LEDBURY Primary School pupils as young as four and five have been fingerprinted in a mass session for a new identikit scanner in the school library.

But parents and a Herefordshire councillor have raised concerns the move is one further step towards wider Big Brother' surveillance in society at large.

They are questioning whether young children, who have committed no crime should have their fingerprints taken and kept on record.

Worried Ledbury parent Rachel Pullen said: "What the heck's wrong with a library card? I was aware that this could happen but I wasn't happy about it. I feel it is Big Brother, having all these fingerprints of children on computer.Invidious is the word."

Parents were sent a letter in the summer about the finger-printing session but no reminder followed and the session went ahead last week.

Peter Watts, Herefordshire councillor for Ledbury, said several parents had contacted him to express concerns.

He said: "A fingerprint could follow a child through his or her life. My concern is that in this day and age, what purposes are these fingerprints being used for and where are we going with this?"

Ledbury is not alone in carrying out fingerprinting of pupils.

Throughout the UK, privacy experts and parents have expressed worries that the move could "prepare" youngsters for the introduction of national ID cards, with children coming to believe that the taking of a fingerprint is normal.

But the scale of fingerprinting in schools is hard to assess.

Herefordshire Council officer Carla Preston said it was up to individual schools and 44 out of 102 currently used the identikit system.

Sarah-Jayne Butcher, of Worc-estershire County Council, said: "I am not aware of fingerprinting happening in Worcestershire schools, but it is up to individual schools whether to go ahead."

A letter from Ledbury Primary head Julie Duckworth to parents said: "We have installed an identikit scanner to record the books borrowed by each child. This involves a thumbprint from each child being taken. Any stored record can be removed easily at a later stage and will be deleted when a child leaves the school."

If parents object, children will still be able to take books out with their old "bar code" tickets.

But Mrs Duckworth added: "In the interests of efficiency, we would hope that there would not be many objections."