Bad News for Family Allowance Claimants

[T C]

Apparantely all the nations records of family allowance have been nicked. anyone heard this ?

[jh1980]

terrycooper6 said:

Apparantely all the nations records of family allowance have been nicked. anyone heard this ?

Fathers 4 Justice eh?

[T C]

sorry got header wrong ....muppet that i am

[Neko Bazu]

Alistair Darling has blamed mistakes by junior officials at HM Revenue and Customs after details of 25 million child benefit recipients were lost.

The Chancellor said information, including bank details of 7m families, had been sent on discs to the National Audit office by unrecorded delivery.

The discs had never arrived at their destination, Mr Darling told MPs.

He apologised for what he said was "an extremely serious failure" but insisted people were not at risk from ID fraud.

The records include parents' and children's names, addresses, dates of birth, child benefit and national insurance numbers and in some cases, bank or building society details.

He said the missing data was not enough to access accounts on its own but anyone who thought they had been the victim of fraud would be reimbursed by the banks.

He said a police investigation had been launched into what he described as a "deeply regrettable incident," which is the latest and most serious in a string of mistakes with data at Revenue and Customs.

The chairman of Revenue and Customs, Paul Gray, resigned earlier after the incident emerged.

Briefing MPs on the incident, Mr Darling said the information had been transferred at a junior level in breach of HMRC's procedures.

"Contrary to all HMRC standing proceedures two password protected discs containing a full copy of HMRC's entire data in relation to the payment of child benefit was sent to the National Audit Office by HMRC's internal postal system operated by the courier TNT.

"The package was not recorded or registered."

"Mr Speaker, it appears that the data has failed to reach the addressee at the NAO.

"Mr Speaker I also have to tell the house that on finding that the package had not arrived at the NAO a further copy of this data was sent - this time by registered post which did arrive at the NAO However, again HMRC should never have let this happen."

The data was sent on October 18 and senior management at HMRC were told it was missing on November 8 and the Chancellor on November 10, said Mr Darling.

Shadow Chancellor George Osborne said the government needed to "get a grip" and deliver a basic level of competence.

He said it was the "final blow for the ambitions of this government to create a national ID database" as "they simply can not be trusted with people's personal information".

Lib Dem acting leader Vince Cable said it was now the Treasury and not the Home Office that was "not fit for purpose".

He asked why the information had been sent on discs through the internal mail when it should have been sent electronically.

Information Commissioner Richard Thomas said: "This is an extremely serious and disturbing security breach. This is not the first time that we have been made aware of breaches at the HM Revenue and Customs - we are already investigating two other breaches.

"Incidents like these illustrate that any system is only as good as its weakest link. The alarm bells must now ring in every organisation about the risks of not protecting people's personal information properly.

"As I highlighted earlier this year, it is imperative that organisations earn public trust and confidence by addressing security and other data protection safeguards with the utmost vigour."

Mr Thomas welcomed the Chancellor's announcement of an independent review of the incident by Kieran Poynter of PricewaterhouseCoopers and said he would decide on further action once he has received the report.

"Searching questions need to be answered about systems, procedures and human error inside both HMRC and NAO," said Mr Thomas.

The prime minister's official spokeswoman said Gordon Brown has "full confidence" in Mr Darling. She added that Mr Darling has not offered to resign.

What a fucking joke

[CHOPPER READ]

Long gone are the days when a cabinet minister would go for such inadequacies. Now they just go along with the blame culture.

[Rulesaints]

I'm on that list

[Teesside White]

i remember when i was on that list lol, wasnt that long ago

[Roaster©®™]

I've two kids on the list and the wife's bank details will be there too. Thank fook we ain't got a joint account ;D

[Katiekins]

I'm on the list

[HURLOCK]

He should walk!

[Roaster©®™]

hurlock said:

He should walk!

He'd manage to fuck that up too though!

[CHOPPER READ]

rulesaints said:

I'm on that list

Sex offenders register?

[Roaster©®™]

markbrandonread said:

rulesaints said:

I'm on that list

Sex offenders register?

Trouble is that ain't public! Should be included in Home Owners Packs - just so prospective buyers know just who the saddo pervs are in their area!

[HURLOCK]

roaster said:

Trouble is that ain't public! Should be included in Home Owners Packs - just so prospective buyers know just who the saddo pervs are in their area!

People next door sound like right candidates, WIDER! ;D

[Neko Bazu]

"Judge my government on its record of competence."
-G. Brown

Fucked that up a bit, didn't ya mate?

Sending it through the bloody postal service... internal mailing system, hand delivery, electronic copies anyone? Y'know, since they were on CD anyway?

Good to see the opposition aren't wasting time sticking the boot in though

"This autumn the prime minister said he had shown this government could be competent and how he needed to set out his vision.

"There are 25 million people whose personal details have been lost by this government.

"Never mind the lack of vision, just get a grip and deliver a basic level of competence."

Kind of concerning that these are the people who're planning those ID cards too though

[HURLOCK]

a valid point Neko San