WHAT DID I TELL YOU?

You will perhaps have gathered that I actively loathe airports and air travel - the whole sordid process treats you as if you're some bullock on the way to slaughter. Still it does have its compensations of sorts when ... eventually and after all the hassle ... you arrive at your destination. So I'm now enjoying a spot of R&R in glorious sunshine sipping my rum punch and catching up on news from home via the Web.

So, what a surprise! As I suggested in my post yesterday, yet more data security breaches have come to light, this time courtesy of the Department of Health. It is almost as if these revelations are running through each and every government department in turn - first HMRC/DWP, then Transport and now Health. So who will be next?

A few thoughts come to mind, all essentially reflected in the BBC's reporting of this. First, as Norman Lamb says (and I've been saying consistently ever since I started this blog): "The whole culture of data management in the public sector has to change." The comment from Joyce Robins of Patient Care indicates just how serious the current situation actually is: "I think it's the tip of the iceberg, actually, because there's such carelessness within the NHS and it's always impossible to hold anyone to account and find out who's actually done anything." Bear in mind that this position prevails across the whole of government, not just in the NHS. It therefore follows that, to give effect to this essential cultural change, major primary legislation will be required to recast the whole sorry mess for the benefit of both the individual citizen and the public good. Andrew Lansley's comments are equally pertinent: "You have to wonder why on earth it took the Revenue and Customs to lose their discs and for government to institute an inquiry across government for these losses of data to come to light. It does feel like there's a sense in government, all parts of government, that we're required to provide data and we are constantly told that it will be protected, but in reality that level of protection simply isn't there." You can't argue with this - although the Government will no doubt try.

Next, it is to state the obvious but now there really does have to be a moratorium on the development of ContactPoint, the NHS NPfIT and ID cards - if not outright scrapping of all three - until such time as all the flaws in the Government's data security systems have been ironed out. To repeat, this has to start with primary legislation. The various "reviews" initiated by the Great Bottler simply do not cut it. And whatever recommendations they come up with for improving matters will, in fact, be worthless. There is nothing to be gained in overlaying new, more rigorous procedures on a regime that is manifestly broken at its core.

Finally, there is the issue of the timing of the announcement ... just as we're all winding down from the daily grind and getting into proper festive mood. Burying bad news? More than likely! Because what's the betting that the Government knew enough detail about these breaches to have been able to reveal them to Parliament before it rose of 18th December?

As I've said before, this is going to get worse for the Government before it gets better. There will be more data security breach revelations in the coming weeks. And, bluntly, the issue is just not going to go away until they hold up their hands, admit the error of their ways and legislate to resolve it. Even then there's no certainty that whatever our technologically illiterate politicos come up with on that front will in fact make our data any safer.

Tiddly-pom ... back to the rum punch(es)!!!

EXCUSES, EXCUSES

Two stories from The Register have caught my eye, this and this.

So, on the one hand, we've got to stop our kids from pigging out on their video games fest so that they can get out there and play footie. On the other, according to Goggle-Eyed Balls, we've got to do it so that they can bury their heads in more books. Umm!?!

Usual stuff, really - dimwits trying to establish a direct causal relationship where none exists (and, in respect of the latter, just so much spin). The sad reality is that our blokes aren't very good at footie because they aren't managed very well - lest you doubt it consider the 'reasons' that Terry Venables or Alex Ferguson attribute to their respective teams' failings in the article (they're new slants on that perennial favourite of "Why the trains don't run on time"). Quite apart from that, nine times out of ten, the other lot are much better than us!

And the reason our kids are getting worse at reading is that the Government's/Bliar's much-trumpeted attempts to concentrate on "educashun, educashun, educashun" have had the perverse effect of making matters infinitely worse - to wit slipping from 3rd to 15th in the league table of reading skills.

BACK IN THE SPIN CYCLE?

Now here's a thought.

In these parlous times for New Labour, is it worth wondering how different things could have been? In the bad old days of Bliar, the man himself would have chosen (essentially) to sit back and ride out the storm - spinning the "well ... umm ... I'm a pretty straight sorta guy" line for as much as he was worth. And, to be fair, this tactic proved uncannily reliable in making sure that not too much (if any at all) effluent or excrement stuck to him. Like it or not, he was superb at that particular part of the politicians' stock-in-trade.

But he - or his underlings - would also have seen an opportunity in the current frenzy (and, on occasions, undoubtedly took advantage of it), namely to 'bury' any bad news stories that might be lurking in the Westminster/Whitehall undergrowth.

Now, the Great Bottler wouldn't try that on, would he? After all, he maintains the Bliar approach has been binned now that he's in the hot seat. We..ell ... the week-end approaches when the Westminster tribe seems to assume some sort of collective narcolepsy and this whole scrutiny thingie goes down the pan. I can't speak for anyone else but I'm going to make sure I'm keeping a pretty close eye on Departmental press releases for the next few days (perhaps even weeks or months if, as looks likely, the donation scandal continues to foment amongst the media).

ContactPoint "DELAYED"

So reports Kablenet. And a good thing too. Yippee!!!

But it is only a delay. And, needless to say, Goggle-Eyed Balls and his crew are trying to spin that the HMRC debacle is only a very minor consideration in this decision - as pointed out by John Oates here.

A few thoughts come to mind. The Written Statement insists that "ContactPoint will be a simple basic online tool" and seek to allay any anxiety by insisting that "No case information will be held on ContactPoint". As ever these dimwits singularly fail to understand that it is possible to infer a huge amount about any given individual from even the slimmest/most basic biographical data. For example, on their own admission, it will include "an indication as to whether a service or practitioner holds an assessment under the Common Assessment Framework or whether they are a lead professional for that child". Now, it doesn't take a genius to work out that, if an assessing "service", "practitioner" or "lead professional" is identified on the database, it becomes comparatively easy to work out the specific area of concern for/of that child. In other words, his/her data privacy and confidentiality has been circumvented.

In addition I've always struggled to understand how it is that a potential total user-base of 330,000 individuals - no doubt of the same calibre as those at HMRC - generates consistency with or confidence in the reassurance that "only cleared staff subject to the highest level of Criminal Records Bureau checks would be able to access the system". And, bearing in mind how adept Government staff have been at losing their laptops (see here), let us hope that those 330,000 people - I'm sure they're all good souls with no malicious intent!?! - can at least avoid dropping their random number generating tokens down the back of the train seat or what have you!

OLD HABITS DIE HARD

This from The Register had me chuckling out loud ... particularly this bit:

"The Information [on the site] does not constitute an offer and Tony Blair makes no warranty or representation as to the accuracy, completeness or fitness for purpose of the Information ..."

It's a pity we didn't have that sort of caveat to hand over the past ten years or so!!!