Sorry Darling ...

After trying to scare us all witless with melodramatic commercials about identity theft, it turns out that some junior knob-head at HM Customs & Treasury has downloaded all the bank details of every family with kids in the UK on to a couple of disks. And 'lost' them.

Well actually it was TNT that lost them - it's not as if the government supports the 'People's Post Office'. And as they were too tight to even send it by traceable service, the disks have now be consigned to oblivion.

If the government were a business (and that's how it likes to see itself nowadays) then an employee could probably sue them on the grounds that they had neglected their duty of care for their personal details. But this is HM Government, so there's probably some sort of medieval crown immunity bollocks.

Still Chancellor Alistair Darling has sent out a reassuring message:

'Er sorry - we fucked up. Really sorry. Don't worry though it'll probably be OK. Best look at your statements to check that your account hasn't been cleaned out though. But don't contact your bank - they're really snowed under at the moment. Sorry again.'

Even forgetting about the financial risk - the confidential family details of all sorts of people has now been compromised - including families who are hiding from abusive partners. Until the disks are found, probably gathering dust in some TNT depot in Aberdeen because the junior knob-head put on the wrong post code, we'll never know for certain the damage that this has done.

Still on the upside: Surely nobody will now trust these fuckwits with a DNA database or a system of national identity cards ?