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A J Cronin
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Having just read Kenneth Roy’s article on Girfec (SR, 11 January), and his exposure of the increasingly Big Brother society we live in, I now fear for my children’s future.
My children have been involved with various agencies, mainly through one child’s serious illness which had a huge effect on the others. Recently, however, two of my children were accused of behaving in a sexually aggressive manner by someone who had a grievance against me. Social work and police interviews followed and the end was that they found nothing to report. I assume, however, that this will remain on my children’s files.
It makes you want to disappear, and that is what will happen to many children and families who need help but will be totally put off asking for it. I was going to seek help through the educational psychologist for one of my children who has been quite traumatised by the police questioning, etc – now I think that would only add to their being disadvantaged in the future.
Have we simply gone mad? What place does love and compassion play in our Scottish society today? Not a lot, and I don’t like it.
This correspondent supplied her name, but for obvious reasons wishes to remain anonymous
In Thursday’s SR, we stated that the McNeilage video in the Sheridan trial had been made available to the media last week. We now understand that it was released to the media on 22 December, before the jury had returned its verdict.
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Loch Melfort at Kilmelford, Argyll
Photograph by
Islay McLeod
Leading article
Scotland is introducing
a compulsory ID scheme
at the school gate
Our police state (2): Kenneth Roy
Who are the others? Shouldn’t we be told? Do they include our friendly neighbourhood police or the social work department? It’s all
delightfully vague.
The two of us talked a bit more and it emerged that the form I was looking at on the Young Scot website had been superseded by the National Entitlement Card. Still all those discount deals in stores and stuff, but now called something else and no longer requiring Difficult B to divulge his nickname.
The NEC (no relation to the National Executive Committee fondly remembered by some of us from the halcyon days of British trade unionism) offers ‘the same great services’ but has been created by the Scottish government, Young Scot, ‘your’ local council ‘and lots of other organisations working together’. It is being promoted as ‘a national card supported by the Scottish parliament’. Only the far from well cool Scottish Review remains sceptical.
I had a look at the application form published by one of the local authority partners in this enterprise. It asks me if I would agree to ‘share’ – beware that word – ‘share’ my personal details with ‘departments and agencies of the council, other Scottish councils, Young Scot, the Scottish Executive and other agencies‘ [my italics]. Who are the others? Shouldn’t we be told? Do they include our friendly neighbourhood police or the social work department? It’s all delightfully vague.
Not for sharing – except for the purposes of a statistical survey, apparently – is a range of other personal information. They want to know if I have a disability. What is my ethnic group? (No idea: I come from Bonnybridge). Educational background? (Easy: none). My employment status? (Unemployable). Before Christmas, there was even a suggestion that I might like to share details of any offences I had committed – only for a survey, naturally. (Blemish-free, so far. How boring am I?). That request appears to have been dropped suddenly.
‘Thank you for your email. The lack of content was down to an error on the Content Management System, which has now been fixed, and the Privacy Notice is displaying fully. Thank you for drawing it to our attention.‘
If I don’t agree to share the basic information about myself, including my passport-sized photo, and instead perversely tick the opt-out box, life will be more difficult. I will get my card, but ‘future services will need to be applied for separately’. How inconvenient. So, why am I being discriminated against? No reason.
But I have protection. There is something called a ‘Privacy Policy’ which I can view on the portal. I have a smile on my face, I’m making the most of the site, and, hey, I manage to access the portal. This is what I read under ‘Privacy Statement’:
The National Privacy Statement section does not contain any general content at this time. Please check back soon.
So, I email the Young Scot charity and ask why.
‘I have passed on your email to the Digital Director, who will be in touch re. the privacy statement’ is the reply.
Later the same day, Martin Dewar responds:
Thank you for your email. The lack of content was down to an error on the Content Management System, which has now been fixed, and the Privacy Notice is displaying fully. Thank you for drawing it to our attention.
None of this is deeply impressive. But if I am someone aged between 11 and 26, who has successfully applied for the card and failed to tick the opt-out box, I have agreed to share my personal details – for what purpose and with whom I am not entirely sure – but at least I have discounted fares on the buses, so I suppose everything is all right, really.
But it’s not all right. It’s far from all right.
In the FAQs on the Young Scot website, there is the following exchange:
Is this the start of a national ID scheme for Scotland?
No. It’s completely voluntary.
This is no longer true. At Breadalbane Academy in Aberfeldy, and we believe at other schools in Perth and Kinross, pupils now need to carry a National Entitlement Card in order to gain access to their own education. Parents have been told that the system has been put in place ‘to maximise security in the school building’.
Will Young Scot now amend its website to make it clear that the scheme is not completely voluntary? Scotland seems to be introducing a national ID scheme by stealth – at the school gate.
Kenneth Roy is editor of the Scottish Review
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