Sir Michael Bichard, the man whose report into the Soham murders started the vetting database, is now having his doubts. In an interview in the Independent, he says that the regulations ‘need to be looked at again’ and that ‘there will always be situations where you could argue that the line has been drawn in the wrong place’. This shows the tide of opinion has shifted. It also reflects the fact that the government copied the database out of the report’s recommendations, almost without thinking about it. The desire to take ‘expert advice’ meant a social policy that was effectively copied up from a paragraph, to a massive system that will affect 11 million people.