Child database closed
By politics.co.uk staff
Activists are counting down until noon today, when the child database Contactpoint is closed.
The controversial database, which was designed to protect children but resulted in accusations of privacy abuse, will be closed for two months before it is destroyed.
The coalition government appears to have given a sympathetic hearing to the civil liberties campaigners who said the centralised database actually put children in more harm by allowing fairly widespread access.
There were also serious concerns about the privacy implications of the database.
The £235 database was built to keep details of Britain’s 11 million children after the death of Victoria Climbie. It was a bid to improve communication between a variety of professionals working with children, and was accessible by schools, doctors, social workers and a other professions.
Children’s minister Tim Loughton announced the closure of the system last month.
It is thought that the closure was the product of Liberal Democrat demands. The party has long been opposed to the database, which it considers intrusive and vulnerable to exasperating the very problems it was designed to solve.
The government is working on a replacement system which will fulfil Contactpoint’s function without a centralised database.
