Trust has been left in tatters

Gordon Brown and Alistair Darling remained in their jobs today as chief executive and finance director of a Government whose reputation for competence has been shattered, writes

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The public's trust in ministers and Government processes has been left in tatters after the biggest breach of trust in the history of Whitehall - the loss of 25 million people's personal and banking details.

The words used by Mr Darling himself to categorise the scale of this disaster - unforgivable, catastrophe, unreserved apology, etc - indicate how serious this is for the Government.

The Chancellor cannot be personally blamed, but he's the man in charge of a department which appears, as acting Liberal Democrat leader Vince Cable put it - to be "unfit for purpose".

Yet it was the Prime Minister, during his years at the Treasury, who merged the Inland Revenue and Customs & Excise and ordered the loss of 25,000 jobs.

He has some big questions to answer.The Information Commissioner, Richard Thomas, said it was "almost certain" that HM Revenue and Customs had broken the Data Information Act by allowing an individual to download the details of every family on child benefit onto two CDs, pop them in a jiffy bag and chuck it, unregistered, into the internal post.

"It is a shocking case. I am at a loss to find out what happened in this situation. It is not just about the law. It is about retaining the trust and confidence of the population where so much information is entrusted to Gov- ernment," said Mr Thomas.

He said any system that collected information about individuals should not only be safe from criminals, but against "idiots" and those who did not follow the ordinary rules of procedure.

"This has got to be taken a great deal more seriously than clearly has been the case in this situation," added the data information watchdog.

Mr Darling said: "People are entitled to trust that the information they give is safe, whether on child benefit or anything else, and that did not happen here."

However, he also said the loss of so many records did not have implicati-ons for proposed identity cards because the use of biometrics would ensure people were protected.

But who is going to believe that when the department which is supposed to be the guardian of so much personal information can be run with procedures unworthy of a company developing your holiday photos?

Mr Thomas said his office should be given the power and resources to make spot checks on Government departments and agencies to make sure they were operating proper procedures - a bit like health inspectors dropping in unannounced to make sure a restaurant's kitchen is clean.

The Chancellor seemed to agree: "We need to make sure firstly that there are robust procedures, and secondly that not only are they stuck to, but there are checks and counter-checks, so that when a request comes in to obtain information, someone at a very senior level in the organisation has to sign off that request."

But it didn't happen in this case, it didn't happen in the Standard Life case involving the details of 15,000 members of the public. And no fewer than 41 laptops have been stolen in the recent past from Customs and Excise.

The old phrase about running a whelk stall comes to mind. That's about as damaging as it gets for any administration, and the looks on the faces of Messrs Brown and Darling yesterday indicated that they knew it only too well.