Jon Bright (London, OK): Brown's slow train-wreck of a government is now piling on the negative headlines at such a rate that it is easy to lose count of some of them (I think Jacqui Smith in particular must be feeling a whole lot more secure about now). The Watt/Abrahams affair is a disaster that has been covered so well by other blogs (particularly Guido) that there seems little point me trying to add anything. So instead I'll try and give a little publicity space to another, rumbling problem, which will probably not be as politically damaging for Brown's government but certainly has a far greater potential to impact on our lives.
That is Labour's "Transformational Government" agenda, covered well by Guy Herbert here, of which ID cards are the mere tip of the iceberg. The main point about transformational government is that individual departments are going to start pooling data on all of us - and Open Europe's press briefing flags up this rather worrying report in the Telegraph that there are plans afoot to make the scheme EU wide (link broken as of 17.40 - think the Telegraph are having server probs link back up).
The main problem with these schemes is not that government departments appear woefully unable to keep valuable data safe (though this is a large flaw). The problem is that, by allowing this pooling of data on people (potentially across the EU), we will be complicit in creating an enormously powerful tool of regulation and control, and then handing it over to the government - we put, if you like, all our faith in them to never misuse this power. This should make anyone watching the latest donations scandal unfold a little bit nervous.
