Should we be worried that the Home Office plans to keep details of the contacts and details of users of social networking sites as part of its plan to store records of all phone calls, emails and websites visited, ostensibly in the name of ‘national security'?
Aside from the issue of civil liberty, this is from a department, remember, that has managed to lose the details of 84,000 prisoners and 3000 migrant seasonal workers - including their passport numbers - in a government that has also mislaid information on among others 25m people's child benefit claimants, 3m learner drivers and banking details on a further 600,000.
Nonetheless the answer is no.
If some civil servant or half-witted minister chooses to leave in a pub or a train a disc containing the usual banal information available on social networking sites, such as ‘...is looking forward to the weekend!', ‘...can't wait for payday!', ‘....has a hangover!', that's fine by me. I very much doubt that there are many Islamic groups that use Facebook to plan attacks with updates such as ‘...is plotting a jihad'.
So go for it Jacqui.
Incidentally the difference between our government and that of Nicolas Sarkozy was thrown into sharp relief on the front page of today's Daily Telegraph. He has appointed Guadeloupe-born TV presenter Christine Kelly as his minister of overseas territories. Hazel Blears she is not.
