Ministers are preparing legislation for the next session of parliament to make local authorities create files on every child in England, including intimate personal information about parents' relationships with other partners and any criminal record, alcohol or drug abuse in the extended family. The files will be available to teachers, social workers, NHS staff and other professionals dealing with children to help them piece together symptoms of neglect or abuse that might require intervention by the authorities.

The green paper produced as a response to the murder of Victoria Climbié, an eight-year-old who died in London in 2000 after months of torture and neglect, said the need to protect children had to be balanced against preserving the privacy of parents. But Charles Clarke, the education secretary, said yesterday that the interests of children "absolutely" took precedence over the civil liberties of adults.

Mark Littlewood, the campaigns director of Liberty, said Mr Clarke's remarks were even more disturbing than the green paper.

We have to make sure social workers are sharper, smarter and better focused. That's done by better training, not by casting the net so wide that every child in the country will be in it. That creates the danger that investigations will be triggered by supposition, guesswork, gossip and rumour. Our concern is that there will be witchhunts rather than protection of the relatively small number of children in real danger.