WTF have they got to do with children?

a) a fair proportion of staff will write their PINs on the token (or have it in their wallet/purse next to it)

b) at least one of the above will leave it somewhere where someone without access to Contact Point will be able to find it

Even better than that -- I bet the system they use allows for "temporary passwords" used when the token is "mislaid" and that a significant number of people will end up with such passwords.

Is the the DWP or HMRC that are responsible for Child Tax credits?

Suppose we have a child, lets call that child 'P".

Can we have a list of the names of all the people that can access 'P''s records? Would that list be 10 names long (e.g. 'P's teacher, headmaster, social worker, doctor....) or would it be 100 names long (e.g. every teacher, every headmaster, every social worker) or 1000 names long (I see they're including police and charities and civil service unconnected with children and plastic police and local government and pretty much anyone dressed in a high visibility jacket)?

Or are we talking about anyone among 300,000 plus people ultimately can dig into 'P's details?

Also I see the rozzers have their own child database 'Merlin' which doesn't have these controls on it. Can the rozzers fill their own database with data taken from Contact Point?

Also I notice that MPs think their own children are not on the database. When I reckon they are on that database, just that those records are shielded from some of the roles. So how many thousands of people in which roles can see the data on children of MPs?

Seems to me, they are talking in general terms about logging in to the database with tokens, and general stuff about background checks, which is a sure sign of major design flaws. As the saying goes, the devil is in the detail.