Category Archives: Government

Government, Legal, Scotland, Technology

Legitimate concerns exist over access to personal information…

GOVERNMENT DATABASE

The rapid growth of information technology and the huge amount of information that can now be stored (and searched for) within seconds has brought some considerable advantages. It has, however, also raised some big challenges, particularly in relation to privacy and human rights.

Recently, the Scottish Government narrowly won a debate at Holyrood on a plan to allow public bodies to access data through an individual’s NHS number. Such data can be retrieved from a database known as NHSCR. Anyone who was born in Scotland or registered with a GP practice north of the border has a Unique Citizen Reference number held in the NHSCR.

The concern is not so much to do with the data that is already held here, but that the government wants various streams of data held by the National Registers of Scotland by postcode to be added to the register and freely shared with other public bodies.

A simple adding of the postcode information would remove by default the consent currently required by the address system.

Protagonists will argue that adding individual postcodes to a database has existed since the 1950s. They might add, as they should, that it helps to trace children missing from the education system and by helping to identify foreign patients accessing the NHS. And with laws currently moving through parliament, it will make it much harder to avoid paying Scottish rate income tax (SRIT), which comes into force next year. It has to be a good thing when better ways are found of ensuring everyone due to pay tax does pay that tax, setting aside of course the Scottish Government’s position on poll tax defaulters who have been allowed to see their debts owed to local authorities written-off in full.

The Scottish Government has tried to give assurances that no medical records will be shared, but there have to be causes for legitimate concern. Losing the crucial consent from the public for the information to be stored under an individual’s postcode is one. The sheer breadth of the public bodies this would be available to is another. What would be preventing Scottish Canals, Quality Meat Scotland or even Botanic Gardens Scotland from accessing personal information on any individual, which quite clearly would be far outside of their own operational domain?

Because no-one can predict the future with any accuracy and political environments can change quite quickly, thinly laid down arguments tend to perform poorly and can easily be lost within the plethora of the wider debate. But that is not the same as raising perfectly legitimate fears about the security of access to an individual’s personal data. The creation of one universal number, the huge amount of data stored by postcode and the number of organisations that would have access must increase the opportunity for abuse, either through wrongful proliferation, malevolent external hacking practices, rogue individuals permitted access to the network, or even by a government agency itself.

The least we should expect is that safeguards are spelled out in parliament so that there are reassurances on these reasonable points before the green light is given on these proposals. Otherwise, the whole plan will be seen as introducing ID cards by stealth by the back door, a process which, similarly, relies on the proliferation of information across a single database.

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Aid, Government, Politics, Society, United Nations

Food, hunger and undernourishment…

ENOUGH TO GO AROUND

Global undernourishment shouldn’t exist. Each day the world’s farmers produce the equivalent of 2,868 calories per person on the planet – enough to surpass the World Food Programme’s recommended intake of 2,100 daily calories and enough to support a population inching toward nine billion. The world as a whole does not have a food deficit, but individual countries do.

Why do 805 million people still have little to eat? Access is the main problem. Incomes and commodity prices establish where food goes. The quality of roads and airports determines how easily it gets there. Even measuring undernourishment is a challenge. In countries with the highest historical proportions of undernourishment, it can be hard to get food in and data out.

Things are slowly getting better. Since the early 1990s world hunger has dropped by 40 percent – that means 209 million fewer undernourished people, according to the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations. Future progress may prove difficult, but it will be critical to first improve overall food production and availability in places like sub-Saharan Africa. Once that is secure, the focus can then turn to access.

What causes hunger?

Although there are enough calories for everyone alive, people go undernourished for a variety of reasons – virtually all of which are related to access. Reasons and specific examples include:

Natural Disasters – In Haiti, a series of events, including an earthquake (2010), hurricane (2012), and a drought (2014), have severely limited Haiti’s capacity to ease undernourishment.

Erratic Weather – Almost two-thirds of Bolivians living in rural areas of western South America depend on subsistence crops. Recurring droughts and floods bring food deficits. Undernourishment has stunted the growth of one-quarter of all children under five.

Civil War – In the Central African Republic, fighting between government forces and Muslim rebels has led to wide displacement. Farm yields decreased by 40 per cent from 2012 to 2013. Nine out of ten households report eating just one meal a day.

Economic Swings – Since the 2008 recession, Tajikistan has seen reduced prices for its main exports – cotton and aluminium – which has led to lower incomes. A majority of its people spend up to 80 percent of their income on food.

Poor Infrastructure – In Zambia, unreliable roads are the biggest barrier for Africa’s food imports and exports, according to the World Bank. Only 17 percent of the rural population has access to an all-weather road.

Restrictive Leaders – Strained diplomatic ties have resulted in severe sanctions on nearly all North Korean trade. Much of the population of North Korea relies on food rations. The country has received food aid from China, South Korea, and the United States.

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Asia, China, Economic, Europe, Government, Intelligence, Middle East, Military, National Security, NATO, Society, United States

US Defence Strategy…

(From the archives) Originally posted on January 7, 2012 by markdowe

SHIFT IN AMERICA’S DEFENCE STRATEGY

On Saturday, 07 January, 2012, the Editorial of the Daily Telegraph focused on America’s shift in defence strategy, following Thursday’s announcement by President Barack Obama. The US is to focus less on Europe and more on Asia following the rising threat of China.

The Editorial states:

‘The Pentagon briefing room rarely hosts all of America’s service chiefs, let alone the president. Its use by Barack Obama to announce the conclusions of his defence review was designed to add a sense of drama – and the occasion certainly lived up to its billing. Future historians will probably conclude that this was the week when America’s entire foreign and defence strategy pivoted decisively away from Europe and towards the Pacific. More ominously, it might also mark the onset of a new, if concealed, arms race between the US and its aspiring rival, China.

First things first: America’s military dominance will remain unchallenged for the foreseeable future. Mr Obama might have announced spending cuts of almost $500 billion over the next decade, but this amounts to a light trim for a defence machine with an annual budget of $650 billion, amounting to 45 per cent of all military expenditure in the world. America is not axing capabilities in the foolish fashion of British governments; rather, its power is being focused on the great strategic challenges of the next century. These can be simply summarised: the struggle for mastery in Asia, home of the world’s most populous countries and fastest-growing economies, and responding to sudden crises. To this end, the US will reduce its presence in Europe, cut 90,000 soldiers and bulk up in the Pacific, with new bases in Australia and elsewhere. As for other flashpoints, few will be surprised that the US policy stresses the goals of containing Iran and guaranteeing free passage through the Strait of Hormuz.

On a purely military level, two points stand out. The US might be cutting its army, but it has ruled out reducing its fleet of 11 aircraft carriers, each of which packs more punch than the entire air forces of most countries. While China’s defence budget has recorded double-digit increases for the past decade, it has still launched only one carrier – an old Russian model of doubtful combat value. Second, Mr Obama stressed his determination to invest in “intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance”. Put simply, the US will seek to extend its lead in the most advanced combat systems: where scores of troops – and hundreds of support staff – might once have been required to dispatch a senior al-Qaeda operative, now one unmanned drone can do the job.

America’s new course could well be shifted by a strategic shock akin to the September 11 attacks. Nevertheless, this plan will have momentous consequences for Europe and Asia alike. For decades, the US has underwritten the security of the Atlantic as well as the Pacific, effectively allowing Europe a free ride and permitting a string of Nato members the luxury of running down their defence budgets. This era is rapidly coming to a close. Yet with a few honourable exceptions, such as Britain and France, European powers have failed to fund their armed forces adequately, or deploy them when needed. Germany, in particular, must overcome the burden of its history and face up to the responsibilities that go with being the Continent’s leading economic power.

Mr Obama’s address studiously refrained from mentioning China, the country that probably has most at stake. Beijing’s leaders will now have to make far-reaching choices of their own. As events in Burma have shown, China’s “peaceful rise” has alarmed many of its neighbours: for most countries in the region, American power and values remain far more appealing. Moreover, China has grown rich largely thanks to trade, not least with the US. Faced with the net of containment that America is quietly laying across the Pacific, China will search for the Achilles’ heel of the US Navy, perfecting a new generation of missiles capable of destroying aircraft carriers from hundreds of miles away, working out how to cripple the internet, and how to blind the US satellite network, on which all its military assets now depend.

The world will pay a bitter price, however, if this veiled arms race between America and China escalates. History shows that free trade and military rivalry – however disguised – make for uncomfortable bedfellows. Beijing has gained rapidly in both wealth and power. The manner in which it chooses to pursue them now will have consequences for us all.’ [sic]

 

MD responded:

Whilst the US has declared China as a threat and announcing Asia as a priority, America is also to invest in a long-term strategic partnership with India. India will become the new powerful Asian ally of the United States in the region. In rolling out its new strategy, the Pentagon has made clear that the fronts for potential conflicts are shifting towards China. The US says that all of the trends – whether that is demographic, geopolitical, economic or military – are shifting towards the Pacific and, that over the long-term, China’s emergence as a regional power will have the potential to affect the US economy and security in a variety of ways.

It shouldn’t be in any doubt that China has unsettled its neighbours over several years with the expansion of its navy and improvements in missile and surveillance capabilities. The Pentagon is anxious about China’s strategic goals as it begins to search for a new generation of weapons.

The US defence strategy followed a major diplomatic push by Washington to expand security partnerships with its allies in the region. Last month, the US, India and Japan held their first trilateral meeting in an attempt to counter China’s rising influence in the Asia-Pacific.

China has advanced its influence in the region, along with allies like North Korea, Pakistan, Myanmar and Sri Lanka. Over recent years it has established itself as a growing, and sometimes bullying power in the Pacific, particularly in East Asia. Most of the countries, though, in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) have festering territorial disputes with China. America’s new emphasis on Asia and the containment of China also stems from the fact that the Asia-Pacific region now constitutes the centre of gravity of world economic activity.

But is America’s new stance the beginning of something that could fan Cold war-style antagonism?

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