10,000 “requests” a week to invade your privacy
The figures were published in the annual report of the Interception of Communications Commissioner, Sir Paul Kennedy. It showed that nearly 10,000 “requests” were being made by various public bodies to snoop in to your privacy. Now arguably the security services making requests could be justified but the sheer scale is mind boggling.
The reason I have put “request” in quotation marks is because at this level of activity there is a tendency for the request to become routine and allowed rather than the whole point of the process which is to ask if it is really necessary; therefore instead of acting as a hurdle the process is just something that has to be done with the result unaffected by the content of the request.
In my view these figures are just further proof how amazingly a LABOUR government has been the most draconian in British history in its relentless attack on civil liberties. Gordon Brown had a chance to distance himself and provide a fresh start instead he launched in to his failed macho rush to further increase the time someone can be held without charge.
We were in a family discussion the other day and one of my cousins was being teased about being a “fundamentalist”, he replied he had rights, he turned to me for support. I said unfortunately his rights such as they were would not protect him from being locked for 28 days, and even then he may be charged with something and not be told of what it was. If he was lucky and he was told what he was charged he could be charged for anything from “associating with” to “supporting” banned groups based on as flimsy evidence as his internet surfing records. Even if he did clear himself by then he would probably be bankrupt and unemployable.
I am afraid I am one of those lily livered liberals who believes that if one reacts to a threat by curtailing the freedoms that signify the society as a free society then the terrorists have won because we have changed for the worse.
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