nunoncastors

It is with increasing horror that I read the shite spouted by our leaders; they seem increasingly intent on grinding down civil liberties ‘for our protection’ before turning their new legislation against the very people it’s meant to protect. As a result, I read the following article with a single quote running through my mind, to whit;

“There was of course no way of knowing whether you were being watched at any given moment. How often, or on what system, the Thought Police plugged in on any individual wire was guesswork. It was even conceivable that they watched everybody all the time. But at any rate they could plug in your wire whenever they wanted to. You had to live—did live, from habit that became instinct—in the assumption that every sound you made was overheard, and, except in darkness, every movement scrutinized.”
George Orwell, 1984

Now, at risk of having to don a tinfoil hat and find a black helicopter, it seems that a descent into dystopia always starts with little steps. RIPA for example, was brought in by way of a misnomer in order to ‘make us safer’; our councils instead use it to spy on us. I realise it’s easy to sound like a paranoid delusional, but it’s the kind of behaviour that should worry you as much as it worries me. Anyway, read on.

Database would ’stop terrorists’

Transport Secretary Geoff Hoon has said that not monitoring mobile and web records would be “giving a licence to terrorists to kill people”.

In exchanges on BBC One’s Question Time he said terrorists used the internet to communicate with one another.

Mr Hoon said was prepared to go “quite a long way” to “stop terrorists killing people in our society”.

Lib Dem MP Julia Goldsworthy questioned how far civil liberties would be “undermined” by such a database.

Earlier the government confirmed the controversial plans would not be in the Queen’s Speech.

On Question Time, Mr Hoon said the plans would only extend powers that already exist for ordinary telephone calls, to cover data and information “going across the internet”.

He said the police and security services needed the powers to deal with “terrorists or criminals” using telephones connected to the internet, for “perfectly proper reasons, to protect our society”.

But the Lib Dems’ communities spokeswoman Julia Goldsworthy said it sounded like “something I would expect to read in [George Orwell's book] 1984″ and questioned whether the government and councils could be trusted not to misuse the powers.

She asked: “How much more control can they have? How far is he prepared to go to undermine civil liberties?”

Mr Hoon interjected: “To stop terrorists killing people in our society, quite a long way actually.

“If they are going to use the internet to communicate with each other and we don’t have the power to deal with that, then you are giving a licence to terrorists to kill people.”

He added: “The biggest civil liberty of all is not to be killed by a terrorist.”

The plans were condemned as “Orwellian” on Wednesday by the Liberal Democrats and the Conservatives have called on the government to justify proposals for a giant database containing all internet and telephone traffic.

Details of the times, dates, duration and locations of mobile phone calls, numbers called, website visited and addresses e-mailed are already stored by telecommunications companies for 12 months under a voluntary agreement.

The data can be accessed by police on request but the government plans to take control of the process in order to comply with an EU directive and make it easier for investigators to do their job.

Information would be kept for two years by law and may be held centrally on a searchable database. The government had also promised new laws to protect civil liberties.

Shadow home secretary Dominic Grieve said pulling all the information together in a central server, to be managed by government, “represents a very profound change in the relationship between the state and the citizen”.

In a speech on Wednesday Home Secretary Jacqui Smith said a consultation would be held on the controversial plan in the New Year but did not say if it would be dropped from the Queen’s Speech which sets out the government’s legislative programme for the year ahead

However, on Thursday Commons leader Harriet Harman confirmed it would be delayed after calls in the Commons from the Conservatives and Lib Dems for a debate on the draft Communications Data Bill, in which it was due to be outlined.

She told MPs: “The draft communication bill was in the draft legislative programme and a number of issues and concerns have been raised about it.

“The home secretary makes it clear that at all times, on important issues such as these, she wants to listen to what people’s concerns are, she wants to consider those concerns, she wants to consult on a bipartisan and wide basis.”

On Wednesday Ms Smith attempted to reassure people that the content of their e-mails and phone conversations would not be stored and local authorities would not be able to trawl through looking for “lower level criminality”.

But the proposals came under fire from critics, including the government’s own reviewer of anti-terror laws, Lord Carlile, who said it would need “very strict controls”.

Source: BBC News

So, one more little step toward safety, one little database and terrorism will be banished for ever? Oh, ok then, as you’ve said all the magic words to make me panic and agree, why not? After all, I fucking love hyperbole and fear mongering, they’re the two things I’m most persuaded by. In fact, I’m convinced already.

So I’ll tell you what Mr Hoon, while I set about telling you where I am, what I’m doing, who I’m with, who I speak to, and about what, how about you fuck right off and mind your own business you insidious little shitrag?

Cheers.