ANGUS COUNCIL yesterday hit back in a civil liberties row over a biometric ID schools library system, and denied fingerprinting children as young as five without parental consent.

The Green Party criticised the system which has been rolled out across the area’s secondaries and also taken up by two district primaries, but the council defended the protocols it applies and expressed “surprise” the issue was raised over five years after it was piloted in Brechin.

Dundee-based Green MSP Shiona Baird claimed the use of the biometric system in school libraries could be “teaching the next generation to surrender their civil liberties without question.”

The Greens said they were prompted to put forward the parliamentary motion urging Scots schools to reject the hi-tech access scheme by concerned parents after it was alleged some councils were fingerprinting pupils without adult approval.

“I cannot imagine any justification for such intrusive use of technology in schools—how many books would a library need to lose each year to even make this system save money?” said Ms Baird.

“We should be encouraging children to understand and value their civil liberties, but instead there is a danger that we will be teaching the next generation to surrender them without question.

“At the very minimum I would want an assurance that no school will go ahead with this system without a full and open debate with parents about the implications of fingerprinting, and no child should be fingerprinted without their parents’ or guardians’ consent.”

That assurance was immediately forthcoming from Angus Council, which said the biometric system was just one add-on element of an automated library management programme that had run successfully in Angus schools for years.

The system allows scanned thumbprints to connect directly to a unique database number, revealing the pupil’s borrowing history and when books are due back.

Brechin High became the pilot school for the technology in 2001, and civil liberties were a key element of the Angus education committee debate in September 2002 when the decision was taken to extend the identikit system to all Angus secondaries, as well as any primaries which wished to.

At that time, education director Jim Anderson said he was fully aware of concerns surrounding the technology—fears which had previously seen Dundee Council stall its adoption of the system—but was satisfied there were no human rights implications as a result of the procedures adopted in Angus.

Children must have parental consent to sign up to the Angus system, and letters have gone out to parents ahead of the system being adopted in individual schools.

A council spokesperson said yesterday that since the technology’s introduction there had been no complaints over civil liberties.

“The system was introduced several years ago. When a school decided to opt into the system, parents were asked to give consent,” added the spokesperson.

“If they chose not to, pupils could still access the library by different means. The system is in place in all eight Angus secondaries and two of the area’s primaries, and is an additional module to the system we already had in place.

“We are trying very hard to promote reading and this is just part of that portfolio.

“Careful consideration was given to its introduction, which only took place when the council was completely satisfied with the systems put in place regarding its use and matters such as parental consent.

“It has worked successfully since then, so it is surprising that this issue has now been raised again.”