The government wants to control what you see online
contribution by Peter Bradwell
Ed Vaizey, Minister for Culture, Communications and Creative Industries, this week confirmed that he is discussing a voluntary website blocking scheme with Internet Service Providers and copyright lobbyists.
There are plenty of reasons why so many people think this is a bad idea and why it won’t work.
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What happened after I got arrested on Saturday
Yesterday, I was arrested outside Fortnum & Mason after the UK Uncut protest, on suspicion of Aggrevated Trespass and Criminal Damage. Below is a summary of my experiences.
When we were inside Fortnum & Mason, the police said if we left we would not be arrested. At 6pm or so, we left, together. The police kettled us outside the shop. It then became clear that they were, one after another, leading people away to be arrested.
Eventually, it was my turn. I was placed in handcuffs, asked on camera for some basic details, then led down a side street by my arresting officers.
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Saturday night inside the kettle
OK, I wasn’t there for all of it, and I am in no position to offer a definitive judgement on what happened in Trafalgar Square on Saturday night. But thanks to my possession of a press pass, the cops let me inside the kettle and I got a pretty good voyeur’s view of the proceedings. These are my impressions.
I did not see any serious violence, and that goes for both the protestors and the Old Bill. I’m not saying serious violence didn’t happen, just that I didn’t see it happen.
Ask me about aggressive behaviour, argy bargy and general unseemliness, and I’ll admit that the activists were hardly angels. But the policing was ridiculously heavy handed for much of the time.
Boycotting the Census is a counter-productive move
During March, people across the UK will be receiving forms for the Census. There are calls by groups such as No2ID and the Stop the War coalition for people to boycott the census, on grounds ranging from protest against state intrusion to concerns about the involvement of US arms manufacturer Lockheed Martin.
It’s perfectly reasonable for campaigners to use the fact that the Census is coming up to campaign on these issues.
But a boycott of the Census is the wrong way to go about this.
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Why human rights for prisoners and even paedos matter
First they came for the prisoners.
A few weeks ago, MPs voted to ignore the European Court of Human Rights to keep a full ban on prisoners. Our Prime Minister put blatant populism above politics, declaring that “giving prisoners the vote makes me sick” (even if that means paying £143 million in compensation from the barren public purse).
Then they came for the paedophiles.
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The Observer bravely stands up for punishment without trial
There was a very odd piece in Sunday’s Observer, running under the headline MEPs putting child pornographers’ rights ahead of abuse victims, claim campaigners.
The piece, written by veteran home affairs correspondent Jamie Doward, says – as a reported fact in the piece, not as a quote from a pressure group:
The European parliament’s civil liberties, justice and home affairs committee (LIBE) will meet in Strasbourg tomorrow, when it is expected to approve a controversial measure that would compel EU member states to inform publishers of child pornography that their images are to be deleted from the internet or blocked. Child pornographers will also have to be informed of their right to appeal against any removal or blocking
The UK a safe-haven for terrorists? Try war criminals
contribution by Spencer Wright
In a dusty corner of the Coalition’s new Police Reform and Social Responsibility Bill lie a series of amendments that really have failed to gain the mass audience they deserve. Hidden away under a rather dimly lit “Miscellaneous” sub-heading, is Section 151 – “Restriction on issue of arrest warrants in private prosecutions”.
The origins of that section lie in events a year ago, when an arrest warrant was issued by a senior judge in Westminster against former Israeli Foreign Minister, Tzipi Livni, for her part in the attack against Gaza in 2008/9.
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Three problems with David Cameron’s speech on multiculturalism
I think the biggest problem with Cameron’s speech yesterday that it missed a vital opportunity to start a more mature and intelligent dialogue on integration and counter-terrorism, rather than continuing the hectoring tone reminiscent of Tony Blair’s government.
My objections can be divided into three areas.
First, it was striking how much it was simply about pandering to the Daily Mail crowd through strawmen, than saying anything new.
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The law doesn’t apply to policemen spraying CS gas
contribution by Gary Dunion
When asking where was the Met’s Defence Council authorisation to carry pepper spray or CS gas, I was missing something.
I assumed it would be an obscure Amendment Act or similar, but it turned out to be a giant elephant in the room.
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Introducing Sukey – a new online tool to help protesters evade kettles
contribution by Tim Hardy
A couple of nights ago, I had the honour to meet the team who put Godzilla in the Thames during the student protests.
Making use of freely available internet tools, they maintained a live map of central London throughout the demonstrations showing the location of police kettles and blocked roads so protesters could stay safe and move freely on the streets of the capital.
Their next project takes this to a whole new level.
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Top policeman has audacity to compare protesting with theft
contribution by Steven Sumpter
The Guardian yesterday reported that Prospect Magazine (£) had interviewed Sir Hugh Orde, president of the Association of Chief Police Officers.
I remind you that the ACPO is a private for-profit company that seems to have a say in the way that we are policed, without being subject to the Freedom of Information Act or any democratic oversight. The interview was very revealing about police perception of social media as a method of organising protests and about their attitude to protesters’ rights.
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The Libdem ‘miserable little compromise’ on Control Orders
Don’t settle for low politics and broken promises: be more demanding. So intones Nick Clegg in his introduction to the ever increasing barrel of laughs which is the Liberal Democrat manifesto of 2010.
Hidden away, appropriately enough on page 94, is another of those promises which has since become a miserable little compromise: the proposed abolition of control orders.
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A significant ruling in the battle for libel reform
contribution by Gareth Winchester
On Tuesday the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) made an important ruling in MGN Ltd. v UK case.
It unanimously ruled that success fees in libel cases are excessive, and breach Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which relates to Freedom of Expression.
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Venezuela: Stop Attacks on Judicial Independence
Just before Christmas I met a Venezuelan lawyer who was in Brazil lobbying for an imprisoned colleague. The story has been written up in the Guardian and it makes extremely disturbing reading.
Since many British leftists still retain some affection for Hugo Chavez I think its point needs to be re-stressed amongst the liberal left.
Judge María Lourdes Afiuni has spent the last year in prison without trial because she granted bail to a prisoner who had himself spent three years in pre-trial detention.
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How voters changed minds on Control Orders
Never mind the ‘liberal intelligensia’, is the public for or against Control Orders? Yesterday the Sunday Times published details of a poll saying that most people supported them.
But it comes down to how the question is asked, as YouGov show today.
The Sunday Times poll for YouGov asked this question:
Current laws allow the government to impose control orders on people who they suspect pose a serious terrorist threat, but who they do not have evidence to prosecute. Control orders can restrict where suspects are allowed to go, items they are not allowed to possess, and who they are allowed to see or communicate with. They do not require a trial and there are only limited rights of appeal. Do you think the Government should or should not have the power to use control orders?
A big majority, 73% say ‘should’, while 15% say ‘should not’; the rest don’t know.
They also asked:
Some people have suggested a compromise, where people subject to control orders would be allowed the freedom to leave their house, but would still be banned from going abroad and have limits on who they could meet. Which of the following best reflects your response to this suggestion?
This time, 38% said: ‘These changes would weaken control orders to an unacceptable extent and put people at greater risk from terrorism’, while 31% said ‘These changes are an acceptable compromise that would impact less on people’s freedoms while still keeping us safe from terrorism’. A further 31% said ‘neither’ or ‘don’t know’.
A clear cut case? Not necessarily.
YouGov also did a poll for the human rights group Liberty, which phrased the question differently:
Which of the following is a better way of dealing with people suspected of terrorism, when they have not been arrested or charged?
• Restricting where suspects can go and who they can meet, electronically tagging them and banning them from using telephones and the internet
• NOT imposing such restrictions, but instead placing them under intensive surveillance and monitoring their communications, in order to gather evidence with which to prosecute them
40% supported the Control Orders option, while 46% supported the second one.
YouGov’s Peter Kellner draws three conclusions from this:
First, our findings are consistent with our past surveys: that if there is a trade-off then, for most people, national security trumps civil liberties. Those who argue for civil liberties to be upheld regardless of the risk of terrorism are in a small minority.
Second, that supporters of human rights and habeas corpus need to challenge that trade-off, rather than argue that civil liberties matter more than the threat of terrorism. If they can win the argument that control orders in practice do more harm than good (for example by alienating ‘moderate’ Muslims or because some of those subject to control orders still manage to evade their restrictions), then they can win over millions of voters.
Third, public opinion is fluid. When minds are made up, then question wording matters far less. People know which side they are on, and are less prone to be swayed by specific words or assumptions underlying the different questions. But when attitudes are less fixed, different questions can produce very different results. That is the position today with control orders.
But the biggest danger to the Coalition would be that the public were convinced that the fudge over Control Orders was engineered to keep the government afloat rather than a concern for civil liberties or public safety.
The cowardly fudge behind the rhetoric of Control Orders
I was at the Nick Clegg speech earlier today. He took aim at Labour’s pretty poor record on civil liberties, suggesting that the previous governments were more systematic and less casual than prominent ex-Ministers would have us believe.
Although there were some fine words on Libel Reform and some interesting proposals on Freedom of Information, most of the discussion in the speech itself, and in questions afterwards, was on control orders and curfews.
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Another case where ‘extreme porn’ legislation is used to police morality
contribution by Pandora
To some extent, I’ve been blithely assuming that the “extreme porn” sections of the Criminal Justice and Immigration Act 2008 wouldn’t have any real effect in law.
I was wrong. This week a dramatic local news article announced that this law was being tested in a “landmark trial”.
In one of the first cases of its kind in the country, Kevin Webster is accused of having “grossly offensive or disgusting” pictures, even though they are “fakes”.
Webster, aged 47, denies three charges of possessing extreme pornography depicting images likely to result in injury to a person’s breast and one similar charge depicting an act which threatens a person’s life.
‘End anti-torture imperialism now’
I am only an occasional reader of Norman Geras’s blog these days, but happy to grant him this late seasonal gift.
I look forward to the upcoming CiF post, ‘End anti-torture imperialism now’ – in which some progressive-minded person lets us know why the prohibition of torture is a culturally relative norm that must occasionally be sacrificed to other pragmatic considerations.
Here is the link Norm, although I am surprised you missed at the time.
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What really worries me in the ongoing war against WikiLeaks
It is somewhat staggering that enough isn’t said about the implications of this ongoing war against WikiLeaks. There is something seriously wrong going on here.
I generally try and avoid conspiracy theories. I broadly believe in the importance of rule of law. I believe in open societies where there is a healthy degree of competition for private goods. I believe governments should also abide by the law and enforce it.
But the system really is conspiring against WikiLeaks.
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Pornblocking – why it would have killed me
contribution by Charlie Owen
The Conservative MP Claire Perry, representing the good constituency of Devizes, Wiltshire, recently suggested the introduction of a Great Porn Filter. Minister Ed Vaizey now says he is seriously considering a voluntary version.
This stalwart piece of software would patrol the borders of our great nation, letting in only the most virtuous, the most pure, the most clean of web traffic.
With the filter in place Britain might rid itself of the terrible addicition to pornography that has brought it to its knees (so to speak) and which has led to all the problems that we now face: student debt, benefit cuts and snow over our noble runways.
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» The government wants to control what you see online
» Is it legal for us to supply arms to Libyan rebels?
» Government prepares to compromise over watered-down banking reforms
» Cuts to back-office jobs will still affect frontline police officers
» Incompetence will destroy this government, not the cuts
» The fall-out from Saturday illustrates the limits of left pluralism
» It’s Osborne who is maxing out the nation’s credit card
» Sayeeda Warsi plays the race card to campaign against electoral reform
» The EMA is to be replaced by Victorian style charity
» Evaluating the #March26 protests
» Adam Ramsay: in defence of posh lefties
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