“For five years I have avoided using the phrase ‘police state’. But the sort of things going on here is what you expect in a police state, a banana state. This is the most extraordinary event of my parliamentary career.” (David Davis)
I find the items on this list extremely disturbing, particularly those which relate to his offices, phone and computer.
Yes Prime Minister: The Nuclear Deterrent and Salami Tactics
I invite you to consider this very funny but very poignant clip with reference to a “government going bad” type scenario. We’re hearing an increasing amount of discussion these days here in the UK about what we should do, and at what point we should do it, should our current government’s authoritarian direction continue unabated.
Among the problems potential rebels would face (in addition to the small matters of pervasive surveillance, an increasingly aggressive and well-armed police force, and the likely invocation of “anti-terrorist” measures to swat down any politically undesirable behaviour), is the process brilliantly parodied in the Yes Prime Minister clip above. No single slice of salami will ever seem serious enough to get the average bod to go and wave banners in Parliament Square. Well obviously, that’s not likely because they’ve already banned banner-waving there, but somewhere else where democratic protest it is still allowed, like in the middle of a multitude corralled into Oxford Circus and controlled at the point of a taser, for example.
Unless by some means we can arrive at some broad consensus regarding a line or lines that must not be crossed by government (and this, IMO, is where not having a written constitution is a serious disadvantage), we’ll be doomed to experience frog-in-pot syndrome. We’ll all just sit here waiting for some big call-to-action event that never comes, and inevitably, we’ll end up boiled.
I write this as someone who grew up surrounded by adults who would regularly ask that classic rhetorical question about German citizens in the 1930s “But how could they have let it happen?”. Even as a young child I knew that the smugness was unwarranted. As for the question about how authoritarian government develops without the general public doing much to prevent it, I suspect we’re on our way to finding out.
“The arrest of Damian Green for doing his job of opposing the executive is a step too far in rolling back centuries of democratic achievement. The pretext is the excessive desire of this government to keep all public information secret, and prevent the taxpayer from finding out what has been done in their name and at their expense. This is the most secretive, as well as the most authoritarian, government of the modern era.”
In case you’re wondering, the author is not exactly a natural political ally of the Conservatives:
http://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2008/11/the_jackboots_a.html
(Link seen on Glyn Moody’s blog)
Updates:
Cross-party fury over MP’s arrest
Damien Green arrest ‘like Mugabe’s Zimbabwe’
Damian Green arrest: PM accused of contempt for parliament
The six facts causing Tories alarm about Damian Green
Reading Glyn Moody’s blog earlier reminded me to flag an article I saw last week. Stella Rimmington (former Director General of MI5) on the political response to the threat of terrorism:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2008/oct/18/stella-rimington-9-11-mi5
“[She criticises] politicians including Jacqui Smith, the home secretary, for trying to outbid each other in their opposition to terrorism and making national security a partisan issue.
It all began, she suggests, with September 11. “National security has become much more of a political issue than it ever was in my day,” she says. “Parties are tending to use it as a way of trying to get at the other side. You know, ‘We’re more tough on terrorism than you are.’ I think that’s a bad move, quite frankly.”
Information Commissioner’s Office statement on the Communications Data Bill
“This summer the Information Commissioner called for a public debate on government proposals for the state to retain citizens’ internet and phone records. The Commissioner warned that it is likely that such a scheme would be a step too far for the British way of life. Creating huge databases containing personal information is never a risk-free option as it is not possible to fully eliminate the danger that the data will fall into the wrong hands. It is therefore of paramount importance that proposals threatening such intrusion into our lives are fully debated. We welcome the fact that the government intends to fully consult the public on any scheme it brings forward. Precise details of the plans are unclear at this stage the ICO will be studying the proposals once published and responding to the Government’s consultation in due course.”
Source:
http://www.ico.gov.uk/upload/documents/pressreleases/2008/ico_statement_comms_data_bill.pdf
Commentary:
http://www.out-law.com//default.aspx?page=9533
If you wish to make your voice heard on this matter, sign this petition!
Everyone who buys a mobile telephone will be forced to register their identity on a national database under government plans to extend massively the powers of state surveillance. Phone buyers would have to present a passport or other official form of identification at the point of purchase.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article4969312.ece
By any metric the surveillance policies being enacted by the current government are strongly characteristic of both authoritarian and totalitarian governments. This has gone way beyond a matter of polite debate. Our basic freedoms are being systematically destroyed by a coterie of ex-academics, ex-broadcasters, ex-journalists and career politicians i.e. the current government (most of whom really should know better…)
“We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to resist all calls for GCHQ to monitor all email and internet activity within the UK”
http://petitions.number10.gov.uk/privacy-matters/
More detail about the petition here.
After you sign, don’t forget to click the link in the verification email you’ll be sent.
Almost all of the most alarmist predictions made over the last few years are coming true. Little seems to have been too extreme or exaggerated.
Next stop: “We don’t like that free software vendor, one of our “consultants” has advised us it that its offerings might potentially violate patents held by a respected member of our business community, so we’re afraid that their website will have to be blocked….”
Don’t even bother trying to persuade me that this won’t happen. Yes it will. Business and government are going to combine to restrict our choice, compromise our privacy and civil liberties (they’re already doing that big-style, of course), and will attempt to force us to pay for as much of our online activity as they are able. The perpetrators are the new digital authoritarians, turning technology that they didn’t create, champion or (in the case of the majority of politicians) understand, against the general public.
Government and politicians fear the Internet because it enables the general population to have conversations and to access knowledge that those supposedly serving us don’t control. Remember Tony Blair’s moaning about the Internet and how it had made the population much harder to govern? It was prophetic.
I just want to write a string of expletives, but what’s the point?
UPDATE: http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au