Personal Information No Longer Private

After the HMRC, DVLA, Sefton PCA & many, many more examples of private information being lost or given away to the wrong people, another one crops up! It's like buses, you wait ages for one...

This time, the Department of Work & Pension (DWP) has lost 800 loan application forms somewhere between Sheffield and Newcastle. The applications were from people hoping to take advantage of interest free loans given to the financially disadvantaged, in order to help them spread the cost of one-off purchases like kitchen appliances.

The information included applicants' names, addresses, dates of birth, National Insurance numbers and bank details, according to Lee Rock, from the civil service union PCS. The DWP said: "Clearly we are extremely concerned that these payments have been delayed and we are striving to ensure no one is in hardship because of what has occurred."

You might also want to be concerned about them suddenly discovering they're even more financially disadvantaged because someone has taken loans out in their name, using the information you've just lost sonny Jim.

In other DWP comedy news, an ex-contractor has revealed that she still had two discs - containing up to 18,000 names and details of benefits received - a YEAR after being given them, as she had "forgotten" to return them. I'm guessing that, in line with other Government departments, the DWP don't list who has what information and whether it's been returned.

Good work the Government. You fucking retards.