Ministers in the UK are considering plans for a database to hold details of every phone call and email sent in the country. Apparently the system will be a “crucial tool” to protect national security and prevent crime. From BBC News:

A Home Office spokesman said: “The Communications Data Bill will help ensure that crucial capabilities in the use of communications data for counter-terrorism and investigation of crime continue to be available.

“These powers will continue to be subject to strict safeguards to ensure the right balance between privacy and protecting the public.” The spokesman said changes need to be made to the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 “to ensure that public authorities can continue to obtain and have access to communications data essential for counter-terrorism and investigation of crime purposes”.

I will never vote for any party that votes for this to go ahead. They are going too far.

Of course, it will never get passed. What will happen is a watered down version of this will sneak through under the radar of the press, chipping away a little more at our civil liberties, something which many Western governments seem to care little about. They want to spend millions in tax payers money protecting our freedom, yet are willing to trade away that very same freedom in the interest of security.

At the weekend I took my daughter to the swimming pool for the first time. I was not allowed to take photographs of the occasion because paying customers are no longer seen as people by management, but as potential paedophiles. It’s blindingly obvious that those in charge don’t give a crap about the dangers of these criminals, they’re just covering their arses should something happen in their venue. Banning phototgraphy won’t solve the problem. It will just make it less likely that they’ll have legal action against them.

In the same way, the goverment doesn’t give a crap about the freedom they claim to be protecting, they just want to be seen to be doing something by voters.

The UK is now a country whose authorities are obsessed with terrorism and by paedophiles. We have suffered at the hands of terrorists in the past and mistakes were made then. The wrong people were fingered for crimes they didn’t commit. Sad though that was, I’d rather live in a country where mistakes are made than one where everybody is considered guilty before any crime has been committed. It bet if these laws were put to statute these mistakes would STILL happen, no more correct convictions would be made, and the collected data would fall into the wrong hands.

I no longer feel trusted by the people who I helped put in power, and whose wages I pay, along with the millions of other tax payers. They need to think about the consequenses of their actions.

Read more at: The National Terror Alert and at Engadget
Photograph licensed under Creative Commons from nolifebeforecoffee

It’s very easy for me to sit here and write a post about freedom…and that’s the point. Within the reasonable boundaries of the law and my own conscience, I can do, say and believe exactly what I want.

But what if that wasn’t the case. What if I was forced to live in fear for my beliefs? What if telling others the truth could result in jail? What if protesting against such intolerance resulted in torture or death of myself or my family? Could I put up with that? Could you?

There are many people in this world that have to put up with that type of fear every day.

Darfur: This is probably the most serious humanitarian crisis on our planet today. The government backed militia are forcibly displacing their population by killing and raping, and by destroying the villages and homes of the farming populations of the region.

Burma: There have been large pro-democracy protests in Burma over the last few weeks, and the military crack-down, and violent threats against the peaceful protesters have prompted fears of a repeat of the 1988 mass killings of protesters. Since the current protest began, the whereabouts of thousands of monks is unknown. The military government have acknowledged 10 deaths, but many more are feared.

These are just two very well documented worst case examples.

In the last few years many of the freedoms in my country (and yours) have begun to be eroded. Usually in the name of “the war on terrorism”. New crime and public order laws have limited many activities and freedoms that we still assume we have. Freedom of movement, the right to silence, the freedom to protest, and the right to privacy, are gradually being eroded and the over use of surveillance is very apparent.

Now I don’t notice these things every day. I’m a straight and narrow guy. But the fact that I notice means that they are already going too far. I pretty much trust the current government in the UK not to abuse these new powers, but what about the future? What happens when some nutter gets into power? What’s then to stop the UK (or the US, or Australia, or Spain) become the next Yugoslavia?

Since 2001, we have been told that terrorism is the biggest thing to fear, but I’m not sure that’s the case any more. I reckon the erosion of freedom is top of my list.

I don’t wish to belittle the real struggles on our planet. The places where it really has gone wrong. I understand the fear of terrorism, but I just think it’s time to start questioning whether the erosion of our rights is a price we’re willing to pay.

Photo by Jonathan Ward

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