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New Government proposals for the National DNA Database

7 May 2009

The HGC will discuss new Government proposals for retaining DNA profiles on the National DNA Database when it meets in London on May 12.  Its conclusions – to be published shortly – will be fed into the Home Office consultation on the database. 

The new proposals, announced on 7 May, follow last December's European Court of Human Rights judgement in favour of two UK citizens, ‘S’ and Marper, who sought the destruction of their DNA records.  Their records, like those of about half a million other UK citizens, had been retained by police even though they were never convicted of a crime.

Last year the HGC published the findings of a Citizens' Inquiry into the NDNAD, which was followed by an open public consultation.  Since the consultation closed last November, the HGC has been reviewing the evidence and drawing together its conclusions.  Both the Citizens’ Inquiry and consultation responses demonstrated the complexity of the issues involved – balancing the privacy rights of un-convicted individuals against the need to solve and prevent crime.  The HGC has repeatedly called for genuine and open public debate about these issues, and an examination of the evidence on which retention policies are based. 

The Government’s new proposals aim to meet the European Court's criticism of the UK's 'blanket and indiscriminate’ DNA retention policy by setting time limits for the retention of new DNA records from people suspected, but not convicted, of committing an offence.  These would be: 

  • 12 years for those arrested but not convicted of certain violent and sexual offences
  • 6 years for those arrested but not convicted of more minor recordable offences
  • up to the age of 18 for children over 10, unless they are convicted of more than one minor offence

The DNA records of people convicted would continue to be retained indefinitely.  Whilst there would be an effort to include more convicted people whose profiles are not currently on the database, innocent people who give samples voluntarily to exclude them for an investigation would no longer be retained, and all biological samples from which profiles have been obtained would also be destroyed.

The proposals stop short of the destruction of all records from people not convicted of an offence, which was a majority recommendation of last year’s HGC Citizens’ Inquiry on the National DNA Database.  This is likely to be seen by critics as keeping legally innocent people currently on the database (estimated at around half a million by the home office) on a kind of ‘genetic probation’.  However, the Home Office has already indicated that it thinks that the move will lead to fewer offenders being caught through Database searches.

The Home Office’s proposals are published as the Parliament in Scotland – where DNA profiles from un-convicted people are usually retained for only three years – is considering confirming this approach in new legislation as part of the Criminal Justice and Licensing (Scotland) Bill.  The HGC has recently contributed advice to the Committee scrutinising the Bill. 


Links:

Information about the HGC's consultation and ongoing work in relation to the NDNAD can be found at: http://www.hgc.gov.uk/Client/Content.asp?ContentId=809

The HGC’s submission on the new Scottish DNA legislation can be found at: http://www.hgc.gov.uk/Client/document.asp?DocId=198&CAtegoryId=4

More information about the HGC’s Citizen's Inquiry can be found at: http://www.hgc.gov.uk/Client/Content.asp?ContentId=755

The Home Office Consultation can be found at: http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/documents/cons-2009-dna-database/

The European Court of Human Rights judgement in S and Marper v. The United Kingdom can be found at: http://www.bailii.org/eu/cases/ECHR/2008/1581.html

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