Out-Law News 2 min. read

Only those convicted should be on DNA database, says panel


An inquiry panel established by a Government advisory body has recommended that many of the records on the UK's DNA database, the biggest in the world, be deleted. A ruling is still awaited from the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) on the issue.

More than 6% of the UK population is on the DNA database, the highest proportion in the world. In England and Wales anyone detained by police on suspicion of a wide variety of offences can have DNA material added to the database even if they are never charged or convicted of a crime.

Government advisors the Human Genetics Commission (HGC) established a panel of 30 people to investigate the database. The panel, called a 'citizens' inquiry', could call expert witnesses, take evidence and direct their own six week period of research.

It concluded that the database should not hold the DNA of people who have not been convicted of a crime, and that data on people who were convicted should be held for a length of time propotionate to their sentence.

The ECHR is yet to rule in a crucial case on the issue. A British man who was never charged with a crime is objecting to the police's retention of his DNA data.

Michael Marper has argued that his human rights are infringed by the retention of his DNA sample. The House of Lords ruled in 2004, though, that the parts of the Human Rights Act that apply to privacy were not relevant to the police's retention of the information.

The ECHR rules on questions relating to the European Convention on Human Rights, whose principles became UK law through the Human Rights Act. It heard Marper's case in February and a ruling is expected later this year.

The citizens' inquiry recommended that the DNA database be seperated from Government and the police and put on an independent statutory footing to avoid its being abused. It also said that anyone giving a sample should have the implications and reasons for that explained to them clearly, and that the ethnicity of those giving samples should not be recorded.

Black men are over-represented on the database, with 40% of black men said to have their DNA data on the database.

One of the judges in the Marper trial has recommended that the best way to redress this ethnic imbalance is to have everybody's details added to the database. Lord Justice Sedley told the BBC last year that putting everyone on the database would be fairer.

A majority of the citizens' inquiry panel members rejected the idea of putting every UK citizen's DNA details on the database on the grounds of "cost, utility, difficulty, and data security among other considerations", its report said.

The panel also recommended that the database in England and Wales should be run more like the Scottish one. In Scotland police can take samples of DNA but must delete those of people who are not convicted, except in the case of some sexual offences.

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