Reform UK’s ‘Doge’ unit battles councils for access to sensitive data
https://www.ft.com/content/201924c2-900a-4b95-b8ce-38b5234133ba
Posted by birdinthebush74
Reform UK’s ‘Doge’ unit battles councils for access to sensitive data
https://www.ft.com/content/201924c2-900a-4b95-b8ce-38b5234133ba
Posted by birdinthebush74
33 Comments
I hope they don’t just roll over like they have in the US.
If the other parties and activists don’t capitalise on this with “Big Brother is watching you” type stuff about Farage and Reform then this country is fucked.
It needs pro-Palestine movement levels of effort.
Trouble is the left will expend its effort on what is happening in other countries and fighting itself instead of the real enemy, and the Tories will just try and out-Farage Farage.
The guy who was running the ‘team’ ran a data-mining company according to he profile on linked-in. I looked him up. He resigned when Zia Yusef resigned as chairman because it was Yusef that hired him. I don’t know if he came back when Yusef did or who is actually directing this so called ‘Doge’ team now.
I suspect that data mining is what this bullshit is all about. I also wonder who is paying for it ? Are our council taxes paying for this nonsense ?
> The team is run by 12 volunteers, including software engineers and artificial intelligence specialists, according to Reform’s Doge chief Zia Yusuf.
I can only imagine the calibre of ‘software engineer’ that would happily work for free.
It’s a good thing that our judges are not politically skewed and the government isn’t Reform’s if it comes to that.
Why did they think that US style crap would work here? Am glad they’ve been told to fuck off. Bunch of absolute grifting ghouls.
Thankfully we have far stricter data access laws than the Americans. “Because I want my mates to look at it for reasons” isn’t a good enough reason to disclose personally identifiable data to a third party. I’d be interested in hearing what the justification they’re trying to use to facilitate the transfer of sensitive data outside of the council’s control.
This is the very essence of what Brexit was about.
Break from European human rights and workers protection rule and turn us all into corporate slaves like the US.
Remember every workers rights has been fought for and not given away.
Somehow Farage has convinced enough people he is doing this for Thier own good.
This Doge concept is only really executable if you have access to lawmakers, so it would only really work for Reform if they somehow got the national government. Right now, there are a plethora of decent laws (privacy and GDPR being two) that can stop them doing too much damage.
Why do we keep trying to copy every little Americanism, no matter how fucking stupid and embarrassing it is?
Unelected, unaccountable mates of Farage being given complete access to councils’ and therefore council taxpayers’ sensitive and personal data?
What could possibly go wrong?
Is already tearing itself apart! Imagine them in government😂
Populist grifters. Are they going to shove a load of 18-year old Andrew Tate fans into their little DOGE cosplay who have no idea what they are looking for?! This will certainly end well.
DOGE was a complete and utter failure in the USA. Even Trump all but admits it.
The idea that they’re still trying to make ‘Doge’ happen even after it was a complete failure (even by its own insane standards) in the US is a good measure of how completely unserious Reform actually are.
The most ironic bit about this is that councils will be spending money, part of their budget, to fight this…
Farage can stick his “doge” up his arse the frog faced twat.
Sorry chaps. We’re not like the US, we have the rule of law in this country.
Jesus Fuck, dont give that lot access to anything, look at the damage they can do with a plentiful supply of Exygen.
Called this month’s ago. They are going to prepare to emulated the clown show over here by the way of cutting funding to as many things as possible.
Surely any team working for the council should be employed by the council or be subcontractors hired by council and not be part of a political party hired to investigate by a party.
Also we have had so many years of Austerity caused by dickheads like Farage who tanked the stock market meaning we bailed out banks that there cannot be that many safe things to cut and hiring a team of 10 odd people would take quite a lot of money to offset.
I fucking despise reform bringing over US politics. We are not the fucking US for crying out loud, this crapmhas zero relevance here.
“Oh after 14 years of cuts and underfunding to our public and government services we totally need our own DOGE to combat government overspending!”
It’s a wild goose chase, and such a damn moronic one at that, I have genuinely heard more intelligent things from my damn cat.
This really is just noting more than performative politics by Reform, mostly for the benefit of their voter base, by being seen to be aping the lunacy in the U.S.
They are not, however, the UK Government and so their so-called “Department of Government Efficiency” has no basis is statute and has no official powers or duties in the UK.
In fact, the exact opposite is true: there are numerous legal duties placed upon local government bodies in the UK, particularly in the context of the services they provide to their resident populations, requirements under data protection legislation, and the rules around how council plans, income and expenditure must be published. A bunch of random outsiders have no right to trample on this and the push back will be significant.
Reform and their “DOGE” goons can ask, and can submit Freedom of Information requests but this isn’t the U.S. where an essentially rogue administration can push for access into Federal agencies, playing fast and loose with their own rules and protections; this is the UK and the chief executives of local government councils and their legal advisors would likely advise councillors that, for the most part, Reform’s “DOGE” can go and whistle.
That they’re not doing their actual job and instead immediately zeroing in on forcing access to sensitive data shows that this is a data grab and nothing more.
People should be in the streets over this. The foxes are in the hen house.
If there is even a whiff of a privacy concern they will be sued and it will only be the taxpayers losing out. DOGE only *worked* in the US because there is no one holding anyone to account.
The article even says that Kent CC is having to hire external counsel lol
My partner works in privacy and gets paid a king’s ransom because privacy concerns and litigation go hand in hand.
Hypocrasy and ‘misconduct in public office’ there are laws and rule in place that could simply be used if the powers that be had the wits to actually do something.
The 1st step for this, and leading by example’.. would be to reveal Mr F’s financials; his incomes and their (real, not shell or ‘front’) sources, what hes done for them, e.g. when emplyed e.g. by the EU, did he actually deliver, attendances etc for what he took payment for… The when his intergrity and honesty can be proven, then perhaps theres some credibilty in what hes after from others…
*And as for reform, just another bunch of short sighted xenophobic zionist ‘believers’, sheep sadly will follow a bad shepherd / blaggards!
It would be intereting if reform could acually produce valid testable pros and cons (with considered consequences) for their decision trees, and of course how realistic and feasible any of their spoutings really are, rather than just short sighted, emotive, popularist, poppycock, that seems to lure some that don’t see through the spin of blaggards*.
We all know politics is rife with BS rather than what and most importantly HOW the state of the nation can be fixed, from the years (decades) of rot and decline that governments have sunk to and the populance vote for…, but the population wouldn’t really like the truths of what needs doing, at what costs and the needs for honest leadership with decent integrity, honesty and social morals. Even a dose of egaletarianism would be a bit of fresh air.
Countries and their populances need to recognise where they have dependencies on others, minimised where appropriate, and remember you can always achieve more as a team than as an individual (country that can not feed or fuel it’ self).
They are trying to steal our data to either profit from it or use it for ‘marketing’ or both.
Either way, simply the fact that they copied this from the current regime in the States should give you every reason to avoid them like the plague.
Shame on us for allowing reform to gain this much traction.
They’re not “doge” . That’s an amerikan thing. They’re not the government, its not a government department.
Amerika is a foreign country. If they want to be amerikaaners. They must go and live there.
Cosplaying at being foriegners is an odd look for people who like to self identify as patriotic when they clearly arent. All things considered.
F*** these jumped-up domestic terrorists and everyone that voted for them
This is data mining to profile the electorate, similar to the Cambridge Analytica scandal. It’s hugely effective in getting swing voters over the line, hence everything going on with Palantir in the US at the moment. Reform are trying the same thing here from the exact same playbook but without the clout or competence to pull it off.
The difference between here and the US is that the UK still respects the rule of law and has a good level of data protection law. So you can’t just create some non-public body, call it a “department” and expect to get your hands on things. Giving personal data to such an entity is a huge and obvious data protection breach, illegal under GDPR (and even its predecessors), and councils aren’t just run by political councillors, they have significant staff who actually know this stuff and will stymie illegal politically motivated moves.
Can Farage have an original idea? Or is everything just recycled garbage that failed elsewhere that we’re for some unknown reason entertaining here like we don’t have the internet or something?