Legislation giving the SA Police Service (SAPS), among other things, access to the fingerprint databases of other government departments was approved in the National Assembly on Wednesday.

Speaking during debate on the Criminal Law (Forensic Procedures) Amendment Bill, Justice Minister Jeff Radebe said that the measure was intended to deal with fingerprint and DNA evidence shortcomings - two pivotal aspects of forensic crime fighting.

Despite the fact that a number of government departments administered fingerprint databases, SAPS currently, owing to legal and information technology reasons, only had access to the fingerprints stored on the SAPS Afis system.

As a result, the SAPS currently had no direct access to the Hanis home affairs system where the fingerprints of 41-million citizens and about 2,5-million foreigners were kept.

Nor did SAPS have access to the transport department's eNatis system, where a further six-million thumbprints were kept.

Radebe said that the criminal justice system review office, through an analysis of a compendium of statistics, had found that in 52,5% of all crime cases in 2006/07, and in 46,2% in 2007/08, the perpetrators remained undetected. A further 11,3% of cases in 2006/07 and 13% in 2007/08 were withdrawn before reaching court.

"In other words, a total of 63,6% in financial year 2006/07, or 59,2% in 2007/08 of all crimes investigated never reached court.

"Of the 6,5-million more serious crimes in the criminal justice system for the period 2001 to 2006, a total of 4,4-million, or 68% of cases, were undetected or withdrawn before reaching court," he said.

In addition, current legislation did not provide for compulsory taking of fingerprints, even in instances where a person had been convicted of an offence.

"Therefore, the manner in which fingerprints are currently collected, loaded into the South African Police Service's database and used, means that a fingerprint lifted at a crime scene will most likely only be checked against the limited number of fingerprints of convicted offenders included in that database."

The bill intended to address all these shortcomings by ensuring that the SAPS had access to the fingerprint databases of other government departments for criminal investigations only, and by expanding police powers to take and return fingerprints, bodyprints, and photographic images of persons charged with or convicted of offences.

Radebe said that the bill contained strict safeguards and penalties to ensure that fingerprints, bodyprints, and photographic images were collected, stored and used only for purposes related to detecting crime, investigating an offence, identifying missing persons and unidentified human remains, or conducting prosecutions.

Care had thus been taken to strike an appropriate balance between an individual's right to dignity and privacy as entrenched in the Constitution and legitimate demands by the public that police pursue the objective of preventing, combating and investigating crime, he said.