As 2008 juddered to a halt, Mrs C and I took a jaunt to our local megalithic coffee retailer for some java and breakfast. The news has obviously been filled with stories of the situation in Gaza and the continuing economic woes, but another story caught my eye on December 31st as I picked up the newspaper. Since then, I've heard almost nothing about it. Political timing? PC not paying attention?

The Guardian headline read "Private firm may track all email and calls" and the ensuing lead story was somewhat alarming to me. I wonder what you think about this.

The top and bottom of it is that the government is to propose that the private sector "manage and run a communications database that will keep track of everyone's calls, emails, texts and internet use" in a consultation paper next month. At an estimated cost of £12bn, this seems to be a story that should be receiving more attention for a number of reasons.

• Given all the furore over the ID cards scheme (to which I am unopposed), it seems that this database has the potential to be significantly more intrusive than any ID card could ever be.
• Looking at the track record of private companies in the NPfIT, the NHS super-database, I'd think that there'll be significantly more than the £12bn mooted spent on this. The public sector may well have a facade of being more efficient, but the NHS project goes against that in every way. maybe it is because of the interface of public and private sectors that cause the headaches, but either way, that project isn't a glittering recommendation for such an approach.
• And let's not forget that figure. Twelve billion pounds. Are we going to get VFM here and how exactly are we going to know it? In the face of the worst economic downturn for a couple of generations, aren't there more effective ways to spend £12bn? That's a quarter of the figure that was pumped into the banks and one eighth of the amount spent on the NHS each year. I bet you can get a lot of critical medication, not to mention hospitals, for £12bn.

What surprised me more than anything about this story was the reaction it provoked in me. As I said, I'm not concerned about ID cards and I see the need to have better interfaces between public agencies (such as was lacking in the Soham murders) or preserving our safety by monitoring the activities of the 21/7 bombing case, but is that mandate enough to warrant such extensive snooping? And snooping by the private sector to boot.

No it isn't. It seems to me that we're heading into 1984 not 2009 and we need to keep a close eye on this one. There have to be better, less draconian ways of ensuring our safety by ensuring that the critical public agencies that do that at the moment communicate more effectively and have access to the data that they need, but I'm sure the answer is not to enter into a mass voyeuristic frenzy of gazing over the shoulders of the citizens of the UK.

At what point is this data going to be used? What's the trigger? If I buy fertilizer for my garden will they then look at what websites I visit and what I say to my Mum in emails? Far fetched? Maybe...maybe not.

Of course, the Government have said that there are no plans for such a database. They also told us that the UK was well placed in the global downturn. We all know that isn't true either.

Watch this space, I plan to keep an eye on this one.

-pc.