WRITTEN ON March 24th, 2009 BY William Heath AND STORED IN Data nitwittery, Foundation of Trust, Transformational Government, What do we want?
Amid all the coverage of theHis piece today – OK, I admit I was dreading it – is a good read. Just because people have been convicted of one crime does not mean they should be prejudged as guilty of others. In that sense they are as “innocent” of everything else as anyone else. I can certainly see the world that way. And his criticism
Perhaps in future they should try discussing these things with people who don’t agree with them.
is one I’ve made many times myself. Eek. We’re guilty of our own groupthink! Of course we didnt. Although, to be fair we did TRY to talk to government IT insiders about this, and getting just the one interview too so long that it nearly bust our deadline. (I didnt attend because former boss confirmed to me that HMG’s CIO has a bee in his bonnet about me. Public servants are prone to human failings).
Aaronovitch is smart and passionate, and well into this subject. I liked his earlier analysis of the dubious 300 CCTV cameras a day statistic. But I would make a couple of observations about this comment piece of his. He accuses us of not specifying what sort of DNA database Britain should have. Fair enough, but that wasnt our brief. I won’t accuse him of failure to write The Times’ horoscope. In his thinking beforehand he assumed DNA databases could be of four sorts: universal, the present muddle, only of the convicted, or none at all. This overlooks the important possibility of “convicted plus opt-in”. This matters because that sort would be legal if (a) keeping the DNA of those who were convicted were judged proportionate and necessary in a democratic society, and (b) if the consent of the others was informed and freely given. Quite a lot of people seem to be happy to be on the DNA database. Yes, I would find it creepy but it could be the “nudge” option. It would of course still treat those with convictions differently from those without convictions, which seems to be the point irritating him.
Aaronovitch’s final point:
it is a fantastic irony, and a testament to the stupidity of the way this debate has been conducted, that the DNA database the Rowntree authors and their cohorts seem to have ended up supporting, by default, is the most discriminatory of all
is hyped up. He’s bigging up the shortcomings in something we weren’t engaged to do. It’s not the brief of this report to recommend every aspect of exactly how child protection, education, health and law enforcement databases should work. It’s job, which it seems to have done pretty well, is to map out the database state, do a triage and make overall recommendations.
To say exactly how every aspect (not just the DNA database) should be done is a fascinating, important and monumental task. And on that we can agree that it is best done with the effective engagement of a wide range of parties and disciplines. A disussion, indeed, as both he and I have called for, between people who dont necessarily initially agree with each other. Perhaps we’ll both be engaged on the job and can discuss all this face to face.
7 Responses to “Innocence and David Aaronovitch”
And another thing….
“Quite a lot of people seem to be happy to be on the DNA database”
Do they really?. I’m aware that many people say that but I’ve never met anyone who has voluntarily submitted their DNA to the database (political stuntmen like Blair notwithstanding). I would suggest that “convicted plus opt in” would only yield a proportion of those who offered their DNA in a local sweep to catch a rapist or somesuch thing and couldn’t be bothered to get it destroyed.
No, no, no and no.
William, Mr Heath, Sir, your report has established that the overwhelming probability is that the DNA database, among others, breaks the law. That is not an acceptable state of affairs. It must be corrected.
Some people seem to find David Aaronovitch terrifically irritating. He gets under their skin. They start to suffer from prickly heat. They come out in a rash.
Rub in a dock leaf and you will find that he ignores the main point of your report in his article. Is he interested in seeing the law upheld? Apparently not.
He is the one who has questions to answer, not you.
Mr Aaronovitch detects “fantastic irony” in the compilation of your report, which is, according to him, a “testament to … stupidity”, in his article. Your report was “treated as though it had emerged from a body of dispassionate academics engaged in open enquiry” and you failed to take account of people who disagree with you.
Appeals to irony are contra-indicated by the time you’ve got to O-level English.
Accusing people of stupidity, ditto.
The report was not treated as a dispassionate judgement, that is a fabrication, it was and is treated as a case of regnition – yes, that’s it, that’s exactly what I/we have been trying to say.
It was not treated in the way he suggests but it nevertheless is the output of dispassionate academic judgement and Mr Aaronovitch gives no reason to doubt that.
The authors of the report – and everyone else in this campaigning business – deal every day, day in and day out, year in and year out, with disputation, counter-examples, contradictory arguments, disagreement, …, it is impossible to write on the subject of the database state after that experience without at every word bearing in mind the “opposition”, and to pretend that you haven’t is … naïve.
Disputation never gets anywhere unless people put in the effort to define their terms and itemise the issues. That is one thing the report achieves. You cannot be disqualified from doing that because you actually know the facts and have an opinion on them. Does Mr Aaronovitch follow his own principles and only write about matters of which he is ignorant and uninterested?
There are questions to answer about the DNA database, for example. Should it exist at all? If so, why? What is the rationale? Jolly important questions.
While we’re waiting to debate those questions, it remains the case that the DNA database seems to be illegal. And that is anathema. The government can’t break the law. And that, with fantastic irony, the main point of the report, is something which Mr Aaronovitch has precisely nothing to say about.
He doesn’t want to impugn the “nobility of the cause” and he doesn’t want to impugn your “intellectual integrity”, he just thinks you’re stupid, that’s all.
I really wouldn’t let him nettle you, William.
Last week, David Aaronovitch wrote about all the improvements wrought by the government, not least in healthcare, ‘Politicians mess everything up’ – wrong:
But what about (and here, as a scribbler, you take a deep breath because you know what’s coming) the things that went right? The new schools. The defeat of bullying. The new hospitals. The waiting list reductions …
Minutes later, it seemed, with what Mr Aaronovitch would presumably recognise as “fantastic irony”, we read Gordon Brown apologises for ‘inexcusable’ failings at Stafford Hospital:
The Prime Minister and the Health Secretary apologised today for the “inexcusable” failings at a hospital trust where at least 400 patients may have died as a result of poor care.
400 or more people died in a hospital that had turned into a medieval hell-hole in one of the richest countries in the world in the 21st century. Maybe there’s something wrong with my “intellectual integrity” but I would have thought Mr Aaronovitch might return to the subject. But no, he’s too busy accusing other people of stupidity.
According to David Aaronovitch:
There is a certain economy to the way in which non-governmental reports seem to be commissioned these days. Yesterday the Joseph Rowntree Reform Foundation published a report – Database State – variously described as coming from a “panel of experts” and as being “the first comprehensive review of Britain’s major databases”. One of its authors, Ross Anderson, told reporters that the nation’s “database state has become a financial, ethical and administrative disaster”.
The economy I referred to comes from this having been Professor Anderson’s view before he was ever commissioned to survey the issue, let alone report on it.
When Mr Aaronovitch accuses all non-governmental organisations of “economy”, it appears that what he means is a lack of objectivity.
What about governmental organisations? Do they suffer from economy?
Presumably not, according to him.
But oddly, just to take an example at random, when the House of Commons Science and Technology Committee examined IPS’s plans for the NIS, they declared themselves to be concerned, surprised, regretful, sceptical and incredulous at the confusion, inconsistency and lack of clarity of those plans. So perhaps IPS – a governmental organisation – suffers from economy, too, it’s not just the stupid authors of the JRRT report.
Here’s another example. The government – a governmental organisation – want to fine employers for employing people who do not have the right to work in the UK. They want to fine us, despite the fact that they, the government, say they have no way to tell who people are, even in prisons. If they don’t know who people are, how are employers supposed to know? That’s irrelevant, apparently, the employers will be fined anyway. IPS did promise to provide a way to check the legal right of people to work in the UK. They were going to have it ready by June 2007, nearly two years ago. But they forgot. They still supply no such service.
IPS are very, very economical.
And that’s quite enough Aaronovitch.
Don’t be conned by the nudgers, William. The “nudge” option (or ‘touchy-feely fascism’ as it is sometimes called) would be the one that encourages as much share-and-enjoy compliance as possible while maintaining the illusion of choice. E.g. when they take a blood sample from you at birth, your parents may apply to opt-out for you, otherwise you are on the database.
Aaronovitch’s technique is one he uses often: an inverted slipery-slope fallacy. Next: “Bungy-jumping. If you wanted a proper thrill, then you’d do it without the rope.”
David Aaronovitch has become a parody of himself.
WIBBI he had no wider audience than the unlucky fellow who finds himself parked next to him in the pub or on the tube.
That’s not very constructive I know, but Aaronovitch doesn’t make me feel constructive.