There is data, such as your name, your address, and there is meta data, i.e. information above and beyond the basic information and which is needed to make sense of the basic information.
No term appears to exist for the case where the 'meta data' is false, misleading or prejudicial. I shall call it 'anti data'.
Let me give an example.
Let us take the data: Mrs George Brown. Address 24 West Road, Portsmouth. February 2001
Let us invent some meta data:
a) Mrs Brown lives at 24 West Road.
b) Mrs Brown lived at 24 West Road on February 1st 2001
c) In February 2001 Mrs Brown told Mr Smith that she lived at 24 West Road
d) It is now 2012 and Mr Smith assumes, having heard nothing to the contrary from Mrs Brown, that she still lives at 24 West Road
e) In March 2012 Mrs Smith told Mr Jones that she lives in London
f) Mrs Smith is lying about where she lives now
g) Mrs Smith was lying in February 2001
h) Mrs Smith is a completely honest person, constitutionally incapable of telling an lie.
i) Mrs Smith might be a liar.
j) We need to root out liars
k) There should be an investigation to find out whether Mrs Smith is or is not a liar.
l) On this basis, we shall legally abolish any rights to any sort of personal privacy which the law confers on Mrs Smith
l) We should insist that Mrs Smith clears herself from suspicion of being a liar.
m) We should encourage Mrs Smith to do this by alleging that there is evidence of a discrepancy or inconsistency.
n) Mrs Smith will only object to this process if she has something to hide: any objections will, therefore, be further grounds to suspect Mrs Smith.
We cannot know whether any of this meta data is true or fair without the whole picture. But it is clear that in example i) somebody has a suspicious mind. It is also clear that in example l, somebody is setting out on a course likely to cause distress and injustice to Mrs Smith.
On one view, incorrect meta data - anti data - is the problem at the heart of the SPD cock up now sweeping the country. Hundreds of thousands of SPD recipients would, if the NFI had its way, be put into the situation of Mrs Smith in cases k and l and m above.
The Audit Commission insists that when personal data (names, addresses etc) are sent to them for matching on the two SPD exercises certain 'meta data' is attached to it.
The problem appears to be that the NFI has never understood this meta data correctly.
This meta data takes the form of 'codes'. The NFI wants councils to attach certain 'codes' to our personal data. A document on the NFI web site specifies the 'meta data' which the NFI believes can and should be attached to our personal data.
These codes and types vary between systems so a key is required. However, we are only interested in knowing the equivalent codes/types for certain entries and so it is important for us to be able to distinguish these from the rest. Irrespective of what other codes and types mean, at the very least it must be clear as to which fields represent the following:
Discounts
Single person - suggested field entry = SINGLE
Disregards
Student - suggested field entry = STUDENT
The varying mis-interpretations of these codes is at the heart of the problem.
These codes do not indicate the basis on which the council made its calculations for the demand notice and they do not indicate the basis on which the appropriate amount was deducted from the chargeable amount and they do not indicate the basis on which the demand notice was issued. Nor do they indicate the 'basis' on which the taxpayer 'is claiming' to be entitled to a discount, or (assuming competence and lawful administrative procedures) do they represent the 'beliefs' about councils about the basis of entitlement. They most certainly do not set out 'unambiguously' the reason for entitlement, or the basis of entitlement.
This is the basic untruth which time and time again the NFI has stated or implied.
It may be that these 'codes' represent information on the basis of which, while undertaking its duties under Regulation 14, at some time in the past, the council made its assumption that there was entitlement to a discount of a particular amount, at the rate set in law, but in all fairness no more can be said.
To add unfair and legally inaccurate 'meta data' to the personal names supplied to the NFI is both morally and - in so far as those concerned have legal duties to administer finances in accordance with the law - legally wrong.
