State surveillance to cost billions

The cost of running Britain’s state-run databases over the next ten years has soared to £34 billion, according to estimates from a new campaign against what it called the surveillance society.

Supporters of the Convention on Modern Liberty claim that spending on computer systems ranging from the NHS Spine to the ID card register is rising at an alarming rate.

The convention is to hold its first meeting in London next month, which will coincide with the release of a Home Office consultation paper on the future of communications surveillance.

A Home Office working party has drawn up three options for surveillance of telephone calls, e-mails and text messages, including a huge government database. Opponents describe this as a Big Brother project that could cost £12 billion over the next ten years.

However, the police and security services argue that access to data about the time and duration of calls and texts, and the location of callers and senders, is essential. They emphasise that they are not seeking access to the content of calls and e-mails, but believe communications data must be retained in some format.

Lord Bingham of Cornhill, the former Lord Chief Justice and a supporter of the Convention on Modern Liberty, said that citizens should use the Human Rights Act to challenge the spread of the surveillance society.

“Perhaps the British are content to be the most spied-upon people in the democratic world,” he wrote in The Guardian. “But this would be surprising given their traditional belief that the state should mind its own business. The right to respect for private and family life embodied in the European Convention on Human Rights is not an ideal weapon to counter the growth of a surveillance society, but failing adequate regulatory oversight, it may be the best weapon there is.”

The Convention on Modern Liberty said: “How long can we continue to finance the huge rise in surveillance and data collection, which the House of Lords constitutional committee stated ‘risks undermining the traditions of privacy and freedom which are vital for a democracy’?”

This news breaks following comments by Dame Stella Rimington, the former head of MI5, who argues that the government are using the fear of terror to justify passing legislation that erodes the fundamental principles of privacy and freedom of speech.

Since the beginning of the year, the government have announced plans for a number of new national databases, including one aimed at collecting data on every child under the age of 18 in the UK which will be accessible by over 300,000 staff across government and the private sector.