Fingerprint-protest worker fired

09.11.2004
By MATHEW DEARNALEY

David Barnes has forfeited his job at an Auckland printing works
rather than become a "marked commodity" by surrendering his
fingerprints to his employer.

"Where does it all end?" he said yesterday of his dismissal as a
maintenance engineer for PMP Print in Wiri.

"Ultimately we'll be no more than producers and consumers in an
extremely regulated Big Brother society that I don't wish to be part
of."

Mr Barnes, 52, was sacked last month for alleged serious misconduct
for refusing to allow his fingerprints to be scanned into a machine
for identification when clocking on and off.

He said this would have violated his religious and ethical beliefs.

About 30 per cent of the 160 or so staff at the site had been
similarly reluctant to provide their prints, he said. But although
another man quit, the rest gave in after what he claimed was merely
token resistance by their union, of which he is not a member.

Australian-owned PMP told the Employment Relations Authority in
September it needed the technology to combat false time claims, 
but Mr Barnes said he always arrived well before starting time.

Site manager Lee Rakiraki said Mr Barnes was dismissed for refusing a
lawful and reasonable request. The authority endorsed this before the
company delivered its final ultimatum.

He refused any other comment. 

(snip)

Green MP Keith Locke, who has accused the United States of wanting 
to build an international database on the world's citizens by
fingerprinting him and other passengers at airport transit lounges,
said he was shocked by the dismissal.

He said the use of biometric information for purposes such as time-
keeping or even issuing library books, as happens at one Auckland
school, was yet another move towards a surveillance society. 

(snip)

Full article at New Zealand Herald ...
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/storydisplay.cfm?storyID=3608386&thesection=news
&thesubsection=general

Cheers, Steve...

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