In the week that The Liverpool Daily Post reported that Merseyside Police have placed the details of a seven year old on the National DNA Database, we learn that more than a million of those registered on the national DNA database were still children when their details were added.

The Telegraph has this story:

“Official figures show that, since the DNA database was created, 1.07 million profiles of children have been added. This is nearly a quarter of the 4.4million profiles on the database. Anyone who comes into contact with the police, as an offender or a witness, can have a DNA sample taken for the database.

“Ministers and the police say the database is a vital tool in solving crimes, and has helped detectives crack major cases including murder and rape.

“A breakdown of the figures shows that the profiles of more 100,000 children had their DNA taken when they were under 13, and the profiles of more than half a million children were added to the database when they were aged between 13 and 15.

“In the past three years, 48,500 children under-13 and 204,666 children aged between 13 and 15 were added. The figures are far higher than previously thought as Government figures only estimate the number of children currently on the database. Official figures show that the profiles of 344,339 children have been included.”

Helen Wallace, from campaign group GeneWatch UK said, “The massive expansion of the DNA database treats hundred of thousands of young people as suspects for life. Their DNA could be used to track them or their relatives or to reveal private genetic information.”

Liberal Democrat Shadow Home Secretary Chris Huhne said that the Government are “making the world’s biggest DNA database by stealth.”

You can help our campaign to protect innocent people’s DNA by encouraging friends and family to sign our petition at http://ourcampaign.org.uk/dna

The Daily Mail finally cottons on to the government’s plans to take DNA from people for non-recordable offences, like littering, speeding and driving the wrong way up a one-way street.

Here at Home Office Watch, we spotted this months ago (OK, so we forgot to mention DNA, focusing instead on the fingerprinting powers, but no-one’s perfect).

Fact is, whenever you noticed it, these are dramatic proposals. A DNA sample is already added to the database every minute; add in the minor motoring offenders, litter louts and fare evaders and we could have half the population on there.

Today we uncovered the worrying fact that over 100 children have been put on the DNA database before they even reached their tenth birthday.

DNA is stored until you hit 100 (whether or not you die) so those files will be stored for at least 90 years.

The rest of the data shows that, as of January, we had nearly 4.1m people’s DNA stored, so Britain retains its place at the top of the international league, with the largest database in the world.

I’m also fascinated to note that there are 46 DNA samples from people over the age of 90. Is a nonagenarian crime wave sweeping the country?

Today we learn the Forensic Science Service forgot to upload about 26,000 DNA samples onto the national database between 1994 and 2005.

I expect they dropped them down the back of the sofa, along with those 27,000 case files on offences committed by British citizens abroad. (Is this the Home Office version of “sofa government”…?)

This mistake left nearly 200 crimes undetected. Nice one.

Only this government could have a DNA database that tracks the innocent and leaves off the guilty.

Interestingly, the Home Office announced this gem themselves. A new outburst of frankness? Well, given ministers have apparently known since January, no. Just clearing the decks of bad news in time for the new guy is my guess.