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Counter-Terrorism Bill

moved Amendment No. 17: 17: Clause 10, page 7, line 22, leave out subsection (4) The noble Baroness said: I shall speak also to Amendment No. 20. Clauses 10 and 12 deal with the power to take fingerprints and samples. I have great difficulties with Clause 10(4) and Clause 12(5), which deal with the retention of those samples, particularly their retention for purposes other than that for which they were originally taken. This is an area that these Benches have always challenged and I make no apologies for doing so yet again. Two principles are in play in English law at the moment. Fingerprints are not retained after the event in the case of people who are not accused of any offence, but DNA samples are. Many people, as we have heard, have been critical of the fact that, irrespective of whether they have been released without charge or acquitted in a court, a group of people have had samples taken that are retained in a database. The rest of us who have never been arrested, charged or put before a court are not subject to that requirement—we do not have to give samples. The database, therefore, is made up of a skewed sample. It is illogical to have a database of those who have been found guilty of a crime and those who have expressly not been found guilty of a crime but who have their samples retained. The issue is compounded when we are dealing with control orders, which we will move on to. Control orders are exceptional as a class of punishment. They are a punishment without findings of guilt—effectively, punishment on suspicion. They are a way of ensuring that people are not a danger as a pre-emptive measure, rather than post-charge and post-finding of guilt. Therefore, to retain fingerprints and samples from such a person, against whom no charges have been made or put and against whom no case has been proven, seems to be, at the very least, dubious. To do so after these samples have fulfilled the purposes for which they were taken is dubious in the extreme. We need to take great care to examine whether this measure is proportionate and appropriate and to examine the value that it will have. I beg to move.