The new DNA-seizure laws breach the Bill of Rights

From (National's own MP) the Attorney General.
http://www.parliament.nz/NR/rdonlyres/91F063ED-13A2-432C-AAAE-BBC981DE3D76/99920/DBHOH_PAP_17701_6464.pdf

The only other comparable scheme in the world is in the UK and the EU's Human Right's Commission has just ruled that as being in breach of basic human rights.

Odds of National ramming it through anyway?

Human rights are nonsense on stilts.
- Jeremy Bentham

But the BORA is (one of the bits of legislation we have) the closest to constitutional law in this country (let alone his comment that it breaches the base levels of legal principle) and the law is paramount I thought?

At times it's a difficult circle to square. However, all laws are artificial, and there's no reason a new law can't replace an old one.

Rights to hold slaves etc. were once regarded as 'fundamental'. Habeas corpus is only 800 years old.

Nonsense UPON stilts.

And oh how wrong good ol' Jazza was

And paedos used to make love with little boys freely and joyfully, and boy oh boy what good old days those were. God knows why humanity ever moved on from those conditions???

LOL at your rather tragic little concession 'at times it's a difficult circle to square'. This is your best attempt to justify arbitrary exercise of power? Which is what this law is by the way. Draconian legislation which not only conflicts with fundamental legal principles but the very legislation that Parliament enacted to prevent such arbitrariness, the BORA. In fact here is an advisory body created by the Government which is telling it that what it's proposing to do is kinda wrong, but hey, why should the Government care? It's just one of those things.

high, they have show little regard for the democratic process thus far, so why change now

bob_d

Ooooh the Herald editorial has hit on a point I was making to someone the other night:
Supporters of wider sampling will doubtless make light of this.

They will argue that if innocent people's rights are occasionally infringed in the crackdown against crime, that is a reasonable price to pay. Precisely the same people would normally rail against other examples of what they consider unnecessary state intrusion.
This fucks me off so much. "Yay we got rid of that Nanny State Labour Govt - now quick, let's have the state take people's DNA without oversight!"

Im not sure nanny state is the right word for taking dna? Its a swab, not a tax or a law that says you cant do something?

Im not sure i agree with blanket collection (though they do this at birth anyway) but to associate it with nanny state isnt accurate.

I use nanny state as excessive interference/involvement in the private lives of citizens beyond what is necessary. I can certainly see the link here

But this law is only for people accused of crime, not people who consider themselves middle class, hard working. Right wing govts are seldom called nanny states and this is right up their alley.

shall we in the interests of maintaining a difference between what people once moaned about to that which they now moan about call it the Daddy State

Many of the people I see in the media accused and convicted of crimes are middle class, possibly consider themselves to be hard working etc... ie crime is comitted by people from every socio economic group, not just the poor

BD: you think (generally) that criminals voted for national? No it was the above group (and others).

By my understanding if the person is acquitted the sample is destroyed after a time? So its not really any different than finger printing.

Again i dont think this is a symptom of an interventionist state. It is a symptom of "tough on crime not on civil rights" shift.

Not really a fan of the the right is just like the left arguments which seem to be coming from the left of late.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nanny_state



Anyway point is made/taken.

I can't quite work out how much of those post is cutting sarcasm vs serious statement so I'll leave it there

Well the Attorney General and concepts of natural justice disagree.

dude!

plenty of hard-working, middle-class people get arrested for drink-driving, for example.

each and every one of them will be required to give DNA upon arrest = half the population

that's because EBA carries 3 months imprisonment in statute

BG I wouldn't even bother with him

JH: Do they get finger printed?

I don't really have a problem with it as long as it is destroyed if they aren't convicted. What is the difference between inking your fingers versus a swap of your mouth? We have digitised photos for our drivers licences, bio-metric data on new passports.

We leave our DNA all over the place and its not particularly easy to misuse the collected dna (at the moment at least). There are already dna samples taken of everyone at birth (for screening purposes) which is kept.

What is the main concern about it use? (versus collection?).

As does breaching the RMA.
Disorderly behaviour (i.e. protesting or not being nice to a policeman) is one that will get misused methinks...

but ordinary "disorderly behaviour" is a fine-only offence, so it will not trigger the new powers (as I understand them - hard to know when the legislation is secret and being pushed through under "urgency"

um... isn't the David Dougherty case an example of exactly that

I don't trust our law enforcers with DNA samples..

JH:
Disorderly behaviour
Every person is liable to imprisonment for a term not exceeding 3 months or a fine not exceeding $2,000 who, in or within view of any public place, behaves, or incites or encourages any person to behave, in a riotous, offensive, threatening, insulting, or disorderly manner that is likely in the circumstances to cause violence against persons or property to start or continue.

you have quoted the charge of "disorderly behaviour likely to cause violence" which is used in about 10% of all disorderly cases

in the other 90% the police use s 4 (have a read of s 4) which is fine-only


s3 (the one you quoted) is harder for police to prove and they use it only for the most serious cases

Not quite sure of what happened with the doherty case? the link i read says he was acquitted by dna evidence after 3 years of wrongful imprisonment.

Were his comments about the justice system about dna procedure in particular?

the difference is that one is merely an imprint, the other is actually a PART of you (that contains far more POWERFUL information about you than a mere print does).

which is why they want it, I suppose.

Right, cheers - so by section 4 you mean Offensive Behaviour?
However given that the Bill allows for no judicial oversight the temptation for the cops to lay the Disordely Behaviour one must be somewhat increased if only to get their hands on DNA evidence against a bunch of people.

s 4 is titled "Offensive Behaviour" but it CONTAINS the offence of "disorderly behaviour" as well as "offensive behaviour."

you raise a good point though about the temptation for police to misuse and "over-charge" with s 3 disorderly, even if they know they can't really prove it, in order to obtain DNA

good observation. yes, I can see this happening.

Those principles are no more "fundamental" than wheeled transport is a fundamental of human existence.

Fingerprints contain sweat though... so when they dust, the dust includes a "part of you"

What if they took the DNA, replicated it, then destroyed the original? Would that be OK?

The fact is that taking DNA samples in NO WAY restricts your freedoms. It will take no longer than giving your name/address, and will ensure better safety for ALL, including the givers

Can you give me ONE example of how giving DNA would be bad?

it's not for me as a citizen to try to imagine or anticipate all the possible reasons why state possession of my DNA might be "bad"

there's all sorts of potential ways in which my DNA could be mishandled, misused, or misapplied

it's not so much the 'taking' of my DNA that concerns me - it's a painless, quick procedure. it's the retention of my DNA and it's use by the State that invades my right to privacy. aside from rights, there is the risk, as JH said, of misuse, misapplication, contamination, etc.

why are we so prepared to give the police such an abundance of powers in crime investigation to the detriment of the citizen's fundamental rights? what happened to proportionality??? what sort of values does this society uphold these days?!

we're quickly losing a civil rights consciousness in this country (if there ever really was one)

here, people prefer it if government policy is written by talk-back radio

It is the taking that concerns me though - that base idea of protection from unreasonable search and seizure should stop that from happening so loosely.

Id love to know how it can be misused?

If anything it would reduce the incidence of people being wrongly charged.

Garethw - how is it different to finger prints or mug shots?

You guys paint yourself into a corner

If you're concerned that the evil state will misuse/misapply your data, then you shouldn't want them collecting ANY information on you.

Either you trust them or you don't.

Which I found out today is a whopping 300 odd years old :> Such a fundamental human right!

Abundance of powers? Police are heavily restricted. Just think of warrants, disclosure, all those little bitty procedural things. Think of the powers given to criminals - bail and parole.

And let's not forget the citizen's ONLY "fundamental" right - although it's not really. That is the right to existence, from which we draw the right to security. The security of citizens, plural, outweighs the rights of any citizen.

It really comes down to a collective, altruistic view or a selfish, individualistic view. I am willing to sacrifice my privacy for the greater good - why won't you? I've always felt that those people willing to give for their beliefs matter a lot mroe than those who want to take

oh how generous of you

we don't all share your cosy little view of the police state

even that I have some issues with, considering the procedure will at least require the taking of a buccal swab, if not a needle

300 years ago, the state did not have the ability to collect, store and analyse human DNA in a systematic fashion

so the importance of the right has arguably increased - you need to look at things in the correct context

some threats to personal rights and liberties did not even exist back then

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/7893890.stm

substitute crime for terrorism

yes

have faith in both science and the legal system

have little faith in my fellow humans to not fuck shit up, espcially those in positions of power

Why dont you tell me HOW it could be misused?

BD: youre excused from this one as i know you dont trust any form of authority/organisation.

My concern mirrors that of the Attorney General and the European Court of Human Rights.
- The huge amount of biological information held in DNA makes it very different to a simple fingerprint. As such, the taking of that material is a non-trivial seizure.
- Well-ensconsed concepts (in natural justice, the BORA, the "constitutional principle of the rule of law" ensure that search and seizure should only be done in specific instances with regard to the person involved, where a stong countervailing public interests exists, and with independent judicial authority.
- This bill provides for no specificity to the person involved, and has no independent judicial oversight at all. There is an argument that there is a countervailing public interest but this is ONE component that still requires the others.

Should the Bill be limited to require some form of judicial warrant and only used where the Police can prove the necessity for it/the reason for overriding basic rule of law concepts then I wouldn't mind.


The Police (rightfully so, IMO) are tasked with doing their utmost to stop crime and capture criminals. They are not asked to provide a balanced, nuanced take on overall concepts of justice in society - hence we need the judiciary to exercise the "leash" to hold back the Police from overstepping constitutional justice boundaries.

Garethw: do you have any specific idea as to how the dna can be misused? I'm struggling to think of anything. The gist of it is that someone who committed a crime some time ago, brought in on another (lessor)charge might get pinged for the previous crime that they wouldn't have likely been caught for... which seems like a good outcome to me? They would still have to be convicted in court using (i assume) other evidence that may not have been enough originally or that comes to light after subsequent investigation now that the police have a new suspect.

The concerns listed:

1)So if the DNA was required to only be used for matching against a database would that counter the first argument? ie the dna is digitised into a form that allows matching but not other information to be extracted (i assume that is possible) and perhaps even having the original sample destroyed?

2)If you are going to claim that dna samples are 'search' how is this any different or more obstrusive than the patting down, finger printing and photo taking of people arrested? Not to mention the internal search? They dont require judicial warrants for such things, it is part of the processing (they need reason of course).

3)Judicial oversight of what exactly? the process of taking a sample? or of maintaining the records? who has access to them? Surely it requires someone of medical training to process the sample so its not like your average cop can do something with it.

The police already have the right to request and demand dna samples in some cases so its not like they're going to amend this law in that way.

when you consider that we've only recently found out that one of the country's most notorious killers managed to breach his parole conditions and the system that was supposed to watch him didn't do so much as bat an eyelid......I think it highlights exactly what other people in this thread have said.

It's not so much the system that's the problem, it's the incompetent / unethical knobs managing it. I for one think the DNA seizure law in itself is a brilliant idea. And just because a system is open to corruption does not mean that it should not be used. As stated, the parole system was obviously abused, does that mean that we will no longer grant suspects bail / parole.....no, you stick with the system, but just get good people to manage it.

No that is a false dichotomy that you keep creating. Security in so far as it's a collective right goes up against a collective right to private and a collective right to be free from unreasonable search and seizure. The fact that you chose to categorize the latter as 'individualistic' and therefore selfish views is a reflection of your fundamental bias in this area.

Just because YOU don't care about your privacy does not mean that there isn't a MASS of us who do and guess what, in a democracy, BOTH groups get a say hence why a balance needs to be struck and proportionality applied.

I second JH's at this and only add that you'd have to be off your tree to suggest that there is no imbalance of power between the police and the individual citizen/suspect.

Though there are restrictions on police and regulation of their powers there is no question that police have a vast amount of discretion still and the trend in recent years has been to greatly enlarge rather than restrict police powers. Which is why human rights (which operate as a critical check and balance on police power) are becoming more and more important.

I dont have too much problem with that but i also dont see the need in dna profiling old grannies.

We could use the dna collected at birth which is on record currently - no invasion of the person issues there.

yes, and there's incompetent/unethical knobs everywhere

would you want them managing our DNA system?

Privacy is inherently self-centred!! Your lovely word "fundamental" actually applies here!

The Star Chamber used to issue certain types of warrants though that basically allowed them to search for libellous matter anywhere

I've been reading some case law in order to get ammunition R vs. Shaheen was the recent one on search and seizure wasn't it?

"not too much problem" does that mean you would agree with blanket collection? i.e. as not being in breach of any principle worthy of protection?

in other words, from your comment "no need to profile old grannies" I gather that your only objection to nationwide blanket collection would be "inefficiency?"

you keep mentioning DNA collected at birth - obviously that doesn't include immigrants - how can it be used? can anybody access it? can the police access it? what legal regime governs its storage and usage?

no it isn't - there is a general value in citizens being able to enjoy privacy - in fact it a basic human need

no sane society wants the Star Chamber back

a raft of laws have been introduced since then to hopefully stop that sort of thing ever happening again

btw you mean R v Shaheed

not so relevant now as the Shaheed principles have now been enacted in statute (see Evidence Act 2006) - s 30 in particular

And surely the privacy of citizens from crime is greater than the privacy of citizens from burglary?

You have to measure the TOTAL cost:benefit. Will we save more privacy by defeating crimes like burglary, home invasion, than we will take by obtaining DNA? It's not just take take take.

Say we could guarantee ZERO burglaries (or a 90% reduction) through 100% DNA collection. Surely the net privacy gain would be substantial?

A policeman pricking your finger or some filthy sicko rifling through your underwear?

no i disagree

I do not think a cost-benefit, pseudo-quantitative analysis is appropriate here

not when important values, rights, freedoms, principles etc are at stake

there are other concerns

as someone has already pointed out, we are all leaving our DNA everywhere all the time

that means, I could innocently leave DNA (say a hair) in a location that later becomes a crime-scene

if we had a nationwide data-base of DNA, I would instantly be matched and linked to that scene and become a crime suspect

GREAT!

The value is privacy.

We can probably measure privacy. Not quantitatively exactly, but close enough. We accept that obtaining DNA is an invasion of privacy; but how much worse is the invasion of privacy in a crime?

You always talk about balancing. Well, we're balancing x amount of privacy vs y amount of privacy.

no but it's balancing in the abstract, not in the concrete

otherwise you run into the danger of sacrificing or unnecessarily compromising an important right or safeguard for the sake of only one (always compelling) real-world problem eg home-invasion/burglary

At the moment there are no specific rules governing what is done with the dna databank. There was talk of enacting laws so or destroying it (which would be a shame from a scientific view point imo) to stop people accessing it.

Efficiency is a concern if the police were to go door knocking and doctors would be a haphazard way of collecting it, what about people who dont go to doctors? anyway its not the doctors job to collect dna for anything other than medical benefit to the patient.

While i have no problem with it being collected from everyone i dont see the need, better to collect it from people arrested, people who have already come to the attention of the police.

Re DNA everywhere - unless your DNA was found under the fingernails or elsewhere on a victim, it is unlikely they would want to look too closely and even then i suspect its likely there would need to be more evidence. In fact it is no different to the current situation, where a lot of DNA is found in most serious crime scenes. All DNA establishes is that you were likely in contact with what it was found on at some time. That is fairly clear already and i doubt a jury will convict even a hardened crim if there is *only* dna evidence that can be explained in a non criminal way (or admitting burglary rather than rape).

well, there are plenty of cases where DNA has been found to be relevant and was not found ON the victim - a rather famous one involving hairs on a blanket springs to mind

you are right that a lot of different DNA is found at most crime scenes already

the difference is that under the proposed DNA databank they could link more of it to specific individuals

right now they can't do that, but because they don't have the information

well this is where many people will differ

coming to the attention of police is not good enough for me - at the very least, I would expect the DNA powers to be subject to conviction of a Crimes Act offence

not just on arrest for ANY offence carrying a theoretical jail term - this includes the most minor drug offending, certain disorderly offences, trespass, drink-driving, wilful damage, minor assaults etc

Heh, do you actually want the police to be able to solve crimes?

Like i said, i have no particular need to see everyone accused of a crime sampled but i think there is a good reason to do it for people who meet a fairly broad requirement.

I would be relatively happy if people charged of any crime had the sample taken at the time of finger printing, it was compared to known cold case dna and then, if the person wasnt convicted, it was destroyed.

(I think this is what happens with finger prints?)

I dont tread on rights lightly and i believe i have a fairly healthy scepticism of the police (i have seen enough shit personally and heard a lot from old school ex cops). I still believe that widespread dna sampling is the right thing to do and this law will give enough benefit to society to make it worthwhile overriding some (in my mind) very minor individual indulgences.

It would be great to see lawyers put in so much work to work for the rights of society as they seem to do so for individuals. I am well aware of the link between individual and society but sometimes i think we are losing sense of the macro effects. Unfortunately as crime in society increases there will be more and more pressure to do *something* about it, better to pre-empt that with sane measures than *wont someone think of the children* measures - and the stupidity such that you sometimes get in the US.

Sorry if I cover points already made, dropping in and out of this.

bob - you asked what misuse I could foresee. I'll answer that in two ways:
1. Misuse doesn't matter. The default point of society, as evidenced in constitutional principles of the rule of law, is that we are individuals to be left to our own devices and not subject to search, seizure, imprisonment, intrusion etc etc by the state without substantial reason. The default position in the "misuse" argument is that the Government has the right to intrude in ways they see fit and it is the citizenry who must prove why they shouldn't.
The one way to argue DNA seizure within the "individual right to privacy and liberty" argument is that the public good is significant enough to outweigh the intrusion on basic liberty. I have sympathy for that view - but, again as evidenced in basic constitutional legal principles, that intrusion has to be for substantial and specific reasons and not left to law enforcement to dictate it - it requires the oversight and authority of an independent judiciary. This Bill does not provide for either a substantial/specific need or independent oversight, basic constitutional requirements when we believe we can override personal liberties.

2. Given that, misuse could take multiple forms over time.
The most obvious primary one is false arrest in order to get a DNA sample to do a blind fishing trip. This is clearly outside intent of the bill but something the Police would pretty obviously try on.
Broader long-term misuse could take the form of unauthorised DNA scans to determine some element of genetic/medical makeup of an individual.
How about ethnic profiling by private companies? Never happen? Ummmmm... And that's the ONLY country who runs a similar scheme, which in itself has been judged illegal.


I'm not some super liberterian who sees Big Brother in every CCTV camera, but having spent time in the UK recently where they have completely lost that assumed right to individual privacy and liberty through a creeping state that overrides those rights to liberty constantly and now has a huge National Identity Database and numerous examples of data matching, swapping and selling to private companies.

The starting position is the state doesn't interfere. When you work back from there I can't find that the police having carte-blanche to take DNA from an incredibly broad list of individual people without specific reason is a tenable position. Even with the few extra prosecutions it may engender.

P.S. Slightly off topic, well, off-angle, but a quick back of the napkin calculation someone did suggested that it would add at least $20million a year in cost to take, scan, analyse, databank or destroy the DNA.

I agree with everything garethw says above, and would add that the "creeping state" is a real concern. potentially, this phenomenon could amount to a significant intrusion on individual liberty

as it happens, just yesterday I received a "business" survey put out by Statistics NZ. I am told that completion of the survey is compulsory, and it must be submitted within 14 days of receipt.

being a lawyer, I of course checked the Statistics Act 1975 and found that, indeed, If I do not complete the survey I am liable upon summary conviction to a fine of $500.

i.e. not an infringement offence, but a charge laid in Court, upon which I would have to appear in court, and enter a plea etc

now the chances of this happening might be slim, but even the fear (note the word fear) of it happening means I will do it. part of me wants to do the survey anyway, as my duty as a citizen, similar to the census etc

but it concerns me somewhat that this sort of legislation could potentially be used to gather information in a heavy-handed way, backed up by the State machinery of prosecution

To add a bit of science to the equation

Although I am not certain exactly what happens to your DNA once it is taken, the current method of building a DNA profile involves examining the lengths of ~12 pieces of highly variable DNA. This is a reasonably cheap technique and provides limited information on the genome as a whole.
However, enormous progress is currently being made in "high throughput DNA sequencing", which allow one to sequence the DNA code of the entire genome (all the DNA), traditionally this was very expensive and took a long time (ie: the human genome project took years and billions).
Lately however sequencing has become much faster and way, way, cheaper to the point where people are talking about $1000 dollar genomes, sequenced in 2-3 days being a reality in the near future.
What could this mean? Well it's possible it might become more efficient to simply sequence whole genomes than to do traditional PCR profiling (as you get far more information) and this could be applied retrospectively to previously collected samples as long as the DNA is intact.
Would this bother anyone?

Glange, what is the practical advantage of "high throughput DNA sequencing?"

will it mean that in criminal trials, an expert can say with greater certainty/accuracy whether DNA found matches a particular individual?

at the moment this is expressed in the language of statistical chance eg "the DNA is 100,000 times more likely to have come from the accused than any other member of the population."

will we be at the point soon where experts can say "this DNA can ONLY have come from the accused, and nobody else?"

Law enforcement isn't passing this bill (if it passes)

It's Parliament. The legislature. Also known as the highest court in the land. They're far more independent than any APPOINTED judiciary, seeing as they are ELECTED.

How is it any more of an intrusion than paying taxes to subsidise social welfare?

The broad principle is the same: I lose some of what I have (whether it's money or privacy) to ensure the stability of society in general.

You cannot bring up these sorts of arguments unless you are a libertarian, as G-dub alluded to. But you're not, so you're inherently contradictory.

how absurd - what a laughable statement

the choice isn't between libertarianism and total state control/fascism

it's a question of where we set the boundaries between those two extremes

you're totally misunderstanding his point

currently, the law only allows police to take DNA for a serious specified offence, and only with approval of a Judge (i.e. safeguards, checks and balances)

the new government is going to take all that away

the public can therefore legitimately ask: what's changed?

In the judicial hierarchy, the parliament IS the highest body

So by passing the Act, the judiciary has given a "blanket warrant".

You seem to think Parliament isn't part of the judiciary or something? Lower courts cannot appeal the decisions of higher courts

You want judicial oversight: you are getting it through 120 people debating the law and subjecting it to select committee processes.

Parliament is not part of the judiciary

ever heard of the separation of powers?

do you have any idea of constitutional law at all?

yes/no/probably/probably not

We aren't America.

In NZ, the Parliament is both judicial and legislative.

but it's not the JUDICIARY

I mean, crikey, here you YOURSELF are pointing out the essential difference/distinction between the (unelected) judiciary and the (elected) parliament

OK. It's a "judicial body" then.
Now, we have judicial oversight through Parliamentary passing of laws.

no, because passing a law is different from interpreting or using a law later on

i.e. passing a law is not the same thing as independent judicial oversight of a law AFTER it has been passed!!


again, you made this point earlier on - self-contradict much?

The power of sequencing means you can compare an almost unlimited number of DNA areas, so yes it would certainly increase the certainty of the identification.

Current DNA profiling is really an elimination method, and can occasionally struggle to identify closely realted people but the enormous amount of data "whole genome sequencing" provides would allow you to id an individually by showing how their (unique) profile is a match.
Of course to do this they would end up sequencing most of your genes too so the potential misuse of the information would be greater than currently.

To be honest I don't know if this will ever happen but we need to remember that the power of DNA anaylsis is increasing all the time and since DNA is very stable, a DNA sample taken from us now could be used in the future for applications that currently don't exist.

a good read on state abuse of power and its futility

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/news/article.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10557655&pnum=0

I have a feeling a certain someone will be a dissenting voice

The author of the article seems quite happy that the Tamil Tigers are gone, if anything that's proof the the government's methods (which he also seems to think are corrupt) actually worked.

p.s - how does that article relate to collecting DNA from criminals / suspects?

it doesn't but is topical on general state abuses of power of which dna capture will be one further piece in the arsenal, no doubt to be used in s l

the author is commenting on the futility of winning this war against the tigers if it does not address the underlying motives for unrest that bode ill for future stability of the state of sri lanka

Jesus vadinho put the pipe down!

Parliament is not the highest court in the land, it is not a judicial body at all! It is one of 3 branches of government. The judiciary does not give any blanket warrant to Parliament - in fact its to the contrary the judiciary acts as an informal check and balance on Parliament through interpretation of laws.

Parliament is the supreme body but the entire point of human rights statutes is to act as a check and balance on Parliament's power, which is why in most countries they take the form of written constitutions or entrenched legislation. In NZ the BORA is not entrenched by there is a higher than usual majority required to repeal it - demonstrating the importance of this legislation.

It's the BORA that really destroys your argument that rights are something you wipe your ass with. Parliament is bound to act in accordance with the BORA - that's what the BORA says. So when it passes laws that interfere with rights and freedoms contained in the BORA they must do so only to the extent that is necessary in a free and democratic society. The question is therefore whether the DNA bill passes that test. Not only is it a legitimate question to ask but one that is necessitated by the legislation (as well as other fundamental legal principles but since you think that is something you wipe your ass with, i won't go into it).

And yet they don't, huh. The last Government routinely passed legislation even though there was an adverse BORA report from the Attorney General. This one doesn't look like it's going to be any better...

Why would a government burden itself with all the extra cost and time of administering a system such as this if it wasn't for the benefit of the community at large? Do you guys have some weirdo conspiracy theory that the government is just out to screw people for the hell of it?



you can only say someone is abusing their power if they are using a certain power for a use other than it is intended for.

So if we break down this DNA seizure law:

The Power = ability to seize DNA from certain suspects and criminals
Proper use of power = using that DNA to add certainty when allocating blame for various crimes.
Abuse of power = using that DNA for anything else.

You cannot say that the government has abused it's power, because it doesn't even have that power yet. If you don't want your DNA given to the police, don't commit crimes or associate with criminals - thereby reducing your chances of being a suspect. Pretty simple I would've thought.

and don't get in a vehicle after having a drink either

"behind the wheel" I should say

in fact, don't dare get arrested at all, even if you are not guilty

and don't act in self-defence either, in case you get charged

Yet again your blinkers make you see every security problem in legal rather than political terms

Parliament is not bound by anything.

You're at one of the world's finest political studies institutions. Open your mind.

it comes down to the rule of law and what you believe in

parliament IS bound by rules procedure principles and laws

it's only because you believe in fascism that you reject that

What you advocate is something that in an institution like this is not even entertained. I can't conceive of someone pulling out Bentham to argue that human rights don't exist. Law IS what it IS and human rights ARE law, the BORA and other instruments say so. What is left to argue??? Scholarship has moved well past civil and political rights and now looks at socio economic rights and their protection believe it or not. For you none of this is plausible because you are a facist and your mind has been shut from the get go.