A civil liberties campaign group has criticised a school which is planning to take pupil's fingerprints.

Hove Park School announced plans in October for pupils to pay for their lunches by swiping their fingers across a fingerprint reading machine.

Big Brother Watch has complained that schools do not have the means for keeping biometric data like fingerprints safe.

Director of Conservative campaign group Big Brother Watch Alex Deane said: “A fingerprint is a unique characteristic which doesn’t change over time and is regularly used throughout the legal system.

“Handing this important piece of biometric data over to schools, which have many tremendous qualities but do not have secure data keeping facilities, is both dangerous and an intrusion into the lives of children who are unaware of the consequences.”