, allegedly causing $700,000 of damage in the process, an alleged figure of some $7,216 per machine.


The defence for Mr McKinnon, QC Edmund Lawson, has argued that the extradition should be blocked, on the basis that the US authorities had offered him a shorter sentence in return for agreeing to extradition. This would constitute an "improper approach" to Mr McKinnon. Max Summers, who is representing the US authorities, told the court that the US was unable to deny this, and would need an adjournment to consider it.

No factual evidence of the extent of any alleged damage which has been done to computer systems has ever been published.

Britons wondering how a man who has never set foot in the US can be extradited to stand trial there should look into the outrageous Extradition Act of 2003, which gives power to the US to demand the extradition of Britons without any evidence being presented against them.

Mr McKinnon has been remanded on bail until 10th May.

East Lancashire Police use patrol vehicles as taxi on night out

Two Police Officers from Eastern Division Police Force in Lancashire have been disciplined after an official patrol car was used as a taxi by police officers on a night out.

The incident happened after a leaving party for two road traffic sergeants, Sgt Stuart Isherwood and Sgt Keith Jackson, held at the BAE Systems Canberra Club, Samlesbury.

It was reported that at around 10:45pm, on Friday, the 2nd of February 2007, a group of police officers who were attending the event tried in vain to get a taxi to take them to a house in Blackburn.

After finding no taxis were available, a fellow Police Officer was called and an unmarked police vehicle, driven by a uniformed policeman picked them up at around 11:30pm, and took the Police Officers to a house in Blackburn.

Only two officers have been disciplined, the Police Officer who made the call, and the Police Officer who authorised the call out, the others involved have not been disciplined.

One retired senior East Lancashire police officer said: "This sort of thing used to go on 20-25 years ago and senior officers would have turned a blind eye. But times have changed and the police are far more accountable."

Steve Edwards, chair of the Lancashire branch of the Police Federation said: “If any disciplinary issues involve our members we will support them.”, surprisingly enough.

The party had earlier provoked a row, after it was revealed all the traffic police in Blackburn, Hyndburn and the Ribble Valley were off duty on the Friday night to attend.

Police Officer Daniel Turner found guilty of assault

This is PC Daniel Turner, currently of Hampshire Constabulary.

He was recently found guilty by District Judge Alec Ormerod of assault by using excessive force.

PC Daniel Turner had kicked Mr Sam Paskins in the leg when arresting Mr Paskins on February 12th, 2006.

PC Daniel Turner, despite being guilty of assault on a member of the public while on duty, was handed a 12 month conditional discharge.

PC Daniel Turner, despite being guilty of assaulting a member of the public while on duty, is currently merely suspended from duty while Hampshire Constabulary is considering whether or not to take “internal disciplinary action”.

PC Daniel Turner had denied the charge.

No compensation was awarded to Mr Paskins.

I appears then that if you do not wish to be assaulted by Police Officers and then denied compensation, you should stay away from Hampshire.

Report on criminal activity by police censored by police

The Metropolitan Police Authority recently released a report onto its website. The report showed that "inappropriate relationships or criminal associations" among police officers and police staff were "significant threats" to the Metropolitan Police.

The report also highlights as a cause for concern the ever increasing number of police officers and staff who are taking illegal drugs. Cocaine and cannabis are named as "the drugs of choice" for police officers and staff, although I'm sure the public will be happy to know that drug testing has been introduced for the most junior police officers, leaving senior officers and staff still able to enjoy using their illegal drugs.

There were also further concerns raised in the report about the disproportionate number of police officers who were accused of domestic violence and sexual assault while off-duty.

The illegal misuse of the information contained in the Police National Database by police and staff was also highlighted, as was the illegal use of warrant cards and other security passes, both by retired and serving officers, and as was the growing number of complaints of discrimination lodged against the police.

I would expect that by now, you would be very interested in seeing a copy of this report for yourself. So, where can you find a copy of this report?

Well, last week it was available on the website of the Metropolitan Police Authority.

Briefly.

The findings of the Strategic Intelligence Assessment, carried out by the Met’s directorate of professional standards, were intended to remain secret.

A slip up on the part of the Metropolitan Police Authority meant that the report was available for a short time on their website.

The report, by Detective Chief Superintendent Gregory Faulkner, was to have been discussed in private, and the findings never released to the public.

Asked why this was the case, Assistant Commissioner John Yates said: “I do not want to explain why in a public forum.”