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Ministry of Justice orders deletion of the UK's largest court reporting database

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Re: Ministry of Justice orders deletion of the UK's largest court reporting database

#331

Post by pjc50 »

gib444 wrote: post #110
pjc50 wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the case of Rotherham, I believe that most of those committing the crimes were not foreign; most were British born British nationals. Ethnicity is not the same as immigration status.

Congratulations, you've corrected us on the usage of the word immigrant. Now can we return to the topic? Whilst we're on Rotherham: "...by men predominantly of Pakistani heritage" [0] https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-south-yorkshire-61868863 Their parents or grandparents were immigrants...

Their parents or grandparents didn't commit the crimes, though. We don't usually punish parents for the crime of their adult children.

Re: Ministry of Justice orders deletion of the UK's largest court reporting database

#332

Post by pyrale »

londons_explore wrote: post #6

Something is either public record - in which case it should be on a government website for free, and the AI companies should be free to scrape to their hearts desire... Or it should be sealed for X years and then public record. Where X might be 1 in cases where you don't want to hurt an ongoing investigation, or 100 if it's someone's private affairs. Nothing that goes through the courts should be sealed forever. We s…

The issue is that the ease of access to information and the ease of proagating it can be transformative with regards to the effects of information to the public.

> We should give up with the idea of databases which are 'open' to the public, but you have to pay to access, reproduction isn't allowed, records cost pounds per page, and bulk scraping is denied. That isn't open.

I really don't see why. Adding friction to how available information is may be a way to preserve the ability for the public to access information, while also avoiding the pitfalls of unrestricted information access and processing.

Re: Ministry of Justice orders deletion of the UK's largest court reporting database

#333

Post by bko »

Sanzig wrote: post #228
bko wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think it should be removed from consideration. Not expunged or removed from record, just removed from any decision making. The timeline for this can be based on severity with things like rape and murder never expiring from consideration. That's up to the person for the particular role. Imagine hiring a nanny and some bureaucrat telling you what prior arrest is "relevant". No thanks. I'll make that call myself.

Many countries have solved this with a special background check. In Canada we call this a "vulnerable sector check," [1] and it's usually required for roles such as childcare, education, healthcare, etc. Unlike standard background checks, which do not turn up convictions which have received record suspensions (equivalent to a pardon), these ones do flag cases such as sex offenses, even if a record suspension was issu…

Why are only some sectors "vulnerable" and who is to make that call? How about the person cooking my food?

You're over-thinking it, trying to solve for a problem that doesn't exist. No one has a "right" to work for me. There's plenty of roles that accept ex-cons and orgs that actively hire them.

Re: Ministry of Justice orders deletion of the UK's largest court reporting database

#334

Post by bko »

Brian_K_White wrote: post #289
bko wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think it should be removed from consideration. Not expunged or removed from record, just removed from any decision making. The timeline for this can be based on severity with things like rape and murder never expiring from consideration. That's up to the person for the particular role. Imagine hiring a nanny and some bureaucrat telling you what prior arrest is "relevant". No thanks. I'll make that call myself.

Then before I give you my business or hire you, I also want to know that you are the kind of person that thinks they have a right to any other person's entire life, so I can hold it against you and prevent you from benefitting from all your other possible virtues and afforts. So I likewise, require to know everything about you, including things that are none of my business but I just think they are my business and th…

You terms are acceptable. I'll put a sign out on my business that says "none of our employees have criminal records".

Note you are free to advertise hiring prior offenders.

You can also look up business ownership details and see if they have criminal records as well.

Re: Ministry of Justice orders deletion of the UK's largest court reporting database

#335

Post by pyrale »

bko wrote: post #155
reactordev wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>”Free to ingest and make someones crimes a permanent part of AI datasets resulting in forever-convictions? No thanks.” 1000x this. It’s one thing to have a felony for manslaughter. It’s another to have a felony for drug possession. In either case, if enough time has passed, and they have shown that they are reformed (long employment, life events, etc) then I think it should be removed from consideration. Not expunge…

> I think it should be removed from consideration. Not expunged or removed from record, just removed from any decision making. The timeline for this can be based on severity with things like rape and murder never expiring from consideration. That's up to the person for the particular role. Imagine hiring a nanny and some bureaucrat telling you what prior arrest is "relevant". No thanks. I'll make that call myself.

> That's up to the person for the particular role. Imagine hiring a nanny and some bureaucrat telling you what prior arrest is "relevant". No thanks. I'll make that call myself.

Well, no ; that's not up to you. While you may be interested in this information, the government also has a responsibility to protect the subject of that information.

The tradeoff was maintained by making the information available, but not without friction. That tradeoff is being shattered by third parties changing the amount of friction required to get the information. Logically, the government reacts by removing the information. It's not as good as it used to be, but it's better than the alternative.

Re: Ministry of Justice orders deletion of the UK's largest court reporting database

#336

Post by idopmstuff »

hananova wrote: post #205
idopmstuff wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you embezzled money at your last company, I shouldn't be able to decline to hire you on my finance team on that basis?

In many sane countries, companies can ask you to provide a legal certificate that you did not commit X category of crime. This certificate will then either say that you did not do any crimes in that category, or it will say that you did commit one or more of them. The exact crimes aren't mentioned. Coincidentally these same countries tend to have a much much lower recidivism rate than other countries.

This doesn't seem better?

I'm an employer and I want to make sure you haven't committed any serious crimes, so I ask for a certificate saying you haven't committed violent crimes. I get a certificate saying you have. It was a fistfight from a couple of decades ago when you were 20, but I don't know if it's that or if you tortured someone to death. Gotta take a pass on hiring you, sorry.

Seems like the people this benefits relative to a system in which a company can find out the specific charges you were convicted of would be the people who have committed the most heinous crimes in a given category.

Re: Ministry of Justice orders deletion of the UK's largest court reporting database

#337

Post by naasking »

andsoitis wrote: post #180
reactordev wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>”Free to ingest and make someones crimes a permanent part of AI datasets resulting in forever-convictions? No thanks.” 1000x this. It’s one thing to have a felony for manslaughter. It’s another to have a felony for drug possession. In either case, if enough time has passed, and they have shown that they are reformed (long employment, life events, etc) then I think it should be removed from consideration. Not expunge…

> Not expunged or removed from record, just removed from any decision making. This made me pause. It seems to me that if something is not meant to inform decision making, then why does a record of it need to persist?

Historical record, as one example. We gain considerable value from official records from the past, why would our descendents be any different?

Re: Ministry of Justice orders deletion of the UK's largest court reporting database

#338

Post by protocolture »

londons_explore wrote: post #6

Something is either public record - in which case it should be on a government website for free, and the AI companies should be free to scrape to their hearts desire... Or it should be sealed for X years and then public record. Where X might be 1 in cases where you don't want to hurt an ongoing investigation, or 100 if it's someone's private affairs. Nothing that goes through the courts should be sealed forever. We s…

>We should give up with the idea of databases which are 'open' to the public, but you have to pay to access, reproduction isn't allowed, records cost pounds per page, and bulk scraping is denied. That isn't open.

Eeehh

I agree in principle. Its just that, a lot of people would want those databases heavily redacted if this was the case, which would ruin their utility.

The financial disincentive that a 25 dollar access fee creates, reduces the amount of spam that can be directed at people listed in these databases by several orders of magnitude. Land title searches are already difficult (in my locality), because a few people can afford to have their solicitors or agents receive and read all their mail. Open that right up, and everyone will either hide behind an agent selling a trash all service, or try and sneak the wrong data in there. Poisoning it.

Re: Ministry of Justice orders deletion of the UK's largest court reporting database

#339

Post by dirasieb »

hackable_sand wrote: post #252
blell wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Immigration policy is one of the most important things people vote for in an election. We need transparent crime data so we can make an informed vote.

Immigration policy has nothing to do with crime

https://x.com/MillennialWoes/status/1893134391322308918

Re: Ministry of Justice orders deletion of the UK's largest court reporting database

#340

Post by bsder »

londons_explore wrote: post #6

Something is either public record - in which case it should be on a government website for free, and the AI companies should be free to scrape to their hearts desire... Or it should be sealed for X years and then public record. Where X might be 1 in cases where you don't want to hurt an ongoing investigation, or 100 if it's someone's private affairs. Nothing that goes through the courts should be sealed forever. We s…

> We should give up with the idea of databases which are 'open' to the public, but you have to pay to access, reproduction isn't allowed, records cost pounds per page, and bulk scraping is denied. That isn't open.

I disagree.

Even if you simply made the database no cost but such that an actual human has to show up at an office with a signed request, that is fine. That's still open.

The problem isn't the openness; it's the aggregation.

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