Ambulance services to have access to telephone and email records

The Home Office has released for public consultation its new proposals on access to telephone and communications data, a watered down successor to the plan denounced last summer as a “snooper's charter.”

Home Secretary David Blunkett promised to scale down the plan after admitting he had blundered in drawing the line between public security and the protection of privacy.

Under the initial proposals, all local councils, seven Whitehall departments, and 11 quangos (quasi-autonomous non-governmental organisations] would have had complete access to telephone and email records under the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (RIPA) 2000. Such powers of access have previously been the exclusive domain of the police, Customs, Inland Revenue, and security services.

The new …