Protection of Freedoms Bill — Clause 3 — Retention of DNA and Fingerprint Information — 10 Oct 2011 at 20:15

The majority of MPs voted to give ministers the power to prescribe additional circumstances in which fingerprints and DNA may be retained, but only for up to three years, in addition to those circumstances set out in the Bill which covered those arrested but not charged or convicted.

MPs were considering the Protection of Freedoms Bill^[1]. The amendment rejected in this vote was:

• Amendment 89, page 3, line 43, leave out from ‘offence’ to end of line 44.

The amendment would have affected Clause 3 of the Bill and would have had the effect of removing the line:

• any prescribed circumstances apply.

from the proposed new clause 63F to the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 which the Bill was to introduce. The amendment relates to the destruction of fingerprints and DNA profiles.

Under the Bill proposed prescribed circumstances required the approval of the Commissioner for the Retention and Use of Biometric Material before an order defining them could be made.

There is no word "offence" on page 3 line 43 of either of the HTML versions of the Bill published prior to the vote^[2][3]; making the amendment appear nonsensical, however the PDF version of the Bill as at the time of the vote^[4] has different page numbering to which the amendment appears to relate.

• [1] Parliament's webpage on the Protection of Freedoms Bill (now an Act)
• [2] Protection of Freedoms Bill as published on 18 May 2011 and as at the time of the vote
• [3] Protections of Freedoms Bill as introduced 11 February 2011
• [4] PDF version of the Protection of Freedoms Bill as published on 18 May 2011 and as at the time of the vote

Debate in Parliament | Source |