This is an extraordinary tale...

I suspect we can all think of better uses for £500 per day - even if it is just burning it to stay warm in the current cold snap.

WTF are we doing this for?

Even allowing for any Daily Mail spin in the story, I find this astonishing.

Has Gordon Brown forgotten the 1980s?

Back in October I drew attention to the fact that Jacqui Smith had attended a G6+US Counter-Terrorism Symposium at which one of the items discussed was "remote searches of computer hard drives".

Today the Sunday Times reports that the Home Office "has quietly adopted a new plan to allow police across Britain routinely to hack into people’s personal computers without a warrant".

In the dead period between Christmas and New Year it emerged that Jacqui Smith proposes to ask private firms to tender for running the snooping über-database under the interception modernisation programme.

The intention of logging details of all our telephone, text, email and web use is bad enough, but is anyone here happy with the idea of turning all this information over to a private firm?

As the recession bites, we press ahead with regulations to allow bailiffs from private companies to break into residential properties, physically restrain those present and seize goods to pay debts - including consumer credit debts such as those incurred on credit cards.

This is a recipe for confrontation, violence and injustice...

Interesting to see two items from tomorrow's papers:

The Times reports another leak from the Home Office, this time of an internal paper suggesting new powers to search WITHOUT a warrant the homes of staff working on ID cards.

The Torygraph draws attention to a clause in the Political Parties and Elections Bill (I suspect this is Schedule 19A, paragraph 1(5)) allowing the Electoral Commission to search WITHOUT a warrant MPs offices or homes.

 

The European Court of Human Rights has just issued its decision in S. and Marper v. The United Kingdom.

Jacqui Smith lost. 

Conclusively. 

In fact it was the unanimous decision of a court of seventeen judges!

 

It really has been quite ghastly to see Jacqui Smith's evasiveness when questioned as to what she knew about the police investigation of Damian Green.

Buried at the bottom of this BBC news item is a proposal from the Progress conference:

Also, forcing local authorities to spend more money on youth services and the creation of civilian security force consisting of military trainers, civil servants, police officers, judges and other logistical staff.

I have seen Obama's ideas for such a force, but does anyone have any further detail of what is proposed for the UK?

Jaqui Smith has announced that £8 million will be spent to issue TASERs to approximately 20% of police officers in England and Wales.

TASERs are already carried by specialist firearms officers, but will now become available to front line police officers who have undergone training.

 

So, 42 days is kicked into the long grass, but Jacqui Smith bounces back with plans for a database to record the details, though not the content, of every phone call, email, text message and use of the internet by anyone in the country...

Forget the ludicrous cost.  Forget the growing evidence that government can be relied on to lose any data it is given.  Forget the fact that any assurances that this will only be used for the investigation of serious or terrorist offences are worthless (look what happened to Iceland).  The real question is whether we want the State needlessly sticking its nose into every aspect of our lives in this way...

As a lifelong Labour voter I am now firmly convinced that we need to lose the next election.  Whoever is driving this nonsense (42 days, ID Cards, Data Communications Bill, etc) is every bit as mad and dangerous as Thatcher on a bad day.  They need to be stopped and the best hope for that - and I hate saying this on every other level - is a change of administration. 

Why are we wasting so much money on this garbage when there is so much we could do to improve peoples' lives?