Labour Child Nazi Snoopers Database

The Labour government won't be satisfied till it has everybody under permanent and complete surveillance, from cradle to grave. In addition to ID cards and the National Identity Register it also plans to keep tabs on all children up to the age of 19.

The popular press have at last cottoned on to what Labour has been up to with regard to our privacy and liberties. The Mail Online carries a useful article on ContactPoint and the Common Assessment Framework, which underpins it.

You can see what kind of information is to be collected by checking out the website of Northamptonshire County Council.

The following gives you an idea:

How the child or young person feels about themselves
Is he/she developing a sense of self as a separate and
valued person? Is he/she confident and self-assured?
Does he/she feel a sense of belonging; express
feelings about ethnicity, gender or sexual orientation?

Aspirations
Does the child or person know what he/she wants to do
in the future? How motivated are they? Are there
obstacles? Is he/she making plans to achieve this (as
expected for their age?)

Guidance, boundaries and stimulation
Is the child or young person helped to control his or her
own emotions and behaviour? Does he/she have
suitable guidance and discipline? Is he/she helped to
learn and participate in positive activities?

Housing, employment and financial considerations
If not already mentioned, what are the family living
arrangements? Does the accommodation have
everything needed for safe and healthy living? Who in
the family is employed? Have there been disruptions to
employment? Is there enough money to support the
family? Do work arrangements leave the family time to
be together?

Children and young people shouldn't be asked questions like these. Neither should they be brought up to accept this intrusive questioning as normal.

All this information will be made available to thousands of 'professionals' and cross-referenced with other government databases, so you can see why the government are so keen to gather details of household income, etc.

And, as is par for the course with this government and their cowboy contractors, data will continue to be lost or stolen on a regular basis.

At the moment inclusion on the database is voluntary, so parents can refuse to have their childrens' details collected, but if Labour get in at the next election it will soon become compulsory. Another creepy bit of Labour nastiness, however, is that once a child is 12 they can decide to have information recorded without parents' permission - or even knowledge. Talk about setting up a snooper state.

The Conservatives have repeatedly said they would scrap ContactPoint and the ID card scheme. We can only hope they can be trusted and hold them to account should they win the next election.

ContactPoint is to go live in January 2009. Resist it.