Welcome to Britain

.....bemused tourists and passers-by wondered what the blank protest banner signified and laughed at the huge police turn-out when told.

Welcome to the party

From the Telegraph:

But then, of course, we forget that the same Charles Clarke who now acts like an old East European interior minister from the era of Honecker and Ceaucescu was once a fanatical student radical who enjoyed his visits to the Soviet Union and, clearly, learnt a lot from them. Equally clearly, he pines after a polity where the executive does what it likes and the media does what it is told.

Is this a new front opening up, a new area of friction where the media actually get serious about the issue of civil liberties in the face of a government that has been running pretty much unchecked for years?

The government has been able to quote its popularity and mandate from the masses as a good enough reason for it to what it wants. ID cards. Detention without trial. The Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill. Protests by appointment only outside parliament. Surges in the use of CCTV cameras. New police powers. On the spot fines or summary judgement light if you like. Databases. More databases. DNA sampling of free subjects. Anti-terror legislation that we were assured would be used appropriately but is now used to eject protesters, hassle hobby and professional photographers and scare old women cyclists.

All the while they quote that this is what's good for the people, this is what the people want. Everyone else is out of touch or stuck in the past. Well now that the media seem to have finally arrived at the party let's see how soon that 'popularity mandate' turns into a 'because we know better', one.

They've been getting away with it because they have not been on the radar of the ordinary public. It's about time that the MSM put it there and kept it there. Government jibes, bullying and insults can only be a good thing. If the media has the stomach for the fight.

Dom has the photos

Dom has pictures of the freedom of speech demo that took place in London over the weekend. There's one placard on show that had me giggling. See if you can guess which one it was.

Also get a load of that copper with his COOL lens. He should really have that strap round his neck, that kit we all bought him looks really expensive.

On ID cards, the importance of the Lords and the calibre of our representatives

The Lords has defeated the government for the third time on ID cards. Expect the government to whip out their get out of jail free card (or the parliament act) as soon as they feel it appropriate. It's a real shame what's happened to the Lords because of the free and easy way the government deals this card. It no longer gives us the same level of protection that it used to, even though the act has been around for a long time. There are no longer any gasps of surprise and shock when someone speaks its name.

Charles Clarke, a very important minister and one who we might expect to be intelligent and thoughtful, told the House of Commons on Tuesday passports were "voluntary documents" that no-one was forced to renew. Honestly, if the calibre of our representatives gets any smaller we'd be hard pushed to find an effective use for them.

Driving licenses are also voluntary documents in as much as you only need them if you want to drive a car. Does he really think that the people he represents (and the rest of us) are that stupid?

Utterly corrupt in thought, respect and principle. He deserves himself and that's about it.

Fox this, I'm off!

You remember that fox hunting ban? You remember all the moaning us pro-hunt bloggers did about it not being about the protection of foxes but about punishing the landed gentry and the posh for centuries of poshness and horses? You remember all that stuff we said about the fox not really benefiting? Well, my dear guardianistas and observeroids, looks like us Toff Huggers are no longer alone:

The current issue of Horse & Hound contains an interview with one Graham Sirl, who says he despises the League Against Cruel Sports and the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals for running a lavish campaign that has now produced 'absolutely zero'.

No surprise that Horse & Hound should condemn the ban as an absurd waste of parliament's time, you might think. And it wouldn't be surprising if Graham Sirl wasn't a former chief officer of the League Against Cruel Sports. He's not alone in giving up on the cause he once championed.

In the past decade, the league has lost two chief executives, two chairmen, one treasurer and one regional head. All of them concluded that an effective ban would lead to the slaughter of foxes by farmers with guns who no longer wanted to keep them alive for the hunts to chase. I cannot think of another protest group that has seen so many of its officers go over to the other side. It is as if senior staff of Greenpeace regularly joined the board of Texaco.

The adverts are on....

...which is why I have this opportunity to make this posting. I urge any incidental readers who catch this posting within the next few minutes to flick over to Channel 4 to catch what remains of the Dispatches documentary presented by Peter Hitchens on the state of liberty in Britain today. There's nothing new there for those of us that are all too aware of what has happened in recent years to Britain and the roll that the state and its agents have played in it but Hitchens brings much of it together in this compelling bit of television.

The state is not your friend.

And STILL they continue to HUNT

Some disgraceful FOX HUNTING news just in. If you are easily OFFENDED by MINDLESS CRUELTY and needless VIOLENCE read no further:

On Tuesday, thirty-one animal rights activists launched a vicious attack on the East Sussex and Romney Marsh Hunt. The attack left one hunt follower in a serious condition in hospital, and several others injured.

This had nothing to do with protest or sabotage. It was a vicious and unprovoked assault by a group of mindless thugs. No more, no less. Sussex constabulary have arrested seven people from London and Hertfordshire in connection with the incident.

Tally ho here we go

And so it begins:

Ministers complain that the upper chamber is exceeding its powers by daring to oppose what was a specific election manifesto commitment and which the government, as a result, is mandated to introduce.

Like I said, any growing reaction against such social control must come from the commons. The Lords, if one is to judge the use of the parliament act by precedent, must be as ineffective from the point of view of the lover of liberty as the ban of fox hunting must surely be from the point of view of the fox.

The Lords now claim a strengthened legitimacy since the house was reformed by New Labour and opposition parties are even suggesting that manifesto pledges are also fair game for the reformed Lords.

None of this matters in the end game. The Lords and it's legitimacy has not changed for the better since the parliament act was used to force through the ban on hunting with hounds. There can be no hushed tones, looks of surprise and expressions of indignant outrage when the government again uses the act for what can only be reasonably judged as more important issues.

It just ain't what it used to be

Over at Samizdata Guy Herbert quotes Lord Rees-Mogg in the Times:

In Parliament, particularly in the House of Lords, there is a growing reaction against such social control [as identity cards]. Most of us think policemen should not be turned into busybodies, warning people not even to discuss adoption by homosexual couples; arresting them for any trivial offence; threatening smokers and publicans; and galloping after fox-hunters. We resent this on behalf of the public, but we also resent it on behalf of the police.

In the history of Britain there have been many periods when liberty was threatened. The immediate threat is a government with a lust for control, with little respect for liberty or for the House of Commons, but enjoying the opportunity of using new technologies for social control. The British are certainly less free than we were in 1997 or 2001. The fightback will be laborious and difficult, but there is a new mood.

One would like to hope but no one can take any great solace from the Lord, or indeed any Lord. The proposition that social control is on the rise and that freedom in many respects is in decline (and by freedom I do not mean the spin doctors definition of freedom from the fear of crime or some such) is, to my mind, true. However, and it is a big however, relying on the House of Lords to do anything about it is like trying to build a bridge from the charcoal of a bridge that was burnt down in haste for less important matters.

The glee on the faces of ministers, MPs, and their supporters in the general public must have been something to behold when the Labour government pushed through the bill to ban fox hunting using the parliament act. I wonder how many of them now are hoping that the House of Lords will gallop to their rescue?

And let us not forget those in opposition to that law were not insignificant in number. If half a million marched through London one can only gawp at the true number that must have been against the ban it in principle, dwarfed only by the number that couldn’t care either way or who thought the whole thing was a waste of time and their tax payer’s money.

The argument that it is right and proper that in a democracy the will of the commons must be obeyed for something like fox hunting must also be true for all other items passed from the commons to the Lords that are of at least the same importance to the nation as removing one method of pest control from a list of methods used to control that pest. A Labour mandate for a resolution of the issue either way is not an argument that can bolster either side.

What proposed legislature does Lord Rees-Mog think falls below the radar of that particular precedent?

Any growing reaction against such social control must come from the commons. The Lords, if one is to judge the use of the parliament act by precedent, must be as ineffective from the point of view of the lover of liberty as the ban of fox hunting must surely be from the point of view of the fox.

If only they could see us now

Had the nazis won the second world war and had they finally invaded and conquered the British Isles there would have been little doubt that lampooning their great leader would have been an offence. Luckily, and with a great deal of effort and sacrifice we, along with out allies, won the conflict. With that in mind it does seem amazing to me that lampooning the leader of the opposition does seem to have become a punishable act.

Well, colour me ridiculously overdone

A young woman recites 97 names of the UK's Iraq war dead by the Cenotaph memorial, gets arrested and charged and is later found guilty of breaking a new law stopping unauthorised protests within half a mile of Parliament. No great surprise there because, after all, the did break the law albeit one that I think is particularly bad.

Then along came a Lord who, for some inexplicable reason, decided to misrepresent our concerns:

"The idea that we take a measure, which is a public order measure, designed to protect our Parliament building, as depriving us of freedom of speech is ridiculously overdone.

Yes, that's right my Lord, everyone who thinks this law is bad thinks that it takes away all of our rights to free speech. The legislation, and everyone is clear on this, prevents people expressing themselves in a manner acceptable in most places across the country within a certain area around of the Houses of Parliament and they (we) complain and protest about it. There is no doubt that it is a free speech issue but it is not one depriving us of freedom of speech in its totality and no one is suggesting that it is. They protest the issue within a context my Lord, which you have chosen to ignore.

After such a brazen misrepresentation of those opposed to the legislation he continues his decline:

"There isn't a country in the world that doesn't take particular measures to protect its Parliament."

As if people were suggesting something different. It would be extremely interesting to draw up a list of parliaments which are protected by a similar piece of legislation however as that is the context, though that in itself would not necessarily change the objection fundamentally.

I can't help but feel that the BBC report misrepresents the Lord in some way. Certainly from their report he comes across as someone lacking in the kind of skills we might expect to be richly represented within a lord chancellor.

He certainly seems to be playing someone elses tune, but can that really be true?

Beer, beer, everywhere and not a drop to drink

The fact that anyone can even consider this to be workable is a very sad reflection indeed of the progress that nanyism seems to have made in Britain:

A LEADING surgeon has called on the Scottish executive to tackle alcohol abuse by limiting pub customers to three drinks.

By appointment only

Do you know what I think says all you need to know about this government and the fools who backed them? Having to make an appointment before you can exercise any right you might think you have to free speech.

Next time an MP or a government slack of any description tries to talk to you or canvas your opinion or tries to express a point or policy directly to you why not ask them to make an appointment first? Tell them why.

Ban this, ban that, look at me everybody

Can Britain's top cops get any more insulting:

The Chief Constable of Greater Manchester Police has called for a ban on parents buying toy guns for their children as Christmas presents.

Michael Todd said seasonal gifts such as replica and ball-bearing guns .... encouraged anti-social behaviour.

Is this really the extent of the sophistication we can expect from our 'top' law enforcement people? I mean, really, if we have got to the stage when they believe that inanimate objects, by some strange and mystical power, can encourage a certain behaviour in our children then we really are in a sorry state of affairs.

It's not just toy guns he wants to ban parents from buying but also knives which further shows the ridiculousness of his position. I mean, is the clamour to all and sundry to "do wrong" of his own set of kitchen knives so strong that he has thrown them out? Of course not.

The reality of the situation is that such objects do not impose or encourage any particular moral aberration on anyone. Bad parenting and poor education on the other hand can do.

I wonder if this particular policeman is aware that the government is already in the process of completely banning the sale of these objects anyway? Almost certainly, so can we assume that he wants to fast track some law to ban parents buying these items this Christmas season because it is unlikely that the current bill will pass before then? No? Then what does he mean? Who does he want to actually ban who from buying what and when? And more to the point why, given the current legislative progress many of us are suffering? In actual fact, what is his point?

I strongly suspect he spotted a camera or a microphone and just opened his mouth. It got him onto the beeb news site at the very least.

This is filthy

At the most recent Parliament Protest:

One policeman was heard saying 'I wish I could join you. I wish I could do what you're doing. This is filthy. This is very hard for all of us'.

Look into my eyes...

...not around the eyes, in the eyes...you're under. From this moment on you will trust us. You will not oppose our ID card scheme. You will love it. You will not worry about your information and any database of that information that we might create. There will be no mission creep. You will believe that there is nothing of greater concern to us than the privacy of your details.

Neil promises us more. If there is real scandal here will it be enough to finish off ID cards?

Beating the Bounds

The custom of 'Beating the Bounds' has taken place in a variety of forms in Britain for over 2000 years. Its origins have roots in many different cultures from across Europe and beyond. In essence it involves local inhabitants perambulating their farm, manorial, church or civic boundaries, pausing as they pass certain trees, walls and hedges that denote the extent of the boundary to exclaim, pray and ritually 'beat' particular landmarks (or even young boys) with sticks. The ceremony might also involve the blessing of crops or animals and the inspection of fences.

Interesting because.

Welcome to the club

Welcome to the club of politically incorrect minority groups. It's not a happy club, but at least it's ours. Smoking within its walls will be permitted for a short time only.

This is the way of things these days. You either have to be well inside the majority (and sometimes this doesn't help) or a member of one of the approved minority groups to get on.

I know full well how Eric feels here. Being a shooter since childhood I have been on the cutting edge of this kind of treatment from the government for decades. It has made me the man I am today.

Just think about this next time you jump on the ban this or ban that wagon. If people cannot stand up for the liberty of others the moans and groans that they will ultimately utter when they fall under the spot light will echo off empty walls.

What's that I hear you say? Airguns and replicas should be banned? Sure, why not? I'll see you in the member's bar soon enough.

It's money in the bank

NO2ID notes within the Guardian that:

“A national ID card for the UK is overly ambitious, extremely expensive and will not be a panacea against terrorism or fraud, although it will make a company like mine very happy,” said Roberto Tavano, a biometrics specialist for Unisys, a US technology company that has worked on national identity schemes in South Africa and Malaysia.

In other news my two friends who are working on this project for the state have been very busy. The speculated ten grand a month that one of them is getting has recently secured him a new Jag. Nice.

The foot soldiers of tyranny

People who frequent pubs and who are demanding that smoking be banned have already made a value judgement about the health risk to themselves. They have decided that the risk to themselves is so low that they have continued to frequent smoky pubs probably for many years if not for decades. These people are supporting anti-smoking legislation not through any overriding health issue but because they find themselves inconvenienced. They are suggesting that it would be appropriate to seriously inconvenience other individuals because of a personal misunderstanding of their own position and a failure in their moral judgement.

History has shown us that people like this have always existed. They are easily manipulated. They will buy any line if they can see that they will get something out of it and they are often happy to damn others for their gain. They are the weak, the foolish, the useful idiots. They rely on any codec that the state can provide them with for their own moral framework.

Oh, that's interesting

So there I was, at the Carlton club in London, to celebrate the Trafalgar victory. Surrounded by the inner enclave of a Tory stronghold I decided that this was probably an opportune time to bring up the Tory party support in principle for ID cards. They looked up from the rather marvellous and well presented lamb briefly and a couple even decided that it might be worth giving this oik a little charitable attention.

I began and a found myself subjected to a half hearted attempt at heading me off at the pass with some particularly inept use of emotive keywords. “Don’t you think that your wife and child should be able to prove their identity and not have it stolen by someone else?”. ”No, not really. I already know who they are and so do they. We’ve know for quite some considerable time and have got by rather well so far?”. Well, what’s sauce for the goose and all that.

My time was short, that I could see even through the haze of a not insignificant amount of celebratory beer. Oh, and the wine.

”The thing is, what history tells us is that the machinery of the state is only ever rarely rolled back. That’s one of the reasons why when it comes to things such as ID cards we have to be very careful. To support ID cards is to not only state that you trust this present government but that you effectively sign up to trusting every subsequent government that might come to power. I simply cannot make that commitment and I am surprised at the Tory support. If the Tory party should be about anything it is about support for the smaller state.”

”Well”, was the response from a rather amiable councillor sitting on my right, ”it’s always nice to hear an alternative point of view.”

Indeed, it was as if this was the first time any of them had heard that particular proposition and that, dear readers, is the most shocking thing of all.

By the way, here's something interesting. This is a photograph of the fire surround in the member's bar. A photograph that I was not permitted to take but one I took anyway. My, I could feel the eyeballs on my back.

It shows the damage caused by an IRA bombing of the member's bar some time ago and was caused by flying debris from the initial explosion at the opposite end of the room. It's a rather strong piece of marble surround with quite a large piece missing.

Terrorism. Nothing new to the Tory party.

Snap happy now sadder

Even the snap happy are noticing the emerging authoritarian Britain:

Having been a photographer for around 30 years, I am getting concerned that police and the £5 per hour security 'jobsworths' are exceeding or misusing their authority under the catch all of terrorism.

Just what on earth is happening?

The wrong arm of the law

Those zany coppers and their New Police Powers:

She was arrested under the Terrorism Act for walking along a cycle path in the harbour area of Dundee.

Ban, Ban, Ban!

Sweet Mother! Reading down a list of RSS fed news sources these days is an alarming activity. Smoking Ban this, Airgun Ban that, Hunting Ban the other. It's like reading the back cover of a book about a "dark and dismal future, where nothing and no one is safe from the ever tightening grip of a state bent on controlling everyone and everything" - "A gripping read" Stephen King, "I almost shat my pants" - Harold Pinter, "Educational" - T. Blair.

I like the cut of this man

Peter Dale, Controller of More 4, said the film exposed a Government that had “curtailed our liberties more than any administration since Cromwell tried to ban Christmas”.

Take that minister down Mr. Dale. Take him down.

Police on 'Standard Form'

"This was a genuine mistake and I am writing to you to apologise for the distress this may have caused you."

This, I suspect, is an approved standard reply from the police to be used whenever they incorrectly use the Terrorism Act to arrest and detain people.

Obviously the guidelines for the issuing of this particular template requires that the 'cameras present at time of arrest' checklist item is ticked.

Fear the truth!

Blair's fashion police at work:

Police arrested a 20-year-old gamekeeper for wearing a “Bollocks to Blair” T-shirt at a game fair last weekend.

A very English protest

A bit more on Sir Ian Blair, his troops and their extra special employers over at The First Post (via Parliament Protest):

Meanwhile, it seems the Commissioner, Sir Ian Blair, is keen to have a memento of a lovely Sunday, which was no doubt why his emissary, a police photographer, took pictures of all the picnickers.

Dredd without the Judge

Sir Ian Blair is a dangerous man and should be sacked:

The Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Ian Blair said "modernisation" of the force should be carried forward by introducing "an escalator of powers" for the dispensing of instant justice.

If someone with a firearms or shotgun certificate spouted such nonsense they would probably have their certificate withdrawn and their firearms taken away. "I believe that certain people in society have the right to dispense instant justice without any of this inconvenient involvement of law courts, judges and magistrates and the like.". Why? Because they would be displaying a serious lack of judgement and a propensity to be a danger to the public. Make no mistake, instant justice handed out by a state police force is a danger to the public.

Consider the whole debate on what a householder can and cannot do when confronted by a home intruder. The police expect the householder to only respond to direct bodily threat and then only up to the point where the householder acts to protect themselves from injury.

If the householder were to, say, hit the burglar he or she would have a great deal of explaining to do and if it turned out that the punch was thrown to deter the burglar from carrying the TV out through the window the householder would find themselves on the wrong side of a courtroom debate.

The same would happen if the householder happened to lock up the burglar in a secure room in the house. The police would prefer that you would use the room to lock yourself up and would be more than happy to charge you at the behest of the intruder with whatever they can find.

It's not for the householder to dispense justice in his or her own home.

It is becoming increasingly apparent that the 'important' people in the police force think that their men and women are significantly different from the rest of us and should be seen as different in law. Super citizens.

Where is the off switch?

What would be the next step, I wonder, in a country that is already seeking to allow the police to arrest and detain individuals for significant lengths of time without affording them the luxury of a proper trial?

What would be the next step in a country where the police are seen as being increasingly political in their actions and motivations? I mean, they already seem to have excessive representation when it comes to deciding what new legislation is required, a situation that is already beginning to motivate some politicians into making statements. The ”police don't run the country” they say. We know that but do they?

What would be the next step, do you think, in a country where the police seem to get away with restraining protesters via the use of approved punches to the face when the subjects they are supposed to be protecting have no recourse to such approved methods?

What would be the next step in a country that seeks to impose compulsory ID cards on all of its population at huge cost when there are countless better ways of spending the billions of our money that such a scheme will require?

What would be the next step in a country whose government has no effective political opposition?

Troops on the streets? Yeah, why not?

We are living under special circumstances at the moment but they will not last forever. After victory, which will come as sure as eggs is eggs in the coming years, will we see all of these special requirements repealed and withdrawn?

I very much doubt it.

You see, even though we know these are ‘interesting times’ there has been no official government declaration of the fact. No specific Act of Parliament around which all these infringements of our civil liberties are structured, such as a declaration of war or some such. No bargain with the people. There is no single event and no single legal article upon which we can say “right, that’s done with then, now we can get rid of this framework that was created to deal with these special times”.

This is the single most troubling issue for me in this war on terror. The government adds to its machinery of power stating that it is necessary for our own good during this distressful period. They do so without offering us any kind of off switch.

And that is crucial, for without one these the new powers for the powerful will never be reversed.

Parliament protest

I have a great deal of respect for people who do this week in, week out. Or even once.

Actions and words, are our liberties actually being 'protected'?

This, I suspect, is a disgrace:

"Before they could even protest about our civil liberties being eroded they were arrested.

"It is shocking that we could not have a peaceful protest in a peaceful country but this is what these ministers want."

The government at least pretends to want our support for their actions on ID cards etc. They assure us that our liberties are actually being protected by their initiatives. Then their agents behave like this.

Sean Gabb on the smoking ban

Holy smokes.

ID card mandarins

So the curtains that have been shrouding the ID debate are opened a little further.

The identity cards saga has, according to critics, now assumed all the characteristics of a classic Whitehall farce.

Labour opponents of the bill claim it was originally cooked up by over-zealous Home Office mandarins who have long wanted to extend the power of the state.

Former Home Office minister Kate Hoey said: ” I know having been through the Home Office in 1998-99 that it was always something that the officials were pushing.”

She added: “It was always floating around even then. Home Office officials have been very keen to bring it up. They are not happy unless they are interfering in our lives.”

When David Blunkett arrived in the job, he enthusiastically seized upon the idea as an antidote to post 9/11 paranoia. However, even supporters of the plans now admit that the government has failed to make a clear case for the cards.

An antidote to paranoia? Whose paranoia? Since when did spending a hundred quatrillion pounds become a reasonable and responsible way of looking like you are doing something?

You know, I never thought I'd say this but I really miss the old fashioned style of politician. The kind that would get up, spout some eloquent and quotable utter nonsense and then go home for a couple of drinks instead of doing anything very much at all. They were so cheap.

Official: ID cards crapper than we said

Here’s a statement on ID cards from the New Labour Party: The government has admitted "overselling" the advantages of national identity cards. The question is who has been a victim of this “overselling”? I speculate that it has been the Tory Party which has failed to take advantage of the normal 14 day cooling off period.

Roll up, roll up, come see the marvel that is Clarke and Blunkett's universal cure all and flatulence remedy - "Snakeoil merchant"

Invitation only

Quick, go here to find out where the special people hang out.

Spread the word

There is going to be a Mass Act of Defiance For The Right To Protest on Sunday 7th August, starting at 12 noon, in Parliament Square. The people at Parliament Protest say more details are to come. Spread the word.

Nope, sorry sunshine, not today...perhaps next week?

Whenever you hear phrases such as Police call off G8 protest march your senses should start to tingle. There's something not quite right with that sentence you might think. I can't quite put my finger on what it is you might fret. Then it will hit you in the face like a state sponsored night stick.

The police have called off a protest march. A phrase that passes virtually without comment with respect to what it fundamentally means.

And there it is. The real story behind the G8 summit. Marvel as no media agency even tries to get close enough to the ball to fumble it.

How dare they? How could they? Because they can.

When and where you protest for your rights and your beliefs is no longer your concern.

We're all ears minister

From the Guardian on the Home Secretaries' outburst against the LSE report on ID cards:

"It's a bit rich for a government minister to accuse a university department of spin and disinformation"

and:

Within days it became clear that only one person's reputation had taken a hit. The second reading of the ID card bill gave the home secretary the opportunity to itemise all the flaws in the LSE research. Clarke - and the combined ranks of the Home Office - failed to highlight a single factual error.

Ruination! Ruination!

You know, there is always a ying for every yang. Many people allude to this truth when they say things like ”well, that backfired on us didn’t it?” and ”I didn’t see that coming”. And so it is with the government’s ban on unauthorised demonstrations outside Toad Hall.

You see the thing about spontaneous protests is that even the protesters don’t really know exactly when they will happen. They are spontaneous. A few friends get together socially, talk about this and that and inexorably the conversation turns to politics. Sporadically this can lead to a spontaneous decision to march on the capital of despotism in the UK to make ones feelings known.

The ruination of the government scheme lies in the common man recognising that this act of spontaneity is their right and, therefore, to deliberately and regularly apply for permission under the toadish scheme to practice these rights.

How many applications do you think it will take before the scheme is laughed out of the offices of ACPO as ”a drain on resources that we could otherwise be using to maintain the level of equality between the rights of criminals and their victims in modern Britain”?

Come on then bloggers, join the we regularly want to demonstrate outside Parliament for one thing or another application campaign. Get those forms off as soon as they leave the press and who’s to say, sometimes we may even turn up at the designated time and place.

Up and at ‘em.

Getting from A to D

Via William Heath of Ideal Government we are treated to this little history lesson:

a) in 1984 the Police and Criminal Evidence (PACE) Act made it illegal for the police to retain DNA records taken from people who were not subsequently prosecuted or convicted;

b) in 1985 British police started using DNA fingerprinting and gave assurances that samples would be destroyed unless there was a conviction;

c) during the period from 1985 to 2000 the police retained all DNA fingerprint data in clear defiance of PACE; the government was aware that the police were acting illegally

d) in 2001 this government introduced the Criminal Justice and Police Act 2001 which included a clause that authorised and retrospectively legalised 15 years of illegal police activity in retaining the DNA records of people who have not been convicted of any crime.

Today we are treated to assurances about ID cards. Now I’m not saying that the ID card business will turn out to be similar, you know, with assurances broken, liberties taken, information recording expanded and access to information widened and even compromised………No, wait, that’s what I am saying.

Where are the conservatives?

Here is just one example of what I hate about politicians. Tory stated policy is not to oppose ID cards as a matter of principle, indeed they have stated that they actually support them in principle. What they do oppose is the current government’s ID card scheme and they will continue to do so unless it is changed so that it can be favourably judged against five distinct tests.

That is all on the record and no statement has been forthcoming from the Tory party to withdraw from this position.

Then we see the following release from the badly named web site conservatives.com. It takes the form of a pledge by David Davis, the Tory Shadow Home Secretary, that a future Tory government would abandon Labour’s controversial ID card scheme. The release is filled with what looks like anti-ID card rhetoric.

….Mr Davis warned that the scheme would "chip away at the basic liberties we would have come to hold dear, and which previous generations fought to protect".

…an incoming Conservative administration would abandon the legislation and scrap the ID card scheme, Mr Davis stressed: "We will not be the party of such a move. The Home Secretary's proposals represent a fundamental shift in the balance of power between the citizen and the state.

And the marvellous closing paragraph …"They are not just excessive, but also expensive. Not just illiberal, but also impractical. Not just unnecessary, but also unworkable. A vision rather like this was originally set out by a man called Blair who later changed his name to Orwell and wrote a book called 1984. It was supposed to be a warning. This government has used it as a text book."

All fine and dandy and all designed to fool everyone into thinking that they are speaking out against ID cards as a matter of principle. But don’t be fooled, they are not.

There has not been a single statement withdrawing the Tory line of support in principle. All the above release from David Davis has said is that they will abandon the Labour scheme. There is not a single promise (would that be worth anything) or commitment to do anything other than this but, I suspect, most people (including the media) will swallow the line that the Tory party is an anti-ID card party hook, line and sinker.

And that’s what I hate about politicians; the politics. They made a statement of support for the principle because they were concerned that opposing ID cards would turn out to be a vote looser. In order to be able to fight for a position distinct from the Labour party they put up certain conditions to their support allowing them room for manoeuvre should their judgement about public support turn out to be false. Now that it looks like there is trouble ahead for the Labour scheme they come out fully against it using rhetoric designed to look like they are anti-ID card when it is nothing of the sort.

It’s all completely unprincipled. They are giving no lessons in anything other than political manoeuvring and they are darkening the very heart of what it means to be a true conservative (or true socialist or true anything for that matter).

No member of the public has learnt anything about what benefits there might be in a smaller state. No member of the public has witnessing a principled stand by an opposition party that is a real advocate of individual liberty. There has been no real progress in the debate and there have been no converts to the ideals of individual liberty due to anything the Tory party has done.

A conservative party would have made a proper fight of it and many, many people could have had that spark of liberty inside of them turned into a brighter flame.

I hate how these quislings have behaved.

Show me your papers

I lost an auction for a genuine WW2 British ID card yesterday on ebay so I'm a bit upset. I only wanted it out of curiosity though so no real harm done. What I was actually looking for was the WW2 German form of ID that civilians had to have, you know the ones that escaping British prisoners would fashion just before going out through the tunnel. I would then use it as an alternative to carrying my ID in my pants. Instead I would place the UK ID in the old and tattered German "papers" and hand the whole thing over whenever asked for my ID.

If anyone knows where I might get such papers please e-mail me.

Your powers are weak old man

Here is a typical example of how a Toad operates. Having to produce your ID card on the street is distasteful to many and amazingly enough the Home Secretary recognises this as an objection shared by many that dwell in liberati circles. To head these wishy-washy lovers of individual liberty off at the pass he has this to say on the matter:

Mr Clarke hit out at civil liberties' fears, stressing: "There would be no compulsion on anybody to show their ID card in the street."

However, he has been rumbled. His powers of obfuscation are weak, barely hiding what must surely be the closing qualification to his ribbiting statement...........However, if they do not produce their documentation in such a public place they will be compelled to accompany the requesting agent to the police station where the relevant documents can be produced in complete privacy.

Putting words into his mouth? Perhaps, but who will wager that I am wrong?

It must be killing them

I'm sitting here wondering who will be the first statist lovebunny to blame the banning of demonstrations outside parliament on the fox hunters. I bet there are a few out there who are trying to reconcile their burning desire to give it to the posh with their fundamental belief that shouting and screaming from close range at the political elite is the duty of every man that has ever got his hands dirty.

The toads of Toad Hall

Sir,

No unauthorised protests outside parliament? You people really are as ridiculous as my father said you were all those years ago.

Faithfully,

It’s interesting, but is it a phenomenon

One of my very first encounters with samizdata.net occurred in the comments section of an entry that derided sporting shooters for their poor defence of pistol shooting. I can’t find the article and my memory begins to fade but I think the general theme was that sporting pistol shooters were arguing the wrong case when pistols were banned. They should have been arguing for the retention of their fundamental rights to have these guns for self defence not simply for punching holes in paper targets at impossible distances.

I argued for the sporting shot whose sole interest in retaining use of their pistols was for sporting purposes. They did not have them for self defence purposes and it would have been dishonest for them to argue on that basis. I believe David Carr conceded that there was meat to my argument.

I have cast my mind back to this incident because of the current threat to another branch of shooting in England (yes, it seems to be the topic of this blog at present) and I have been reflecting upon my journey of discovery that I began as a disaffected shooter with my original and now erased (though I have a copy) web site.

From one search engine to another, from one article to another, from one web site to another eventually leading me to the Libertarian Alliance, Dr. Sean Gabb and subsequently to samizdata.net (still some of my fondest sources of well written material of topical political interest).

This lead me to flirt with libertarianism, the entrance examination for which I would be sure to fail for any number of reasons.

The world of libertarianism is filled with justifiable lament for the state of the gun control laws in this country and many well thought out articles and missives exist deriding the continual infringement of the state on the civilian and the utter failure of the state to reign in gun crime even with some of the most restrictive firearms legislation on the Earth. It makes depressing reading.

And yet most of this material seems to be after the fact, by its very definition too late to have any affect on anything but subsequent stages of infringement. I find it odd.

Where is the libertarian blogging on the subject of the new threat? Where is the incisive commentary from the other freedom loving blogs?

Once again I see a couple of branches of the shooting sports on fire with discussion and worry about further loss and with one or two exceptions the blogosphere in England is like a dusty town in the old west complete with tumbleweed.

I am sure that after the fact, when criminal activity with replica firearms (bb guns etc) continues, the freedom loving blogosphere will be first to respond to articles in the Guardian and the Times with “but you can’t buy those in England anymore” and “it just goes to show that only the law abiding abide by the law”. That will be then (as it has always been) but what about now?

Silence. Quiet.

Something to consider

I will not cooperate with the state or any agent of the state unless by withholding my cooperation I am seen to be breaking the law.

You have failed and continue to be miserable failures

People affect the lives of other people in old Blighty (and I hear in many other parts of the world) on an alarmingly regular basis. They interact, advisee, cajole, help, ignore, pleasure and hurt other people all of the time. Speaking from my own personal perspective I welcome it and on balance it has been a blessing. Though I am perfectly capable of enjoying long periods of time alone and without speaking to another soul I am, as most people are, social.

I like people coming into my life and interfering in a good way. Hey look, we’ve improved this particular model of our BBQ. Would you like to buy it? Oh yes indeed. Fancy a drink mate? Oh most definitely. How was your day? Oh, you know. I love you. I love you too. It’s great.

It’s not all good though. Some people interfere in a bad way and generally do all they can to spoil the very idea of having strangers come into your life. For instance, when we were burgled some years ago. Strangers came into our lives, interfered, and left us worse off than we were before they arrived.

Often, people who interfere fall into groups that can be named. For instance “criminals”. These groups are generally easy to place on either the good shelf or the bad shelf. We categorise them not only by their stated and measurable overall affect on society in general but also on the way they interact with ones self personally and the weighting given to the different types of interaction (remote or personal) is not necessarily a subjective one. A bad personal interaction with a group or member of a group carries more weight than a more remote one.

For instance, one policeman interfering personally can seriously affect a persons view of policemen as a group. It’s not only natural but an accepted way of measuring on which particular shelf a group should go. Your behaviour has brought this particular organisation into disrepute. They would not use that statement and punish (at least in part) on the basis of that statement if they did not recognise the validity of judging a group by the actions of a few. We all do it, it’s just that in the legal world they use fancy statements instead of the layman’s more preferred terminology.They’re all wankers. I hate the lot of them. They’re all the same. Luckily for us people tend to adjust their view over time and recognise the benefits that a group brings. They recognise their overreaction given time and move a group from the bad shelf to the good even if the group was on the bad shelf due to some dreadful personal interaction.

Some groups, and some group members, prove themselves such a bad influence on a very personal level over and over again that one becomes weary and wary of ever moving them back to the good shelf. It’s not necessarily fair but that is the way it is. Local councils for instance. If one were to, say (and as a made up example), have planning permission for a small extension denied, then have permission to remove a large protected tree turned down, then be asked to trim your hedge on a regular basis, then have the street outside made a no parking zone, then be refused permission to put a new sunlight window in your roof and then see the council give permission for a block of flats to go up next door you would naturally put them on the bad shelf on an effectively permanent basis. This would be true no matter how many other great things they do. A few people in planning, following a few rules only to somehow adjust their interpretation when it suits them will result in you being very, very unlikely to cooperate with any council proposal ever again because they have clearly proven themselves to be wankers.

I now welcome two groups into my own bad interfering category. They have affected me extremely poorly on a personal level so many times over a period of a number of years that a briefest glimpse of the good shelf is something that they can now only dream about.

To the Association of Chief Police Officers and to politicians. Your two groups, and the behaviour of individual members of your two groups, over a period of a number of years have personally affected the quality of my life to such an extent that I can no longer foresee a time when, or a method by which, you will ever be considered a positive force. I have had to modify my behaviour so many times that I can no longer enjoy many of the things that contributed so significantly to the quality of my life and I have had to do so at your insistence. You have chosen, because of the actions of people that I have never met, to constrain and restrict my activities and you have done so over and over again without reward or benefit to either myself or to society in general. You have failed and continue to be miserable failures. You will find no quarter and no comfort here.

One man's goose is another man's made up excuse

You know, burglary is a serious problem. It costs people a great deal in money terms and also in other ways too. I'm sure all of you who have been burgled remember the feeling of having been violated. I'm sure the cost of burglary is very high indeed to the country in terms of higher insurance premiums, payouts, police time, court time, prison spaces, lost working hours. The list goes on I am sure.

Yet, somehow, regardless of these disadvantages to society of burglary the government has yet to enforce upon us the need to install burglar alarms and other such anti home invasion devices.

Yet the cost to UK society of identity theft seems to now be the predominant line of the government when trying to justify their ID card scheme.

Any port in a storm.

Scottish ID system

Sweet:

GOVERNMENT ministers were heading last night for a split with their Labour counterparts in Scotland over the introduction of ID cards.

The Scottish Parliament rejected the idea of the cards after an SNP-inspired debate this year. Labour ministers at Holyrood have said, however, that while they will be introduced north of the border to access services reserved to Westminster, such as pensions and welfare benefits, they will not be needed for devolved policy areas such as health, education and transport.

That raises the prospect of a two-tier scheme operating in Britain with, for example, NHS patients in England having to use their cards while patients in Scotland will not be required to present them.

Looks like Hollyrood was worth every penny from where I'm sitting.

Dear blogosphere

Two of my close friends are actively working under contract within a government department helping them to implement their ID card scheme. What should I do? Best answers may well get implemented next time I am in their company and within a particular range (usually coloured red) on my drunkometer.

Comments open (please provide full identification details).

The Jaws of the Trap Are Closing

A most enjoyable and enlightening Free Life Commentary from Sean Gabb:

While the metrication law was upheld, this judgment was the first legal victory for the forces of conservatism. The protection of the European Communities Act was of no consequence, since the first euro-sceptic government we have in this country will leave the European Union by explicit repeal. The significance of the judgment is that it prevents the politicians from shredding the Constitution by stealth. Under this judgment, they can still shred it, but only by openly acknowledging what they are about.

New Labour pest control

As reported by the Telegraph it seems that pest control should not turn out badly for the pest:

The shooting of woodpigeons and crows may only take place in future only if scaring them has been shown not to work, the Government said yesterday.

...

Countryside organisations were informed by Defra that the wording of the latest general licences, which apply to all shooters, was being changed to read: “This licence can only be relied upon in circumstances where the authorised person can demonstrate that appropriate non-lethal methods of control such as scaring are either ineffective or impracticable.”

It looks like the caring, sharing, illiberal bias has saturated this particular government department utterly.

I suggest renaming it to pest herding or pest shepherding instead.

The BASC adds that is simply a clarification to show that the general pest license complies with EU law:

The EU Birds Directive protects all birds with two exceptions: “game” shooting, subject to certain conditions such as closed seasons, and pest control under licence where there is no other satisfactory solution. This latter condition has always been implicit in all such licences. The new wording merely makes it explicit in order to show beyond doubt that the general licence complies with European law.

Anyone who has ever been in Italian or Greek shooting party will know how unlikely it is that they, or their government, will take one blind bit of notice of this EU law.

The BASC advises:

“Those who shoot or use traps to control pests do not themselves have to have tried other methods first. In the unlikely event of an authorised person being challenged by the police he would simply have to state that what he was doing was a contribution to crop protection and cite the extensive literature that demonstrates non-lethal methods to be ineffective and impracticable. He might also add that the Secretary of State for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs states in the opening paragraph of the licence “that there is no other satisfactory solution”.

I am sure most shooters can cite the extensive literature. Indeed I myself, only yesterday, spent a good few hours refreshing myself on the subject matter.

Simon Hart adds:

Even by DEFRA's standards Tuesday's announcement of new far-reaching conditions to the Open General Licences, which allow the killing of a number of avian pests including pigeons and corvids, was spectacularly stupid. Less than eight hours before they were due to come into force at midnight on 1st March DEFRA published the new licences to a limited circulation. It became clear that without consultation, and despite the warnings that had been eminating from the Alliance and others for some months, they had chosen to insert a new condition stating that the licences: "can only be relied upon in circumstances where the authorised person can demonstrate that appropriate non-lethal methods of control such as scaring are either ineffective or impracticable".

All wild birds are protected under the EU Wild Birds Directive. Previously it had been accepted that Open General Licences were issued specifically because the Government was satisfied that there was no other practical solution to a national pest problem other than culling. But at a stroke DEFRA has jettisoned responsibility for justifying the management of such species and placed the onus for demonstrating that ‘non-lethal methods of control are either ineffective or impractical' on individual shooters.

Yesterday DEFRA was desperately backtracking saying: "These exemptions and conditions have not changed in substance as a result of the new general licences". This is clearly nonsense. There was no condition in previous licences about 'non-lethal' alternatives and our legal advice is clear that the new condition is a significant restriction on shooting and makes many forms of pest control completely impractical. The situation does not need spin, either from the Alliance or DEFRA. The new condition means exactly what it means. Every time you kill a crow, magpie, feral pigeon or woodpigeon, among other species, you will have to be able to "demonstrate that appropriate non-lethal methods of control such as scaring are either ineffective or impracticable".

In practical terms this is of course unworkable and, as with other DEFRA diktats, will be largely ignored. But it is the law and however ridiculous it might seem you could now be arrested and charged for shooting pigeons if you cannot fulfil the condition. Our advice is to be aware of the licence conditions under which you may shoot pest species and be prepared to argue that general culling is the only practical method of control. This is not guaranteed to protect you, but should ward off any but the most malicious prosecutions.

DEFRA got itself into this mess by failing to consult properly on its proposals and has completely ignored the Government's own Code of Practice on consultations. The Alliance has already lodged an official complaint about this, and is also working with the NGO, CLA and other organisations to bring a level of sanity back to the open licence system.

How naming things differently nullifies the Bill of Rights

Neil Herron, as readers will probably know by now, is refusing to pay a traffic penalty charge imposed upon him by Sunderland Council. He quotes the following paragraph from the Bill of Rights 1689 as the reason why the charge is not legal:

That all grants and promises of fines and forfeitures of particular persons before conviction are illegal and void

He’s also using case law to show that the section in the Bill of Rights has not been repealed (which is the real driving force behind this story).

Well, back in August he received a letter from a solicitor for the Council who argued that the quoted section in the Bill of Rights is not applicable. The ticket is not a criminal fine but a civil charge instead.

I’m sure that if we had a time machine we could go back to when the document was drafted and signed and indeed confirm that the solicitor is completely correct and that the creators of the document were not at all interested in preventing government levying punishment charges on people in matters of civil law.

“Well that’s it”, said the scribe. “If you would like to sign here, here, once more here and put the date here we’ll have that crown on your head in no time at all.”

“Great. And so simple. Pass me the quill. No, hang on a minute, there are a few things I’m a little concerned about.”

“Oh. What?”

“Well, the title of the document seems a bit, you know, long. I mean just look at it.”

“Yes, I do understand where your coming from on this one but we worked on it for a number of days and An Act Declaring the Rights and Liberties of the Subject and Settling the Succession of the Crown was the best we could come up with. You should have seen some of the other titles.”

“Bad were they?”

“Well, there were a whole bunch of working class types, turnip pickers, mud scroungers and girth cradlers outside last week demanding that we called it The Workers and Workers Families Declaration of Practices, Workers Rights and Implied Cooperation With Working Brothers (and sisters) and Sisters in Workers Associations in this Kingdom. Baldrick wanted to name it after his mother.”

“Oh, well, thank heavens for small mercies.”

“You said there were a few things of concern?”

“Yes, two more. Where it says That all grants and promises of fines and forfeitures of particular persons before conviction are illegal and void what exactly does it mean?”

“It means that people can’t be fined unless they are convicted of an offence first. You know, you can’t just get off your horse and start charging people money for dropping cabbages or failing to clean up horse dung without finding them guilty according to proper process.”

“Yes, yes, but instead of fining them can’t I just, you know, charge them a small fee instead without having to find them guilty of anything first?”

“Oh. We hadn’t thought of that. Well, mine is not to reason why. I guess you could. Can you sign now?”

“One more thing. Where it says conviction is it referring to criminal law?”

“Yes. Yes I believe it is”

“But not civil law?”

“What’s that?”

“Well, if you don’t know what it is the document can hardly be referring to it can it?”

“No, I suppose not.”

“So it doesn’t apply to civil law?”

“No, I suppose it doesn’t.”

“Good. Right. I’ll sign it. What’s the date?”

Ink and parchment

Via The Anglo Saxon Chronicals we have this from the Telegraph. It concerns itself with the interesting issues of which of the UK’s various laws are constitutionally statue (ie need to be explicitly overridden by the will of parliament) and which are not (ie do not need to be explicitly overridden but, instead, are diminished or nullified by new laws in a hierarchical manner – or something like that anyway). Magna Carta and the Bill of Rights were classified as constitutionally statute during the trial of the Metric Martyrs three years ago so need to be explicitly overridden which I don’t think this government has officially decided is a progressive thing to do yet. Give them time.

The recognition of the special status of some legislation in the UK is becoming an issue now. The safety of the conviction of the Metric Martyrs (convicted of selling produce in Imperial measures like pounds and ounces), the right to fine people without a conviction (which seems to be shady legally if the Metric Martyrs were guilty), the governments current plans for restricting freedom of people not found guilty in a court of law and, also, possible issues for various bits and bobs of EU legislation. All these things, it seems, reach back through history to a couple of rather well written inky parchments.

I’ve posted about this issue before and concluded that the state and this government can get themselves out of the various problems that the Bill of Rights and Magna Carta will very soon cause for them. Aged documents which primarily concern themselves with the rights and liberties of the unwashed masses are inconvenient for the powerful progressives who look upon hand written documents as rather quaint but irrelevant in modern Britain. Nietzsche once said:

The masses seem to me worthy of notice in only three respects: first as blurred copies of great men, produced on bad paper with worn plates, further as a resistance to the great, and finally as the tools of the great; beyond that, may the devil and statistics take them.

The parchment bonds which are beginning to raise their voices exist exactly for this reason. For the protection and liberty of the masses that Nietzsche, a great man, refers to.

In the Telegraph article Christopher Booker concludes:

Whichever way the Government plays it, in its continuing assault on the constitutional rights of the British people, this time it is stuffed.

Which leaves me thinking two things. Firstly that I may be underestimating the trouble that these old safeguards will cause for the government and, secondly, how nice it is to see the MSM catching up with the blogs on this story. Mind you, you can't blame them; they simply don't have the manpower.

Wishful thinking?

I certainly hope not:

From private conversation with a Conservative spokesman in the Commons, I gather there is a feeling that the Government would be happy enough for the BIll [ID cards] to stall in the Lords.

Good job it's still legal to hunt rats

Days after the Government's hunting ban came into force, the Rural Affairs minister, Alun Michael has blocked the release of information on his dealings with pro and anti-hunting lobbyists.

The request for information on these talks was made under the Freedom of Information legislation and was declined because the information relates to the formulation of government policy. In other words, it is the information you are looking for.

Pointing out that Labour received a £1m donation from their opponents in 1997, the CA [Countryside Alliance] smells a rat. "I see no reasons other than suspicious ones why these talks should be covered up," says its chief executive, Simon Hart.

The fantabulous case of the Metric Martyrs

Via Neil Herron we have this clear explanation of the mess the Government had to get themselves into to prosecute the Metric Martyrs for selling produce in pounds and ounces.

This argument gave the Government an enormous problem. If they defeated it—by arguing that the doctrine of implied repeal does not apply—they would be admitting that a Parliament could bind its successors and therefore be compromising their own sovereignty. If they were defeated by it, they would have to admit that part of the European Communities Act 1972 had been repealed by a later Act and would have to expect that other parts of it would also turn out to have been repealed. With parts of the European Communities Act 1972 being repealed willy-nilly, it might one day be discovered that Britain had in fact left the EU some years previously. Neither of these possibilities was acceptable.

Blimpish on Hunting

Here is an excellent post from Blimpish on Hunting:

First things first, let us be clear: there is a consensus in this society that animals have categorically lesser moral value than humans, and can be killed at human will. Further, we recognise that some animals are pests and can be killed simply to end their lives, because their existence causes harm to our interests. You mightn't personally like this consensus, but it is the prevailing moral view.

The ban on 'hunting with dogs' does not change this consensus, it simply outlaws one particular method of killing some animals. It is now illegal to go hunting foxes or mice (not rats or rabbits: go figure on the moral coherence there) with dogs. It is not illegal to just go and kill them, but only to do so with dogs.

Now, all evidence I have seen or heard suggests that farmers view foxes as pests, and will want them killed, regardless of method. If the ban were completely successful, this would mean that the farmers would resort to poisoning or shooting foxes. Again, all evidence I have seen or heard suggests that this is worse for the fox, because killing by a pack of hounds is typically sudden and complete, whereas killing by (for example) shot often results in initially non-fatal wounds, which can turn septic or reduce the ability of the fox to survive. (Reports suggest that most hunts will follow the practice in Scotland of hunting the fox as normal, and hiring gunmen to finish the job before the hounds get the target.)

Indeed, I believe that one of the findings of Lord Burns on Hunting was that there was no convincing evidence that Hunting with Hounds was overall any more cruel than other forms of controlling the species.

Naturally, people ask whether we were implying that hunting is cruel... The short answer to that question is no. There was not sufficient verifiable evidence or data safely to reach views about cruelty.

The wrong priorities minister

According to Alun Michael, the rural affairs minister, the hunting ban as not led to a breakdown of trust between the government and rural communities.

He said most people living in the countryside were more concerned with issues like the economy, the health service and their children's future than hunting.

700 hours of parliamentary time were used to force the ban through parliament. How does that figure sit with the minister and his stated understanding of the 'real' issues that concern rural communities?

The end of Old Britain

Katie Grant, yes the one who thinks the English are unattractively soft, yobbish, aggressive and insufferably arrogant laments the passing of Old Britain:

As traditional hunting dies, so, too, dies this valuing of experience and observation, and a mortal blow is dealt to the natural British sense that tradition and history are not just for theme parks. The hunting ban is the final act in a flurry of destruction by the gleeful institution wreckers, constitutional vandals, tradition-haters and petty, jeering class-warriors who constitute the cutting edge of Blairism.

Killing hunting marks an important victory for them, not because it will save any foxes (it won’t) but because it signals to Old Britons that they are finally finished.

And liberty she flew away

"The woodlands where my race has bred
Unto the axe shall yield;
Hedgerow and copse shall cease to shade
The ever widening field."

The ban on fox hunting comes into force today. I've written much about it over the past year or so and regular readers know where I stand on the issue. For those of you that do not, I am against the ban. Utterly. Go ahead and search the archives to find out more if you want. This day was coming, but knowing that doesn't make it any more acceptable.

There are certain events that occur in peoples lives that are unforgettable and unforgivable. Time does not heal them. They are red lines that have been crossed and I suspect that the ban on fox hunting is one of these events for hundreds of thousands of people across the country.

It's that kind of issue and why wouldn't it be? Forcing people to live their lives in a way that is acceptable to a few other and more powerful people is exactly the kind of issue that is likely to raise merry hell.

Some of these hundreds of thousand of people will be angrier than others and some of those will not be able to help themselves in expressing that anger. Any large group will have some people among them who are less able to control their rage. I hope and pray that any incidents will be few and far between and minor.

For some it is no longer about who is wrong and who is right; that process has pretty much run its course and those in the wrong were fortunate enough to have the ear of some of the most wickedly illiberal men and women to have ever held influence in this country.

Like I have said before, I have never hunted and I have never felt the desire to go hunting. That has now changed.

Andy writes:

Do you really believe that huntsmen and women are above the law? Do you really think that punching a woman is okay if you're angry?

The answer to Andy's first question is kind of. They are not above all law, obviously. They are not above the law on Fox Hunting either. However, I believe that the law is wrong on this issue and I would support a policy of civil disobedience on the issue. That is, and to clarify, I would support the continuation of hunting if hunters who break the law submit themselves for prosecution. Read that again Andy, lest you once again missunderstand what I have written.

As to the second question I leave it to the reader to try and work out what other article Andy was reading when he decided to accuse me of thinking that it was alright to hit a woman because one wanted to continue fox hunting and one was angry about it. I said:

Some of these hundreds of thousand of people will be angrier than others and some of those will not be able to help themselves in expressing that anger. Any large group will have some people among them who are less able to control their rage. I hope and pray that any incidents will be few and far between and minor.

I wrote that before reading about the incident Andy refers to and I stand by it now. It is simply analysis based upon what I think human nature is and it seems to have been born out by events. I do not support it and have not said anywhere that I do, yet Andy manages to attribute support somehow to me.

Andy offers me advice: John, you really ought to look at what you've written. I would suggest he also takes a look at what I have written.

Andy adds:

Civil Disobidence is a bedrock of our democracy, indeed as I said above egg-throwing is to my mind perfectly acceptable, the problem I have with John's post is that he seems to consider physical violence as civil disobidence. John is going to respond to that by pointing out that he's never said he supports it, however he has managed to write about it now without even vaguely condemning it. All I want to hear from him is that the Beaufort and the Chiddingfold, Leconfield and Cowdray Hunts have overstepped the bounds of what's acceptable.

I recall writing on the subject of violence (with respect to the anger some are feeling and the incident of the unacceptable incident with the woman) that I do not support it and have not said anywhere that I do. That, at the very least, is a vague condemnation. I certainly consider physical violence as a possible form of civil disobedience, but I do not give it my support. Indeed, I remember as a younger man feeling simply dreadful the day that taxi driver was killed by a protesting miner when he threw that concrete slab off that bridge and it is not something I have forgotten.

Andy wants something from me; he want's me to say that the Beaufort and the Chiddingfold, Leconfield and Cowdray Hunts have overstepped the bounds of what's acceptable. This I cannot do. What I can say is that some protesters have. I condemn their actions.

Tried that, didn't work

This is just one of the many reasons why decisions on when and where customers are allowed to smoke should be left to private businesses:

A pub in Kent which banned smoking last June has said smokers are welcome again after profits fell.

Playing with big fish

Neil Herron brings us this article from the Sunday Telegraph. It’s on the subject of the legality of issuing fixed penalty notices without first finding the recipient of the fine guilty in a court of law. Basically it seems that the practice is either illegal or the Metric Martyrs, found guilty of the offence of selling produce in pounds and ounces, were innocent:

The law making it a criminal offence to sell goods in pounds and ounces was issued under the European Communities Act 1972. But the Martyrs' defence was that this had been overridden by the Weights and Measures Act 1985, which authorised continued selling in non-metric measures. By ancient tradition, when one Act says something different from another, the later Act, by the principle of "implied repeal", takes precedence. But Laws ruled that, since the European Communities Act was a "constitutional statute", it could not be overridden by the 1985 Act, since this had not made the point explicit.

After conferring with the British Weights and Measures Association (BWMA) and Neil Herron of the Metric Martyrs Defence Fund, Mr de Crittenden concluded that, if Lord Justice Laws was right, the 1991 Road Traffic Act could not implicitly repeal the relevant clause of the Bill of Rights, because, as Laws stated, this was a "constitutional statute". Either the automatic penalty system was illegal; or Laws was wrong, in which case the Metric Martyrs should not have been found guilty.

The state, particularly this one, can get around pretty much anything it likes (otherwise it would vanish in a puff of logic) but this case seems particularly prickly.

Naturally the state can argue that it is nothing to do with them; it's down to the courts, but that is not the point. The point is that these laws are created by the state and the inconsistencies that have now become apparent apply pressure on the legal system to re-examine the validity of judgements and processes that might directly affect state law.

Even if you can’t land a big fish, playing the slimy bottom feeder on light rod and tackle can be immensely rewarding, and this particular two barbed hook must be just about as rewardingly uncomfortable as they get.

NO2ID blog

I missed this one. There is now a NO2ID news blog. One for the rss reader and the blogroll.

Update yours today.......

A little freedom now, a little freedom gone forever

Phil, over at Limeypundit, goes into more detail regarding his musings over Blair and the war on terror. I read it last night and he made a lot of sense.

This got me to thinking about yesterday’s posting while coming into work this morning. I wrote what I did yesterday instinctively which is, as I have said before, how I tend to naturally approach subjects. I wrote it in spite my recognition that there is a war on (unusual though it may be) and that Blair is generally doing a good job in facing up to it.

Why? That was the question I found myself facing from myself this morning.

The war on terror is portrayed as a conflict of ideas and of cultures. Islamofacism against the west. This simple view is complicated by the fact that there are people who are easily lead into one cause or another by the rhetoric of hero figures and important men. That’s a human condition that occurs in all cultures to some extent (though some more than others) and it does complicate things but the rhetoric coming from these figures currently stands upon the foundations of Islamofacism so we will be inclusive here.

Blair is facing up to this challenge but it is not because of him that I believe we are going to win. We will win because of what western culture is. No, I am not talking about TV and consumerism here, nice as those things are. I am talking about the ideas that made the west what it is today.

My instinctive posting was born from this question. If Blair or New Labour were not in power in Britain do I believe that the war on terror would be lost? My answer could not be anything but no, it would not.

Today I got round to asking myself why not? Well, It’s because I believe we will win due to existence in our culture of exactly those things that New Labour are treating with such disrespect. Those very things that I respect the most.

I respect traditions that have served us well for centuries. I have a strong live and let live approach to life. I like to take responsibility but I dislike being told what to do. I believe that, even though we are a democracy, it is right and proper that minorities should be protected. I believe in the rule of law and that the law can only rule if it is respected. I believe there are good reasons to offer violence up to your fellow man but that if you do so without good reason you should expect to receive more in return than you are comfortable with. I believe the state should be here to ensure individual freedom, to provide for the weak and needy, to protect the nation and to otherwise keep out of the way. It is because of the existence of these things, and more, that I believe we will win.

Now, I fully accept that some of the above swing from one measure to another over time and through different governments but they are robust ideas. It just so happens that I think New Labour are flexing some (note, not all) of those ideas in a very dangerous manner indeed.

We will win the war on terror and, I think, it could take many decades to do so. Blair will be gone within 4 (give or take). Who knows how long New Labour will be in and out of power in that time. What I can say is that I do not think they are doing us a service by eroding the very things that the enemy hates about us.

One, two or three or more years of Blair may shorten the war. It may not. Either way it is going to be a long one. But New Labour are doing things that I disagree with that will quite possibly last for centuries.

Don’t believe me? Which government will repeal the Civil Contingencies Act? That’s right, none of them. It would not be in the nature of the state to do so.

Tories - for and against ID cards

Though still managing to support the notion of ID cards in principle it seems that the Tory party will, more than likely, abstain from a key vote on the issue. Bishop Hill points us to this Telegraph article on the apparent Tory climb down.

It looks like the Tories are excusing themselves from the vote because some questions they have raised with the current government remain unanswered.

Hardly a cry for liberty.

Of course sophisticated commentators might suggest that we read between the lines here. The Tories are just seeking a way of removing their support for ID cards in principle without causing huge embarrassment to themselves. Ahhh, diddums, would be my reply. The manner in which the Tories are extricating themselves from the vote does not constitute an undertaking to not impose ID cards as a matter of policy were they to form a government.

Remember the sources:

Sources within the Conservative Party told the BBC Michael Howard has always been in favour of ID cards, and tried to introduce them when he was Home Secretary.

The party has been "agnostic" on the issue until now but had now decided to come off the fence, the Tory source said.

Howard is not anti-ID cards and never has been. The best that we can hope for with him as leader is a party that is agnostic on the issue and that policy does not serve those of us who are against ID cards well.

We need an opposition that is against ID cards in principle and in practice and it needs to be seen as such for the debate to be won.

Wolfie, over at the Liberty Cadre, lays into the Tory position.

ID news

Two interesting bits of news from the latest NO2ID newsletter catch my eye. Firstly they have set up some discussion forums. Secondly they have a small piece up on the abolition of ID cards in 1952. Apparently, back in those days, ID cards and the National Registration Act tended "to turn law-abiding citizens into lawbreakers, which is a most undesirable state of affairs.". Those crazy olden day people.

Does anyone take liberty seriously anymore?

The conservative party baffle me often these days. For instance, did you know that they can suspend you as a candidate if you are pictured holding various legal and legitimate items of private property?

A Conservative Parliamentary candidate has been suspended after he was pictured on the internet with a range of guns, rifles and a hunting knife.

Sheesh, I guess that would exclude me from ever being a candidate (not that that's going to happen any time soon).

NO2ID set phasers to "disintegrate"

The folks over at the NO2ID campaign disintegrate the government's response to the NO2ID online petition.

And it will solve what exactly?

Oh for pity’s sake.

Hunting the consequences of an injunction

We know that the Countryside Alliance are to fight the Act of Parliament that bans hunting with hounds on two legal fronts. The first case attempts to cast into doubt the legitimacy of the Parliament Act which was used to push through the legislation after the House of Lords refused to allow it through in the form preferred by the Labour back benchers. The second case appeals to the court of human rights on the belief of the Countryside Alliance that the ban is an infringement of human rights.

The first case is of greater interest at the moment because we understand that the Alliance are seeking an injunction that will allow hunting to continue until the case is answered. The government have already made it plain that they will not seek to fight this injunction the result of which is likely to be that hunting will continue until after the general election.

I have considered this move by the Countryside Alliance as a mistake because it diffuses a situation that would not serve the Labour government well during their election campaign ie hunters breaking the law, media coverage and the like.

This analysis by the Times of the situation, however, reveals a level of legal and political chicanery that simply boggles the mind. On the subject of the government quite possibly escaping election rampaging by country rebels the article states:

Are the Government’s troubles then over? Far from it. It will, in fact, have impaled itself on a hook of its own making. It is surely inconceivable that even this Government can justify not opposing an injunction in one of the two legal cases that the Countryside Alliance is bringing and then go straight on to fight an identical injunction in the other.

Much the stronger of the Countryside Alliance’s twin actions is the one being brought under the Human Rights Act — which, though incorporated into English law, still offers a final right of appeal to Strasbourg. In a case of this kind it is not unusual for that process to take up to six or seven years. Which means that the cry of “Tally-ho” (irreverently included by the Prime Minister not so long ago in one of his party conference speeches) could still be heard in the land up to and beyond his own proposed retirement date.

And what do you think Labour backbenchers will make of that when the penny drops? My own prediction is that figures such as my old friend Sir Gerald Kaufman will simply go ape. And quite right, too. For they will have been the victims of one of the most shameless pieces of politicolegal chicanery that this country has ever seen.

Simply astonishing. If this turns out to be the case (and this is by no means certain) and a second injunction is allowed to extend hunting by such a long time then I take my hat off to the Rebel Alliance. They will have pulled off the greatest piece of sabotage since a small droid and a girly princess stole plans for an almost battle ready space station from under the very noses of their own evil empire.

SAS storm commons

I've been very busy of late which is why blogging has been slight. This interesting bit of news from the Blognor Regis blogger, however, cannot be allowed to pass by without at least a couple of raised eyebrows from yours truly.

I await the McNab book and suggest "Where Beagles Dare" as a working title.

What is the rebel plan?

This hunting ban delay. I don’t get it. I had convinced myself that the Rebel Alliance were quite capable of playing a good game regarding the ban on fox hunting. I once wrote that the rebels were sophisticated enough (bad word, perhaps knowledgeable or experienced would have been better) to fight for their freedoms within the context of state institutions. It certainly looks like that is being borne out by the rebel injunction which could delay the ban for up to a year but can that really be the game? Is the delay really what they are playing for? The cost of the delay is to give the government an easier time come next years general election, the very time when the alliance could have quite conceivably done some harm to their enemy. There would have certainly been quite a bit of media coverage.

A cynical deal, some say, but in such deals both sides generally gain some advantage and I can’t see the few months of extra hunting as a real benefit.

So it’s something else, but what? The advantage to the government is clear but what of the rebel base, The Countryside Alliance?

Could it be that they are trying to diffuse a potentially nasty situation come the general election? Is this ploy their attempt at controlling the more militant sections of their loose alliance of country folk? Are they trying to avoid exactly the same bottom line situation that the government are, namely lots of nasty goings-on focused on and probably increased by the single event of the general election and all the negative media coverage that could bring to both the alliance and the government?

If this is their gambit and word gets out then this could be a catalyst for even more polarisation in the rebel camp.

If I were a golfer

I sat there with the samizdata comments window open for quite a while before I decided that there wasn’t really very much I could say that hadn’t already been said. I did wonder at Perry’s reaction to the impending introduction of ID cards and imagined the cries of “overreaction” from around the blogosphere, cries that I have not yet gone looking for. Indeed, the thought had crossed my mind that planning to leave the country does indeed have the hallmarks of overreaction stamped all over it.

But then I caught myself.

How could I possibly know how Perry should have reacted? Sure I can judge what my reaction might be to any situation but I am me and I have a certain amount of insider knowledge. But I don’t know Perry at all, except through some of his writings.

If I were a golfer and golf was my life I’d spend a lot of my time outside playing golf. When I was not outside playing golf I might take to the Internet to read about golf or, perhaps, to choose what new golfing accessories I might buy. I might even buy some. I could imagine being very excited by the idea of these new accessories being delivered. I might even think about them when I was out actually playing golf. If I were a golfer and golf was my life.

Now imagine golf being restricted or banned outright. How would I react? How should I react? What would be overreaction and what would not? If I took myself and my clubs and left the country for one that allowed golf would it be an overreaction or simply a reasonable thing that reasonable people could be expected to do? Frankly I think it would be perfectly reasonable.

What if the thing that was such a big part of my life was something other than golf. What if it was pistol shooting or fox hunting? What if it was something less sporting, perhaps an idea? What if my thing was writing about and criticising a particular religion? What if I lived and breathed a particular political idea, or moralistic point of view and one day that idea or point of view was damaged so badly that I could see no future in it any longer in the country I lived in. What if I had drawn a line in the sand and that line had been crossed? Would it be an overreaction if I chose to make my plans to leave?

No, I don’t think it would be.

The ultimate, most profound, fundamental civil liberty in the world ever

In a Times article titled ID cards defend the ultimate civil liberty Charles Clarke, our brand new home secretary, gives us a lesson in the most fundamental civil liberty in our society:

I claim that the ID Cards Bill that I am introducing today is a profoundly civil libertarian measure because it promotes the most fundamental civil liberty in our society, which is the right to live free from crime and fear.

This is a whole new level of libertarianism that I was not previously aware of and I thank the man for his insight. Just imagine, a life without fear. How could I have missed that fundamentally ultimate libertarian aim.

Got a vertigo problem? Get an ID card, the ultimate promoter of your right to live free from your terrible affliction. Want to talk to that girl you’ve been too scared to approach? Hey, that’s fear baby and it’s your right to live a life devoid of it. Flash her your ultimate plastic friend! Frightened that your finances continue to spiral out of control? £85 quid for your poverty busting plastic pal and it’s sorted.

Of course, some folk don’t actually subscribe to this no fear brand of civil libertarianism. Libertarians for instance. Fear leads to aspiration. Aspiration leads to action. Action leads to either more fear or less fear depending upon the quality and execution of the plan.

Of course, I’ve ranted.

Clarke was just throwing in a soundbite and he probably was referring to a particular kind of fear, say, terrorism. But honestly, it is hard for us to imagine ID cards as the best tool for that particular job given that it is far easier to imagine the affect that three and a half billion one pound coins could have on a terrorist if used in a more imaginative manner.

I fear that Clarke is guilty of a certain level of woolly thinking on this whole freedom thing so I offer him a little educational material, by way of this short message, which is a great deal deeper than its shallow surface would otherwise suggest:

Clarke. Shut-up. If you want an ID card go right ahead and buy one. I don’t, so piss off.

That, my friends, is my brand of ultimate civil libertarianism.

Shoo Minister

Ohh, ho, ho. It seems that Anti fox hunting Rural Affairs Minister Alun Michael has penned a letter to the Western Morning News from within his underground bunker somewhere beneath Whitehall. I feel sorry for the rural postman that had to deliver it. It’s not easy having to gallop at full speed through field and village these days, what with the rebel alliance and its sympathisers hiding behind every bush. Even stopping for refreshment in a local pub could end in disaster.

Have you noticed that the government never publishes official figures of the number of dispatch riders (or posties as they like to call them) who never return? It’s because they don’t want to scare you.

Anyhow, somehow (and the postie cannot be found to confirm this) the Minister’s letter has come to the attention of a local rebel printing press called This is Devon, probably based in a large barn and well hidden by stacks of straw bales. The type was set and this excellent rebuttal to the Minister is the result.

I will pick out some juicy bits (which is most of it) to save you having to find the nearest tree (or postie) to which it is pinned:

[The captured government propaganda], seeking to explain and justify the hunting ban, is a catalogue of misinformation, wrong-headed conclusions and downright nonsense.

…

…we have no respect whatsoever for the cynical, spiteful, two-faced, hypocritical manner in which the hunt ban has been introduced, and will now be implemented.

…

Mr Michael's first pious point is to plead for sympathy for the introduction of the legislation insisting: "No one could have tried harder than I did - for three years - to persuade hunt supporters and opponents to find common ground...But the hunters did not want to allow the slightest compromise on their pastime." That is questionable in the extreme. A more accurate assessment would have been to admit that Labour's own backbenchers, sensing an historic victory in the class war against hunting "toffs", could not be persuaded to compromise by ministers who were becoming increasingly anxious about the impact of the ban.

But it gets much worse. Mr Michael goes on to claim public support for the hunt ban alleging that opinion polls "have consistently shown that most people oppose hunting, although the vast majority do not feel strongly either way..." Here Mr Michael is playing fast and loose with the English language. How can anyone who doesn't feel strongly "consistently oppose hunting"? It doesn't make any sense.

…

In another outburst the Minister comes over all wounded, complaining that to suggest the law was based on bigotry and prejudice was "an insult to the integrity of MPs of all political parties." Do us a favour, Mr Michael. MPs only got the opportunity to tackle this issue because your Government and your Prime Minister was up to his neck in rebellious backbenchers furious over the war in Iraq and needed to buy them off. So no lectures on integrity, please.

…

But it's when he gets to the Act itself and the way it will be implemented on the ground that Mr Michael really begins to beggar belief. "The Act," he pompously writes "is simple to understand, obey and enforce." If the minister really believes that, then he must be the only person in Britain who does.

…

One particular phrase exposes Mr Michael's woeful failure to understand the countryside and the effect the hunt ban will have. He says we'll still be at liberty, once the ban is in place, to "shoo" any fox, hare or deer off our land, so long as no dogs are used. What a pathetic Islington drawing-room view of the countryside that conjures up; of landowners shooing away obliging little foxes, to keep the baa lambs and the clucking hens safe from harm. How depressingly that nonsense underscores New Labour's abject ignorance of the countryside.

I love that bit. Shoo. Hehe. Shoo. Nope, I can’t see it myself.

A little while ago I wrote on the subject of farmers not cooperating with state agencies and private enterprise as part of the rebel alliance plan to frustrate the authorities. I said:

So, let’s see if we can spot the first accusation from a government mouthpiece that this kind of behaviour is petty and counter productive. At that point we will know that it is starting to have an affect.

Which brings me to this bit of the remarkable rebel rebuttal:

As he founders on, the Rural Affairs Minister digs himself into an even deeper hole with a truly astonishing attack on the landowning hunt supporters who are fighting back against the hunt ban by refusing the public utilities and the Ministry of Defence access to their land. He says such tactics are "unacceptable." But since when has it been unacceptable, Mr Michael, for a land owner to use his own land as he sees fit? Or is that the next thing New Labour is planning to clamp down on?

Unacceptable; a stronger word than I expected for the first sign that things were biting.

When I was retrieving the This is Devon dispatch from the side of a large old oak I was startled by a youth who jumped out from a nearby bush and pointed a rather large farm implement at me.

”Are you a postie!?”, he demanded.

”No, I’m a friend.”

”Be on your way. You look like city folk to me an’ I ain’t gonna be avin’ any of that I can tell you. Go on, ya big tosser ‘for I stick me fork in you!”

Sticks and stones may break my bones but you’d have to catch a train to London to find the rural affairs minister.

From the hunters mouth

By the way, lots of new stuff posted over at Liberty and Livelihood recently.

A day in modern Britain

So, myself and the good lady have just this second got home from a rather fine showing of the young lads school nativity play. Most enjoyable.

At the end of the performance the head mistress stood up and addressed the crowd. ”I notice that some parents have been using video equipment and digital cameras. To comply with child safety regulations I would ask you to visit the office before leaving to leave your details. Thank you.”

Needless to say I did not comply, but I was somewhat disappointed to note that many, if not all, other parents did.

You may think less of me for not complying, after all what harm can it do and I would agree that, on the face of it, not very much. However, as another example of step by step state intervention in the day to day living of the average family I chose not to because if people do not refuse to comply with such things there is little or nothing preventing the ratchet from once again locking into another tooth of the gears of government intervention.

I am guilty of nothing and would, had I been accosted by someone for my refusal, have most definitely kicked up more of a stink than they could have possibly enjoyed.

The eye of the storm

This notion that ID cards have the support of the vast majority of the public makes me feel blessed. Blessed that I somehow keep managing to bump into people who, through some extraordinary twist of fate, are at odds with the vast majority. Lady luck must see me as her very own for the same thing has happened with fox hunting, smoking and sporting pistol shooting. My little area of suburbia must be, by some extraordinary quirk of fate, saturated with sinister globalist illuminati hell bent on living their lives in what can only be horrifically described as a rationally individualist manner.

Fox hunt ban news

Magistrate quits over hunt ban:

"Magistrates have been trained to recognise prejudice against minority groups, and we are encouraged as responsible members of society to help stamp it out. It is ironic that we now have this."

Also interesting is this recent ICM poll which suggests that 70% of the public believe that the police should not enforce the ban on hunting when the legislation comes into effect in February.

And then there's this.

Not, not, not

Blair on what the people want:

"People aren’t disengaged - but they do feel disempowered. They no longer want or expect government to solve all their problems.

"They want the means in their hands to lead their own lives, make their own choices, develop their own potential.

"People don’t want a minimalist state, but nor do they want the old centralised state. Instead, they want the state to empower them, to give them the means to make the most of their own lives."

Indeed, I feel empowered to no longer take up Fox Hunting, not smoke in the local pub, not learn how to master that .22 target pistol that I had trouble with at University, not buy my son an air rifle when I feel he is old enough and responsible enough for it, not to walk around without having a state approved ID card.

The man talks the talk. He sounds convincing and, I suspect, he really believes what he is saying. But the truth of the matter is that increasingly many of us are not being allowed to do the things that we would like to do.

No surprise there then

Here's an interesting bit from the latest Computing magazine on ID cards:

The government is working with the private sector to determine how [to use] ID cards for a range of commercial transactions.

If adopted, the plan would create a central audit trail of every citizen's major transactions with both government and business.

...

Mike Rodd, external relations director at the British Computer Society, says the proposals go far beyond what was ever intended for ID cards.

'The potential to connect and collate information about people that may be commercially sensitive will make the population at large very unhappy,' he said.

'To create this huge database of information starts smacking of some sort of authoritarian state. This could really cause an outrage.'

So, any major(?) transaction you have with a private business could suddenly become the business of the state.

I wonder what the resolution of the data might be. For instance, if I were to buy three or four copies of The Catcher in the Rye in, say, a week would any alarms go off in some darkened room below Whitehall?

Booze throughout the ages

Dumb Jon takes a pool cue to the anti-drink brigade:

Yet, amongst the hysteria, there's something fundamentally reassuring about the prohib's position. Let's not worry that our society really is becoming more violent, let's not worry that increasingly large parts of the public think it's OK to behave like animals. Nope - it's all the fault of Scottish & Newcastle and the rest of their fellow low-lifes. They make people put shop windows through. Let's not blame the criminals. They're victims too. They need lurrrrve, and a big hug, and a ….

No, enough already. Let's hear no more about the epidemic of 'binge drinking'. Contrary to enemy propaganda, there was never a time when working men went out for a night and returned home after two lager shandys. The story of Britain is a story of collective drunkenness. We could have stayed sober, we could have built the kind of exemplary society now to be found in Iran, but we didn't. We got hammered, but never in their most drunken moments did our ancestors think that downing a few pints was a reasonable excuse for getting together with six mates and kicking some guy to death. Now, it appears, we increasingly do. Yet, staggeringly, violence has gone through the roof. Who'd have thunk it ?

I know it's bad form to quote so much of another’s post without adding something of value but I thought it wise to place this text here, errrmm, as a backup just in case the L3 ever find out who Dumb Jon actually is and, you know, prohibit him.

Welsh Pro-hunt protest

This this pro-hunt protest seems to have let the side down. There is no place in the pro-liberty campaign for racist and homophobic insults and I hope that the majority of the protesters will take it upon themselves to eject these idiots from their ranks whenever they find them.

Frankly, I'm surprised at the above.

However, this I am not surprised at:

'Unfortunately, factions within the crowd were intent on a non-peaceful response and caused considerable disruption," he said.

"At one stage, missiles were thrown and previously unseen levels of aggression were shown to police officers.

There are always going to be people who will, when they feel strongly enough, behave in this way towards the police. The police are the enforcement arm of a government that the fox hunters feel has let them down badly and I fear that things will only get worse before they get better.

The same event reported by The Scotsman.

The same event reported by icWales.

The same reported by the Guardian.

Only the Beeb reports racial and homophobic abuse.

Neil on England

Neil, over at German for Beginners has a three parter up on England, his country and why he is no longer a supporter of New Labour.

I can't help feeling that many of us are rapidly running out of people to vote for.

Who's to blame, do you think?

You are not alone

A little while ago I wrote that Blair's New Labour Levellers are a shambles on the freedom front. They wouldn't know what freedom was if captain freedom himself beat them half to death with his freedom bat. Well, it seems that many others are thinking along similar lines:

An overwhelming majority of voters think the Government is going too far in restricting individual liberties on issues like smoking, smacking and fox-hunting, according to a poll released today.

Some 71% of people questioned by ICM for thinktank Reform agreed that too many “infringements on personal liberty” were being proposed.

And the poll suggested Prime Minister Tony Blair was even alienating his own supporters with “nanny state” legislation, with 62% of Labour voters agreeing too many restrictions were being imposed.

Also carried by The Adam Smith Institute blog.

Chicken hunt?

Another protest ,another failure to attend:

MORE than 150 pro-hunt campaigners turned out in Todmorden yesterday to protest at the Government's ban on the sport as a conference met to discuss the future of the countryside.

...

Rural Affairs Minister Alun Michael, who piloted the recent legislation to ban fox hunting through Parliament, had been due to address the conference, but failed to attend.

Meanwhile, another huntsman states that he will continue to hunt after the ban comes into force.

And another who says:

"The whole thing about democracy is it only works if you respect minority views"

Not strictly the case but I know where he's coming from.

Democracy is loosing respect among disaffected minority groups. What a legacy.

More farmland off limits

So another pro fox hunting farming family begins a campaign of non-cooperation:

Pat and Raymond Ford are withdrawing permission for an overhead electricity line due to be built across their land at Alverdiscott, near Bideford.

Mrs Ford said: "We are very sad that we have come to this situation.

"But we feel that Parliament has not listed to us."

Geoffrey Cox at Witheridge has written to the water companies, Western Power Distribution, BT, Devon County Council and environment ministry Defra.

The letters say that access to his farm is prohibited unless prior written permission is sought.

But if vehicles are allowed in, they will have to be disinfected and pressure washed according to a strict interpretation of government guidelines.

I love that last bit.

So, let’s see if we can spot the first accusation from a government mouthpiece that this kind of behaviour is petty and counter productive. At that point we will know that it is starting to have an affect.

It's a tally ho, tally ho issue

It is interesting that the virtually unemployed John Prescott, the deputy prime minister, should admit this about fox hunting:

"I think the majority of people in my constituency, quite frankly, see it as one of those tally ho, tally ho issues and nothing to do with modern Britain."

Of course, what he really means when he quotes his constituency is that this is what he thinks about fox hunting.

Why interesting? Well, because he doesn't mention cruelty. It's a tally ho, tally ho issue. I think it's clear what he means by that and it is not incompatible with the opinion of Peter Bradley, the parliamentary private secretary to Alun Michael, that the fox hunting issue was at least in part a class war.

Now, some of you might accuse me of putting words into Prescott's mouth by equating his tally ho comments with what I think he means. In my defence I would like to say that someone needs to put words into his mouth and that it might as well be me.

Cruelty is not the only measure

The UKPoliticalHack says about fox hunting:

Licensing was a cop out. If we're banning it because it is cruel, then licensing it does not reduce the cruelty.

I would say that fox hunting is not being banned specifically because it is cruel. There are many other things that go on in our society that are cruel which are not being subjected to bans. Battery farming, for instance, or the killing of animals for the table using traditional religious methods.

Cruelty alone is not generally accepted as the deciding measure for a ban, no matter how many MPs might say it is.

The real measure is even more subjective than that. It’s about the balance of cruelty inflicted measured against rewards or benefit gained.

One result of banning battery farming would probably be a significant inconvenience to the majority of the electorate both in terms of scarcity of product and, consequently, the cost of that product.

A result of banning the religious preparation of animals for the table would be a minority backlash by a group more in favour with the authorities because of their claim to a religious right to the activity.

With fox hunting the perceived balance of cruelty against benefit gained is seen by the Labour backbenchers and their supporters to be in favour of the ban. To others who have a slightly (or very) different subjective idea of the balance the ban seems wrong.

Pest control will take place regardless of the loss of one method of control and I suggest that, though it might act as part of the balance towards the defence of fox hunting, it is really only a very minor consideration, particularly with those such as myself who do not hunt and who perhaps are not that aware of the details (only what we have read in the government report).

What I would argue is that the main item of consideration for the pro-hunting side of the balance is quite simply liberty. The belief that an individual should be free to do what he or she wants as long as it does not hurt another person. More than that it is their strength of belief in that principle. At which point do they decide to sell out?

The balance, for many if not most whether they realise it or not, is the weight of their belief in liberty against the cruelty inflicted because the maintenance of hunting as a pastime surely protects an existing liberty.

The actual formula, if we want to think about it in those terms, is even more finely balanced than we might think because we have to take into consideration the cruelty involved in the other methods of pest control that will be substituted in for hunting.

The balance actually is the weight of liberty lost measured against the total of the cruelty involved minus the cruelty involved in the alternative methods of pest control.

Of course, other factors can upset the measure. For instance if one is prejudiced against the hunters themselves as people (perhaps their perceived station) then this would weigh in on the ban side of the measure.

It isn’t just about cruelty, these things rarely are.

Ahem, I'm not happy about the above post. It's not written particularly well and I don't think it actually tells anyone anything they didn't already know whilst kind of attempting to do so. I thought about pulling it but that's just bad form, so I'll leave it up.

There you have it. Self fisking.

Please do come again.

Interesting times

Well, there you are then. Another minority pastime banned. However, this time it’s different.

Usually, the way it goes is that a minority pastime is, for one reason or another, singled out and banned. The pursuers of the pastime are usually a disjointed bunch scattered across the country with no clear identity, no base of power other than their individual votes and no great combined voice. They also usually lack the knowledge and the kind of sophistication that is required to fight for their freedoms within the context of state institutions. How the system works and what have you. Another thing that they also usually lack is the ownership of something of intrinsic value to both the state and other institutions.

It’s different with the minority pastime of Fox Hunting.

Hunting, though enjoyed by people from both town and country has its base in rural communities; communities which have felt neglected by the state for a number of years. There is no love lost between them and their political masters who they see as remote and out of touch with their needs.

The communities are usually close knit with everyone knowing everyone else’s business. A common cause would run like wildfire through such a community, particularly when the individuals who make it up have so many shared values and interests. Everyone will know someone affected by the ban in one way or another.

Within their ranks they have landowners who are already beginning to use their assets as a tool in the fight against the ban and they also have a large number of people who are willing to stand their ground on the issue, knowing full well that if the state and its agents cannot get resources into their communities to protect them and their property from the criminals, they themselves are unlikely to be challenged regularly if their behaviour is somewhat less than that expected of a good state citizen. There are also the Hunt saboteurs to throw into this mix; explosive.

They have people who understand state institutions and the law courts (just look at the House of Lords for some of their supporters) and they know exactly how to make life difficult for certain people who dwell in these places.

The also have an organisation in the Countryside Alliance that really knows how to campaign. I’ve seen nothing like them in this country before and that is going to count for something. They channel information through their grass routes network on a regular basis and everyone knows what’s going on and what is expected of them. The organisation also attracts funding and knows exactly how to use it.

But by far the best thing these people have is themselves. They are angry. They are most definitely not lazy and will get out to London, Manchester, anywhere at the drop of a hat on receiving information from the CA. These people are hunters and our politicians are their prey and this is the way it is going to be for some time to come.

All this will lead to a continuation of the fight. In the law courts, on farmers fields which will no longer be available to the state or to other private industries, over the hedgerows where many will continue to hunt, and in the law courts where some of those caught hunting will find themselves. They will be punished and the anger will continue.

This is part of the whirlwind, but unfortunately not the whole of it.

Part of it lies in the hearts of those who are experiencing not just anger but a burning hatred for those on the nuLabour backbenches who they see as having a personal vendetta against them. A hatred for their political masters who refused to reign those class warriors in. A hatred for the disgraceful way in which they feel they are being treated for no good reason whatsoever.

I once said:

Who would have thought that when Pandora’s box was finally opened they would find nothing but a huntsman’s horn?

I meant it in jest really but now I am not so sure.

What I am sure of is that, on our shores, these are now interesting times.

Mad dog gets madder

Is David Blunkett finally admitting publicly that he is just plain mad?

There should be more checks on the use of information collected through supermarket loyalty cards, Home Secretary David Blunkett has suggested.

In a speech, Mr Blunkett said the cards produced key details about people's shopping habits but were accepted because they run by the private sector.

On the same argument, people should not distrust his ID cards plans because they were a state idea, he said.

David, David, David; that is exactly why we distrust your ID cards.

Anyway, no supermarket is going to drag me up in front of the courts for not joining one of their loyalty schemes.

How Blunkett can confuse supermarket bribes with his enforced ID card scheme is beyond me.

He really, really doesn’t get it does he?

Or is he just trying to present his scheme in stupid terms so the stupid peasants can understand it?

One paragraph changed has been to reduce the amount of pain to its readers caused it might have.

Well, blow me down with a huntsman's horn

Them protesters are everywhere:

We feel we need to make a strong statement to Tony Blair. I think that the British fox hunters are not going to stop. They’re going to take it to the courts and through every legal avenue they can. Mr Blair has been so strong for freedom for the Iraqi people, but he is trying to suppress people at home.

False preacher?

Eric the Unread has part of Tony Blair's Mansion House speech up.

But I know one thing. If we were under direct threat, America would be our ally. I know that its people enjoy, as we have seen, a vibrant competitive democracy; and that in America, Hispanics, blacks, Asians and former Europeans live together, worship in their different ways and can rise from the bottom to the top in a manner we could do well to emulate. I didn't agree with Michael Moore's film. But in America he was able to make it and be praised for it. This is called freedom. We are in danger of forgetting these simple truths.

It's a good one but, and I write this with some shame, I am beginning to tire of his rhetoric on the big issue of Iraq and the war on terror. I am in the camp that believes that there is a war to fight and that Blair is doing well with his foreign policy.

But, and it is a big but, his continued talk of freedom is beginning to grate on my nerves. Of course the freedom's he refers to are the big ones, the obvious ones, the ones that most unsophisticated schoolchildren can agree on but I am beginning to think that his whole notion of what freedom actually is is fundamentally flawed. Deficient. Built on poor foundations.

Taken as a party Blair's New Labour Levellers are a shambles on the freedom front. They wouldn't know what freedom was if captain freedom himself beat them half to death with his freedom bat.

I think that Blair himself needs to take some responsibility for that. I think he needs to spend a little more time preaching in favour of the smaller freedoms at home.

An Englishman's home is his castle

So the government is proposing a ban on smoking in a number of enclosed public spaces:

BBC News has learned the White Paper on Public Health will plan to make most enclosed public areas, including offices and factories, smoke-free.

Only private clubs, where members voted to allow smoking, and pubs which do not serve prepared food would be exempt.

Naturally, given that Scotland and Wales have their own national bodies for this kind of meddling, this will only apply to England and will allow those Scotish MP's sitting in the Westminster parliament who are very concerned with our health to reaffirm their principles by voting on what products we may and may not consume in our public houses. I'm sure they welcome the chance.

Personally I am in no way inclined to support the legislation. As far as I am concerned the proposition that public houses, restaurants and the like offer to potential customers is completely down to them. They are private businesses selling product to customers. If we don’t like what they have to offer then it is a simple consumer choice not to buy it. What the government is doing is influencing the proposition that these private firms can offer through draconian legislation.

"Yes, but what about the people who work in these places", your dinner party guest might ask of you, "they can’t really make the same choice as the public can they?" Well, they can obviously choose not to work there but this kind of dirty talk hardly ever goes down well with the kind of person whose vegetarian meal you have been forced to make in spite of the perfectly good Mexican chilli that sits on the table. You’ve made a hash of it, the yoghurt has curdled due to excessive heat and they are in no way inclined to forgive you.

"It’s not about the people who work there. People work at private members clubs and the government does not intend to ban smoking there. If anything these clubs, particularly the smoking clubs, are likely to have atmospheres thick with the stuff. I might add that a large percentage of MPs belong to such clubs and the cynic in me would suggest that this is the reason that they have not been included in the ban."

You may win some time with that one but the half starved fruitcake will eventually come back at you.

"Well, one step at a time. It will be banned everywhere soon enough. Thankfully."

Do not at this stage go over the ground you have already covered. Repeating your belief that a private business should be able to offer any legal product for sale to its customer base without the government interfering with the menu will not help.

You see, it’s not really just about smoking. If it were some progress might be possible and the dinner party might not descend into the last one that old cow ever comes to. It’s about different types of people with different values and principles. You might not have noticed but you and yoghurt girl have never really got on that well. She’s abrasive, she hates your 4x4, your good lady forbids you to bring up any number of your hobbies when she’s around and, frankly, she’s a bit of a trog. She thinks guns are evil but for one reason or another your wife won’t allow you to take the woman upstairs and lock her in your specially constructed ‘evil room’.

My advice to you is to wait until pudding has been finished and the after dinner mints come out and then light up a big one. Perhaps that cigar you have been saving for a special occasion. Sit back and watch as the rage builds and just imagine what must be going through the stick insects mind.

I wish someone would make him stop.

Not in my house baby. Not in my house.

Fox hunting and farmland

I remember commenting once, somewhere out there in the blogosphere, that the greatest asset that fox hunters have (besides their people) is the land on which they hunt and that there is, in all likelihood, some way that it can be used to show their contempt for government meddling. Well, following closely on the tail of threatening to stop military training on their land comes this from the Times:

FARMERS and landowners fighting a ban on foxhunting are planning a war on electricity installations.

Power companies are to be besieged with requests to remove or relocate installations as part of a new campaign of non-cooperation with the Government, its agents and utility companies.

The cynic in me thinks that there is probably something in the Civil Contingencies Bill that the state can use should things get out of hand.

The Blunkett bot

In an article titled Putting a face to 'Big Brother' the BBC asks us to Imagine a surveillance system that also presents a virtual embodiment of a person on a screen who can react to your behaviour.

Yes, imagine.

You have been seen mixing with the Liberati.
Your entitlement card will self destruct in 5 seconds.

Foxy foxies

The foxies. That’s what I’m going to call them. They are a new kind of political protester, the type that takes freedom and liberty so seriously that they are willing to hunt foxes to prove it:

Tracey Worsfold is terrified at the prospect of hunting for the first time. She sits bolt upright on a large stallion called Cobweb, after only a few riding lessons. She is dressed to the nines and steadying her nerves with a warm rum punch.

The fox is the last thing on her mind as she prepares to charge through the Surrey countryside with 60 others. She quite expects Cobweb to bolt and end up in the mud. He looks even more alarmed.

Ms Worsfold, a gardener, is not your usual hunt beginner, rather a normally apolitical young woman who is so incensed at Labour's attack on the sport that she has taken it up, just because it is likely to be banned when the hunting bill returns to the Commons next week.

It looks like foxie numbers are on the increase and the message seems to be:

'Sod this nanny state stuff, I'm starting.' It's been happening for the last three years. You could say that Labour have shot themselves in the foot by trying to ban it."

It seems that you don't need to hunt to love hunting

NO2ID

Go here and sign. People who trust this and every single future government need not apply.

The bedraggled battle-standard of freedom

A nice article in the Times by Robbie Millen:

Alas, “South Park Republicanism” has few champions here in Britain. But there is a growing market for it. A younger generation of Britons — overtaxed, tolerant and modern — can smell the hypocrisy of political correctness. They have grasped that PC is just a job-creation scheme — do we need yet more diversity officers, counsellors, and vision co-ordinators? They know that the welfare state’s raison d’être is to ensure that “chavs” are supplied with Burberry caps and hooded tops. But the Tories are a shower. Boris Johnson, who has some satiric South Park qualities, was forced to apologise for having unvirtuous opinions. Oliver Letwin, the weedy Shadow Chancellor, believes there is something called the “moral case for low taxation” but he appears to have left it in the luggage rack on some train going nowhere. So Britain certainly needs to import a dose of hardcore liberty-loving. Just look at some news stories from the last few days, and you will see how bedraggled the battle-standard of freedom is.

...

Three hundred years ago today, John Locke, that great exponent of true liberalism, died. Being a Godly chap, he would not have been a natural South Park fan, but he would have found it perplexing that Britons were so idle in the defence of their own freedoms, so keen to deny it to their fellow countrymen, so unwilling to see liberty flower in other parts of the world, and so willing to see the state devour so much of their income. But at least you are still free to ignore every word of the above.

Mirror mirror on the wall, it is my willy after all

Last night a few friends, my family and I went to a leisure centre in Hemel Hempstead. We were there to celebrate the birthday of the son of a very good friend of mine. The young lad decided that a couple of bowling games were in order and the grown ups were in total agreement with him.

As is often the way with these things one beer led to another and those eventually led to the need to visit the boy’s room. It was a pretty typical facility, a little smelly, no hot running water, but it was passable and I had certainly been in worse.

Or so I thought.

To throw a little light on this let me ask you a question. How, dear readers, can one be the only person in a toilet and yet not be alone?

Take a moment.

Yes, that’s right. Surveillance.

On one wall of the toilets was a mirror, nearly as tall as the wall itself and about 24 inches wide. On this mirror was a sticker that read something like this:

Smile!
You are on CCTV.

Now, no doubt this disgraceful invasion of privacy is there as an attempt to persuade people that drug taking and other anti-social activities are not to be tolerated in the facilities but I couldn’t help feeling a little outraged by the initiative.

Because the leisure centre is a private place of business I totally accept the existence of this invasion. I do not like it and I do not like the fact that it is not stated up front that the toilet facilities on this premises are under CCTV surveillance because I was not able to make an informed decision about using the centre, but I accept it and their flawed business practices. It is their lookout. But what I can do is to state that I will not be using their facilities again, I will not be spending any more money there and I will also supply all the information necessary to allow my friends and colleagues to make an informed choice of leisure venue.

So, to be a little more precise. The leisure centre in question (for you search engines I believe it is called Leisure World in Hemel Hempstead) is the one with the bowling facilities. It is situated opposite a Mcdonalds restaurant. To the left of the frontage of the place is a Pizza Hut and on the inside it contains quite a number of amusement machines a bar and some pool tables. I can’t really be any more precise at this moment and my search engine skills seem to be failing me right now. There may be other facilities in the area that fit this description so it might be wise to enquire yourselves of the venue before making a final decision.

If I could find the email address of the company that runs the centre I would also email them my disapproval.

Smile, Leisure World Hemel Hempstead, you are on the blogosphere.

Paul, from voice of the future mails in that the leisure centre in question is called Leisure World. He hasn't noticed the CCTV warning stickers in the toilets but will keep an eye out for them.

I have updated the post to reflect the name clarification.

Enjoying the task is a good thing

Stephen Newton, in article titled Underage Sex and Country folk says:

And thankfully, that’s a morality that says underage sex and inflicting animal suffering for fun are wrong, whatever your community elders told you.

He's talking about the Pitcairn island abuse case and fox hunting. Yes, in the same article.

He’s half right.

Pest control in the countryside is a necessary job and I would argue that most effective way of performing a job is to do so while enjoying it. Your productivity tends to be good, your job satisfaction is generally high and your stress levels low. Also, a job that is both undertaken with zeal and with joy contributes greatly to ones overall contentment. That’s no small thing.

The killing of foxes, rats, pigeon etc. are activities that will continue for some time to come for one reason alone; necessity. The people who perform these activities are varied, ranging from farmers to sporting shooters, professional pest controllers to traditional hunters and these people use different methods that tend to vary marginally in the level of cruelty involved and probably more significantly in the levels of enjoyment experienced by the person carrying out the task.

Often one method that is successful with (and not unusually cruel for) one kind of animal is not so successful when used on another. Shotguns for foxes, for instance, is not usually a good idea requiring, as it does, special loads and a good degree of luck or uncommon amounts of skill.

The tool needs to match the quarry. There’s a method/quarry matrix.

There are also great arguments and some confusion over the level of cruelty caused by any method/quarry combination. Even the issue of fox hunting is not as black and white as the anti-hunting brigade would like to think.

Lord Burns, author of the Burns Report on fox hunting commissioned by the government as part of its “legislate on evidence and principle” period (now sadly passed), states:

Naturally, people ask whether we were implying that hunting is cruel... The short answer to that question is no. There was not sufficient verifiable evidence or data safely to reach views about cruelty.

Cruel, here, needs to be taken in the context of ‘unusually cruel’ I think and not that there is zero suffering. It’s a comparison against acceptable levels of cruelty involved in any pest controlling exercise.

One can argue the cruelty vs liberty case, but I don’t think the issue of enjoyment is meaningful in the debate other than to say that enjoyment is a good thing in a task, particularly when it is a task that needs to be done, and that will continue to be done.

All that is going on now is a messing about with the method/quarry matrix. Foxes, rats etc will still be killed and will still often experience suffering and not a single one of us is qualified to say whether this overall level of suffering will be greater or lesser if traditional fox hunting stops.

But then again, it’s not about foxes really is it?

Boris warns pro-hunt protesters

In today's Telegraph, Boris Johnson warns the pro-hunt protesters to remember what happened to Scargill.

Go back to that miners' strike, and the Scargillian revolt. Remember how people began with some feelings of sympathy for the rebels. We all heard their message; the threat to the communities, the Hovis ad pit villages, the way of life that would never return.

But suburban Britain was never likely to indulge Scargill for long, and as soon as police were pictured with blood running down from under their helmets, the mood began to turn. Neil Darbyshire was spot-on in these pages yesterday, when he noted the basic apathy of suburbs on the question of hunting. Middle England may be interested in principle in the doctrine of liberty, but if the pro-hunt lobby starts impeding their liberty to use the motorway, or to get home for supper, then there will be hell to pay.

He makes sense and he certainly does not over estimate middle England's interest in principle in the doctrine of liberty.

The pro-hunt alliance is quite a large movement and within any large movement there are always going to be people who are willing to step over the line, wherever you think that line should be drawn. With the media the way that it is it will be this group that will get the most press attention; it will be this group that will be labelled pro-hunt or countryside (alliance) campaigners and it will be by these actions that otherwise disinterested members of the public will judge the issue.

Pro-liberty people will look at what happens and may say that it is the wrong way of going about things but will, more than likely, not change their views. What did they expect, they will say (and I count myself as being in this group). People who have pro-animal principles and judge them higher, in this case, than minority rights will not be persuaded to change their views no matter how peaceful or how ugly the thing gets (they will just use violence as positive reinforcement).

The disinterested will have no deeply held principle by which to judge the underlying issues and this, as always, will make them vulnerable to easy persuasion. They will make up their minds based upon the actions of a few more militant protesters and by whichever way the media decides to spin this.

No, I don't think that middle England is that interested in liberty, in principle or in any other form. Not really. Not properly. Not so much as to defend something they don't care about or find mildly distasteful on the basis of that principle.

Some guy called H.L. Mencken once said:

The trouble with fighting for human freedom is that one spends most of one's time defending scoundrels. For it is against scoundrels that oppresive laws are first aimed, and oppression must be stopped at the beginning if it is to be stopped at all.

Now, I don't for one minute categorise pro-hunting people as scoundrels, but even if I did I would still be on their side.

That's what I call being interested in principle in the doctrine of liberty.

Spiked on hunting

A great little article by Mick Hume, editor of spiked:

For instance, the eco-protesters who have defied parliament and the law by wrecking GM crop trials on farmers' land have been sympathetically treated, and even hailed as the true representatives of 'the People', by voices as diverse as the Guardian and the Daily Mail. Animal rights protesters may not always be so popular, yet the Guardian gave prominent space last week for an opponent of animal research to warn that more violence and law-breaking was inevitable unless the government gave in and stopped scientists using animal experiments in medical science.

...

It seems clear that despite all the high-minded language about offending democracy and the law, protesters are judged not according to what they do but why they do it. Certain types of extra-parliamentary action can win wide approval these days, just so long as it is used to highlight the 'right' kinds of issues that press fashionable buttons. But woe betide those who would stage the same sort of protests in support of politically incorrect causes. And there is nobody in Britain considered less PC than the pro-hunting lobby.

The ferocity of the reaction against the hunt protesters was not motivated by the way that they made a little scene in the Commons. It was motivated by the fact that many in the political and media class think that these people are scum. This provides an instructive insight into the limits of New Labour's much-vaunted belief in social inclusion. We are forever being lectured about the importance of tolerance, minority rights and respect for other people's lifestyle choices in modern Britain. But the vitriol poured on the hunters' heads shows that there are new dominant prejudices at play. The illiberal elite cannot tolerate the choices of these people, whose attempt to exercise their 'rights' is deemed not just wrong but repugnant.

I know, I know, I've quoted too much of the article without adding any value. Once again I fall foul of the rules of the blogosphere. No matter, go read the rest. Obviously, only if you like.

My eyes!!

I'm shocked! Shocked I tell you!

It's that bully again

So, I’ve been asked again what my deal is with all the pro-hunting sympathy. I guess the answer is shared experience. You see, I’ve been bullied by the same powerful people that are now bullying the hunters. Call this bully the Labour Party, the Conservative Party, the Government, Populist democracy, whatever, it matters not to me. What I want to see is for the bully to be thumped square between the eyes. Maybe even taken outside and given a good thrashing.

Yes, the later I think.

Metaphorically speaking of course.

I look at the country that I live in and I feel let down. Don’t get me wrong, it’s still great in spite of the loss of memory, but I do think there is something not quite right with the way we are governed and the way decisions are made. You see, I think a democracy needs to have built into it certain mechanisms that safeguard the interests of minority groups and I’m not just talking about ethnic minorities here, you know, perhaps like the ones that only eat animal flesh if the animal was bled to death in a particular way. No, I’m talking about all kinds of minorities whose activities don’t generally cause any kind of problem for their fellow men and women.

So I look at our democracy and I search for these safeguards and what do I see? Well, not very much really except perhaps the House of Lords. The second chamber. Our democratic safety valve. And then I see what this government is doing to that safeguard and how it intends to jam it open using the parliament act and I see that bully again. But this time I see it in even starker relief. Caught with its trousers around its ankles, fully intent on rogering another helpless bunch of people at the supposed behest of the popular masses.

I see that and I hate it.

New Labour Democracy - the needs of the few

Over 10,000 people demonstrating against the position of 300 or so more powerful people about a subject that tens of millions of people are not particularly interested in.

I hear reports that at least five protesters have got into the chambers of the house of commons and that all proceedings have been halted. It seems that at least one of the protesters appeared from an entrance behind the speakers chair which is an astonishing thing to happen. This is just a wild guess but I find it hard to believe that such a thing can happen without at the very least extensive knowledge of the inside layout and workings of the house of commons and at most without specific help from someone on the inside. Obviously just a guess mind.

The scene inside the house was, apparently, astonishing with the protesters attempting to speak to an MP whilst being wrestled by Labour MPs and some bloke in tights.

There have also been scenes of some violence outside the house with, reportedly, some heavy handed tactics by the police. Many protesters have been injured though the extent of those injuries are not yet known.

A Pandora’s box has been opened, it would seem.

These intrusions into the house are another major blow to the security services and that coupled with the reported violence will leave many questions to be answered by an already troubled service.

Report on the commons protest here:

Parliament has been suspended after five protesters got into the Commons chamber while MPs debated whether to ban hunting with dogs.

Four of the men ran out from behind the speaker's chair. Another wrestled past a doorkeeper from a different entrance.

They were chased by officials but one harangued minister Alun Michael.

Police in riot gear have also been sent into parliament square - expect the usual results.

A rather stale release (a bit of background) from the Countryside Alliance on the demonstration can be found here:

Mr Hart's [Chief Executive of the Countryside Alliance] comments followed an extraordinary and inflammatory admission by Alun Michael [junior Labour minister] this morning on BBC Radio 4 'Today' , when questioned by presenter John Hunmphrys, when the minister effectively conceded that his wrecked bill's return, and its proposed 2-year delay to a fox-hunting ban, were for Labour party management reasons rather than animal welfare.

Apparently the five protesters that made their way into the commons were not the only ones. I hear reports that 'several more' were stopped in the corridors of the house. This is a massive breach of security.

Some live quotes from the radio:

One of the protesters inside the house said You've mucked up pensions, you've mucked up everything.

Outside: Come on lads - we need to open a second front.

Scotland yard (from memory): A minority of the crowd rushed the perimeter of the police security cordon outside the house and missiles were thrown. Control has been regained and the majority of the crowd are protesting peacefully.

Woman on the TV, bloody faced: I wasn't even demonstrating! A policeman did this to me!

Presenter: This will go down as the day that the pro-hunt lobby unsheathed its claws.

MP (library pictures I believe): There are those that do not understand that the numbers are against them. They should get on with the job and tell the House of Lords to go to hell.

Radio: Apparently the vote to ban fox hunting is taking place now.

Results in: For a ban on fox hunting: 356; against 166.

Live interviewer at the protest to, I believe, Victoria Jonston (random protester): You've heard the vote. Are you prepared to break the law?

VJ: Yes; I'm prepared to do anything.

Fox hunting?

I don’t hunt. I never have and I don’t think that I ever could but that does not mean to say that I do not support it. But why do I? I live in suburbia, I know little about the countryside and I know absolutely no one with any interest in the activity whatsoever. These observations are hardly qualifications for my feelings on the subject which are, quite frankly, ones of anger.

It’s the same with the Handgun ban. I’ve never owned a handgun of the banned variety and never felt the desire to. I didn’t know anyone who had or wanted one and knew little about them at the time. But the ban really pissed me off. After all this time I’m still angry about it. Same M.O. as fox hunting.

I thought, at first, that perhaps I had a problem with authority but I soon discounted the notion because there are many examples of authority in action that I simply do not have a problem with. I thought that it might be that I have a strong sense of fairness but I don’t think that’s it either. For instance, I can be a pretty unfair guy when I want to be and certainly don’t mind certain unfair tactics being used to achieve an end that I support.

I’m not a great thinker (no, you don’t say) so my positions on various topics tend to be instinctive and not based in any formal pre-formulated rational framework but after I have instinctively made my mind up about something I can usually come up with a reasonably rational argument in support of my position given the time. It’s rare that I change my mind on a subject, though I appreciate that admitting to doing so carries a certain amount of kudos in the blogosphere.

There is, however, a common theme and it’s that theme that first drew me to the Libertarian Alliance and it’s militant dinner party wing, samizdata.net. I have a strong liberty streak that runs right through me. People, I think, should be allowed to do pretty much what they like as long as what they does not hurt another person or damage their property (and no, I’m not talking about hurting sensibilities, that’s a fact of adult life and a perfectly reasonable and acceptable state of mind for the enemies of liberty to be in).

Don’t get me wrong; I don’t consider myself a libertarian as there is much that I disagree on with people who do call themselves libertarians but I think that I have more in common with them than any other, what do you call it, movement – ideal – whatever. I believe in the individual and the individuals right to do pretty much whatever they want regardless of what a majority of individuals might think about it.

It’s a frightening situation to find ones self in for the first time I can tell you. To begin to ask questions of yourself that, at first, seem contrary to what you thought you knew as right and proper is no easy thing. It’s messy. Do I really believe that, within a certain framework, the desire of one person to do something is as important as the desire of one million for him not to do it? More to the point, do I believe it even if I am among the one million? Cleary no, then clearly maybe, then clearly yes. That’s the process.

Of course, I’ve still got to go through the really messy part. The big question. The one that will have me excluded from polite company. Isn’t your position incompatible with the whole notion of democracy? Errrm…….don’t ask difficult questions (see what I mean about not being a great thinker). I don’t know what the answer to that one is yet.

So, fox hunting. The desire of a few over the desire of the…….erm……ah……well, who exactly? I don’t think that anyone has proven to me that it is the desire of the many (not that knowing that would change my view) but it is an interesting point. Who will benefit from the ban? The fox? I said who not what. This stopped being about the fox a long time ago.

I have a feeling that no one will benefit really. I don’t even think its about fox hunting anymore. Its about two small groups (The Blair camp vs his backbenchers etc) of men and women arguing the toss over a subject on which each group is determined to get their way. One group (Blair etc.) would like to let the issue slide because of the trouble it will cause on the streets and in the countryside and another group (backbench MPs) wants to carry it through because no one can get away with ignoring them. It has got to the position where the subject matter could be anything or, perhaps, lost in time like a bad science fiction novel and none of it is based upon evidence or principle.

Of course Blair etc. will capitulate and it is his position that is the most disgusting to me. Sure, it’s in his manifesto but who here believes that he would not make that pledge magically disappear if he could? He is making his choice on the basis of which group scares him the most – the hundreds of thousands of hunt supporters or the relative handful of people who belong to the same club as he does and who can, you know, influence his enjoyment of that club.

He has made his choice and, no doubt, will make all the right noises about promises, cruelty, majority and the like but that won’t change the fact that he’s a pussy and that what he and those other meddlers are doing strikes me as symbolising exactly the opposite of what I believe in.

You know, it’s the same for me really. It’s not about fox hunting, it’s about how I think I should be able to live my life.

Liberties' fox

Melanie Phillips on the bill to ban fox hunting:

From barbarism to bathos. The centrepiece of the British government's legislative programme in the run-up to the election, the issue that is going to define its priorities and dominate public debate, is... the banning of fox-hunting. And for the fourth time, yet. It is truly astounding that, with international terror still at the top of any sane agenda (an issue, however, that was not mentioned at all in Tony Blair's to-do list for the new parliamentary term), with every public service in the country sliding into disrepair or outright chaos, with violent crime rising and disorder out of control, the Prime Minister's big issue is the revival of the attempt to ban hunting.

It's astonishing, I think, the amount of time that has been given over to this issue in the past few years. I'm personally against any kind of ban on fox hunting but most people simply don't give a fig. That's the astonishing thing about this whole thing and it beggars belief that a serious goverment would even have the issue on the radar at such a time.

So why then does this labour government keep banging on about it? Melanie suggests:

But maybe the real agenda has been revealed in this poisonous little aside by one of Blair's aides:

'"This approach leaves us with the delicious prospect of a win-win situation," said a Government source. "If it gets through then we make keeping the ban the nuclear issue of the election. But if the Lords block it we can retaliate by putting a pledge for fundamental Lords reform in our manifesto."

Maybe the real agenda behind the hunting ban is the delicious destruction of Parliamentary process, the delectable removal of all oppostion to the government machine and the delightful abolition of parliamentary democracy altogether.

I'm far from convinced. I certainly don't think that the hunting issue, as it stands, was engineered for this particular purpose. The following exchange between Blair and the late Lord Jenkins does not support the notion that the hunting issue was a means to a different end:

Jenkins was regarded as the “grandfather of new Labour” and, like a dutiful grandson, Blair always listened intently to his advice. In a typically frank conversation, which the peer confided to friends, Jenkins warned Blair against provoking the House of Lords over foxhunting. Jenkins, a passionate advocate of the euro who also supported university tuition fees, never hunted. But he advised Blair against suppressing the Lords, who rejected the Commons ban in the last Parliament, by deploying the rarely used Parliament Act.

“Tony,” he said, “if you invoke the Parliament Act it will be the most illiberal act of the last century.” Blair’s reply was even more revealing, since most Labour MPs expect the Bill to outlaw hunting to go back to the Lords by June. “Roy,” he said. “I wish I had never heard the word hunting. We are in such a mess. I do not know how we are going to get out of it.”

Now this does not mean to say that, as an opportinuty, New Labour would not jump at the chance to use the problems they have had banning fox hunting as a tool to bash parliamentary democracy. That, I am quite sure, is not beyond them.

Bothered

You know something that bothers me? Selective government price fixing of privately produced products, that’s what. I’m talking tax here, of course.

Now, I accept (for the moment that is, until someone persuades me otherwise) that some tax on the products that we buy is necessary for various state sponsored reasons that currently slip my mind but what I do not accept is the governments right to selectively charge higher rates of tax depending on the product.

It’s unfair on producers and an immoral act of coercion against the consumer. The state has no right (and I’m talking about my rights here, not yours) to interfere with my selection of what legal product I buy and in what quantity I buy it.

Ignore the health Nazis, win a prize

The Guardian, which is sounding increasingly like a type of lawgiving robot of doom, issues the following statement of authority:

Parents are sending their children to school with lunch boxes that are packed with fat, salt and sugar. Three out of four of the 5m lunches prepared at home each day fail to meet government guidelines on healthy school meals, a survey by the Food Standards Agency has found.

Interesting, that so many parents seem to be ignoring government guidelines. That cheers me up no end. As for the children, well, I remember my packed lunches when I was at school all those years ago and mine were packed with crisps, choccy biscuits, cheese, white bread and germs. The only difference between now and then is that I got a hell of a lot of exercise at school and needed more sodium and chocolate in my diet than kids do these days.

My recommendation: Double maths, double games and a free place in a reformed scouts or guide group for each child of those parents ignoring the health Nazis. Placements where kids can learn to fish, shoot air rifles, make fire with sticks, build shelters, cook and learn all those skills that would lead to a self sufficient young adult immune from government cajoling. They could win a sew on patch like this one:

Off license ripped off by leather booted gang

What happens when HM Customs doesn't get its way first time? Yes that's right, they put together some cock-and-bull story and get you a different way:

Britain's first offshore off-licence is out of business after part of its cargo was removed for a second time.

When they came into port, Customs officials said the vessel was not secure and the cargo had to go into a bonded warehouse. Mr Berriman refused and his part of the cargo was seized.

Give me your body!!!!

The Times reports on a police investigation which seems to be based around the collection of DNA from a large number of people in the hope that one of them turns out to be the criminal that they are looking for:

Some 120 people have refused to provide DNA, prompting police to send letters asking them to reconsider. Those who continued to refuse have been arrested and compelled to give a sample.

I wonder what those airy-fairy liberati types have to say about that:

Barry Hugill, of the civil rights pressure group Liberty, said: “The police appear to have taken it upon themselves that the refusal to give a DNA sample is a criminal act. That means every single citizen is a potential criminal. Simply to arrest in the absence of reasonable suspicion that a person committed a crime and then take a DNA sample is a clear breach of the law.”

The law is such an airy-fairy thing, no?

Legislating away legitimate freedom

I am becoming increasingly concerned about the Home Office. Once a respectable part of the British political landscape the office seems to have become a platform from which increasingly illiberal orders and ‘requirements’ are barked at the population. A population who, when they quite rightly question the orders, are called names and accused of talking nonsense.

The Home Secretary, David Blunkett, is the top dog, the main barker, the big man in office. A man who seems to trust no one.

He wants each and every one of us to have an ID card so that we can prove who we are to the state.

He wants to lower the burden of proof required for a conviction so that it might be easier for the state should it suspect us of certain crimes.

He wants to charge us for board and lodgings for our time in prison should we be wrongly convicted and later released.

He continues to seek more legislation to restrict the legitimate activities of shooting sportsmen and women while being completely ineffective at stopping the criminal use of guns.

Even the police are not safe from his kind of bullying.

He is a man who seems to lash out at every opportunity leaving a trail of bad and illiberal legislation behind him like a slug might leave a trail of slime.

So what has he in store for us today? Hate legislation:

Inciting religious hatred would become a crime as soon as possible, under plans expected to be announced by Home Secretary David Blunkett on Wednesday.

Agree with him or not there is no doubt that these plans restrict even further your freedom of speech. What is incitement to religious hatred?

What of the deep contempt that someone who has no religion might feel for all for those that do?

What if the contempt that a non believer might have is published on a regular basis in a newsletter or on a web site. What if the atheist speaks of how he doubts the intelligence and integrity of true believers of Christianity or Islam? What if he continually refers to them as the stupid people, who wander around in their self indulgent imaginary worlds filled with a historical bigotry complete with a track record of unimaginable violence against men, women and children who are not part of their particular club?

What of the intolerance that believers of one particular religion have for non-believers?

Labour peer Lord Desai suggested that "from a mullah's viewpoint any criticism of religion will be an incitement", and the law change could have seen Salman Rushdie prosecuted, not protected.

Indeed. To criticise a mans God can be very offensive to the believer but is it incitement to hatred? In one way it doesn’t really matter. If the zealot believes it is incitement all it takes is one phone call to send a whole heap of trouble on its way.

And what if a particularly persuasive atheist criticises a particular religion in an extremely effective manner? A manner which encourages others to take his point on the basis of its intellectual merit and to then spread the criticisms far and wide.

Your God is false and here is my evidence. Your whole belief system is based on nonsense and the fact that you continue to have faith in spite of all this evidence is laughable. It makes you look stupid and, frankly, the fact that you continue to believe makes me doubt your judgement or your honesty. I could never employ you or someone from your religion who continues to believe in it in spite of all the evidence.

It’s a belittling position to take but could it be described as incitement to hatred? I am in no doubt that it could.

But is the position taken by our imaginary atheist a reasonable one? I think that it is. He is making judgements about another person based upon their actions, their thinking and their beliefs. We all do it every day and we all act on our observations and conclusions every day. I find it impossible to welcome as justifiable or legitimate any decree that could result in our atheist being criminalized for his perfectly reasonable judgements.

Religion (of all names) has been responsible for the greatest and bloodiest conflicts in all of human history. Spreading this fact alone incites others to look upon religion and the believers implementation of it with a certain amount of revulsion. Would continually reciting particularly horrible historical facts about one religion be seen as incitement to hatred rather than the simple recounting of historical fact? Yes. Yes of course it would because there is a chance it would incite others to hate that religion and all that it stands for. The hatred itself might be irrational but the teaching of the history is perfectly legitimate.

This is the currency the Home Secretary is dealing in. The currency of freedom. He is spending it like there is no tomorrow.

One day they will be dragged into the real world

Here they go again.

The BBC is setting out its vision for how it should work in the 21st Century as part of the charter review process.

No doubt they will drone on about their ‘quality’ programming and their world renowned ‘impartial’ news service.

One of their intelligensia was on radio 5 live this morning saying how programmes such as Strictly Come Dancing would not have been made if it wasn’t for the BBC finance model. Sheesh. Another innocent radio gets shouted at.

What they will never admit to getting, because they fear for their protection money, is that regardless of the quality of their output their funding model is sickening.

Home office vogon spokesman responds to ID card concerns

The Englishman has a link up to an interesting article on ID cards.

The money quote comes from Mr. Richard Thomas, some kind of Information minister:

This is beginning to represent a really significant sea change in the relationship between state and every individual in this country.

It was now clear the scheme was not just about identity cards but about a national identity register.

It is not just about citizens having a piece of plastic to identify themselves.

It's about the amount, the nature of the information held about every citizen and how that's going to be used in a wide range of activities.

Responding to this, a Home Office vogon said:

Home Office vogon

To learn more about Home Office vogons visit this wikipedia page:

Here's what to do if you want to get a lift from a Vogon: Forget it. They are one of the most unpleasant races in the galaxy. Not actually evil, but bad tempered, bureaucratic, officious and callous. They wouldn't even lift a finger to save their own grandmothers from the ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal without orders signed in triplicate, sent in, sent back, queried, lost, found, subjected to public enquiry, lost again, and finally buried in soft peat for three months and recycled as firelighters. The best way to get a drink out of a Vogon is stick your finger down his throat, and the best way to irritate him is to feed his grandmother to the ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal.

LA news release on fat

The Libertarian Alliance has issued a news release about the current health fascism that seems to be all the rage at the moment. We're all too fat you see.

The general argument is as follows:

Govt: You're all too fat.
Media: Holy cow, we're all too fat! We're like giant lardy time bombs.
Peeps: Erm, I'm fine actually.
Govt: No you're not. You're fat. You will destroy the NHS then die.
Peeps: Oh, the NHS. Can't I opt out or something?
Govt: No.
Peeps: Wankers.

Wanker seems to be the conclusion the Libertarian Alliance has come to in its news release:

If they want to do something useful, they should look to taking their own bodies in hand, and (l)eave the rest of us alone.

Tony Blair to the countryside:

"Bring it on!"

There's a whole lot of trouble that will soon be coming your way Tony. More, I suspect, than you can possibly enjoy.

Actually, we don't want no stinkin' ID cards

I think my banner will say "BLUNKETT - WHO THE HELL DO YOU THINK YOU ARE?" or something.

Spiderman innocent

This is great news.

A man who spent six days up a 150ft crane causing widespread traffic chaos in central London has been cleared of causing a public nuisance.

It was fairly transparent to me when Mr Chick was making his protest that the police were being completely unreasonable when they closed the roads and caused all that traffic chaos.

So, you might ask, why would they close the roads unnecessarily? To punish Mr Chick for his protest of course:

He told Southwark Crown Court the police played a "psychological game" to make him look like a "reckless idiot".

Officers said he could fall on pedestrians or cars and stopped work on a £45m office block while surrounding streets were sealed off.

Large parts of the City and east London were gridlocked with frequent 10-mile traffic jams.

But the jury heard excerpts from police logs making it clear senior officers not only treated the road closures as a "bargaining tool" to get him to come down, but felt the prosecution case could be "weakened" if they were lifted.

They manipulated what they could to ensure that Mr Chick would suffer for his cause and they did so unfairly.

My house is your house

What a disgrace this is:

Homeowners would be forced to rent out properties that have stood empty for more than six months under proposals unveiled today.
Under an amendment to the housing bill, tabled by Labour backbencher David Kidney MP, councils would be able to take over such properties, restore them to a decent standard and rent them out at an affordable rate. The council could claim its costs back and give the rest to the owner.

I mean am I still sleeping or have I woken up into some kind of parallel twilight zone style universe. Or dimension even. You know, the one where everything is the same except for one minor detail, like property rights.

Someone should swing for even suggesting this idea. Perhaps tonight I will dream and tomorrow I will wake into a better dimension; one where statist Labour MP thieves are used as toilet paper.

Something wicked this way comes

Via samizdata's David Carr we have this excellent Nick Cohen article on the erosion of liberty. His message? Basically we are saying goodbye to our traditional freedoms and loving every minute of it.

My experience is that he is right. I have grown tired of trying to persuade dinner guests and drinking buddies that ID cards, curfews, stricter gun control laws and the like are bad ideas. Really, really tired. It's so hard to put up a constructive argument when the whole table is against you, throwing extreme and imagined examples of the possible successes of such measures at you quick fire style. It doesn't help that I have usually had a skin full at the time.

Since getting involved in this kind of thing, you know, blogging, political comment, thinking, I've noticed something peculiar. Hardly any of my close friends actually agree with my political and social points of view anymore. Some accuse me of growing more right wing with each passing year (when I know that the opposite, if anything is actually true) whilst others accuse me on being soft on criminals due to my opposition to draconian Home Office measures.

Just this weekend I had a real clash with a very old University friend of mine at a BBQ about Bush and America. Bush is evil. America is evil, was his basic line. Another old University friend nodded frantically in agreement. No says I, and those figures of America supplying arms to Iraq are factually inaccurate. I get a few nasty retorts along the lines of how I always fall for right wing propaganda, other groups of party goers gradually move away to talk about skiing and the like and I'm left feeling a little angry but, more to the point, sad. Sad like the last curlew might feel in late summer finally realising that there is no chance of a mate because there are no others curlews left. Utterly alone.

One of these days I am going to accept a samizdata invite. Find the time to get to one of their dinner parties or chats just to know what it feels like to have someone look at you and nod.

Man, that would be sweet.

Here’s a question

If you were given 3 billion quid to use in the fight against terrorism and other types of crime would you spend it all issuing membership cards?

I’m not sure I would.

I'm sorry, did I say 3 billion? I meant 4.5 billion.

Sorry again, I actually meant 5.2 billion.

Due to unforeseen circumstances I'm having to review the offer to 6 billion. Oh, by the way, please take your time. We know that spending this kind of money can take quite a while.

What's that? Need more money you say? Here you go.

It's a question of trust

Well, we are informed that the government is minded to log all ID card usage:

The Home Office has tried to assure us that David "Big" Blunkett's plan to impose compulsory National Identity Cards on innocent British citizens is not a threat to privacy. Yesterday that argument was finally blown out of the water.

The Guardian reports that ID Card usage will be tracked centrally. Stephen Harrison, the head of the Home Office's identity card policy unit, admitted yesterday that the Government is "minded" to log every single ID Card usage and store the data centrally.

For me the debate about ID cards is one of trust. When having to make my mind up about whether I support the idea of them or not I ended up asking myself some very simple questions.

Can you see any benefit in ID cards?
Do you trust the current government?
Can you be sure that future governments will be trustworthy?

I answered yes to the first and no to the second and third.

I answered yes to the first because I could imagine operational circumstances where a policeman for instance may be able to (given the time and inclination) extract a valid identification card from an individual who is in fact a criminal.

Further to this, in circumstances where carrying an ID card became compulsory I could imagine certain aspects of a policeman's job becoming easier than they are at present.

For me, however, the answer to the other two questions were critical. So critical in fact as to effectively make it impossible for me to consider the risk of introducing ID cards as one currently worth taking.

For me it's all about trust in the state and I don't just mean in the current version of the state as a Blair led, Blunkett employing incarnation of Labour. I mean the state as it will manifest itself in the future because we all know that once introduced, ID cards are likely never to be withdrawn.

We are rapidly approaching "make your mind up time". It is trust that is the real dividing line between the pro and anti ID card camps and I don't think that anywhere near enough people on the streets of Britain have asked themselves the questions that need to be asked.

Sean Gabb sound file

The sound file for the incident where the BBC cut off Sean Gabb is available here. Look for the Yasmin Alibhai-Brown interview.

Looks like there's some sport to be had in San Francisco

An interesting letter from David Codrea, a gun owner, to a few officials in San Francisco. Seems that he's comfortable with his chosen lifestyle and has decided to come out of the closet:

You see, I also belong to a group that is forced by social prejudices to keep a low profile—often times to hide my choices and practices lest I suffer disapproval and ultimately, life-threatening persecution by the state.

Of course one can't equate being a gun owner with being homosexual but that's not what the letter is trying to do, though it will be discounted on that basis by anyone who deliberately wishes to miss the point.

Oh for pitty sake, what do you mean "so what is the point?".

Could it be that Mr. Codrea is an honest man who feels he is being persecuted for his minority lifestyle?

No? Oh never mind.

The Blunkett plans

On Wednesday the Home Secretary David Blunkett will spell out some of his anti-terrorism plans. These will include a lowering of the burden of proof required to obtain a conviction and also the ability for evidence to be heard in secret:

Among options under consideration are “special advocates” — state-vetted defence counsels — in British courts. They could be trusted not to pass on intelligence information heard in camera during a trial and to protect Security Service sources.

Now, I’m not particularly comfortable with the whole notion of lower burdens of proof and all the secret behind the scenes stuff so luckily for me one of Mr. Blunketts aides provides a brow soothing observation of his own:

The question is how much proof do you have to give? There have been a series of cases in recent times where Customs in particular have withdrawn prosecutions because they have been called on to explain where their information has come from. David is saying, do we need to do that in private with a judge.

What thanks I might have had for this Blunkett-bot for easing my concerns was short lived however as I recalled news from early last year which reflected badly on Customs and its notion of how to go about this whole justice thing:

After the hearing, Mr Grant's solicitor, Andrew Benson, said his client, who spent 16 months in jail, would be taking legal advice over compensation.

"The public should be absolutely outraged," he said.
"It is an absolute disgrace that the prosecutions have been brought and the only people who knew the prosecutions were wrong were those within the Customs and Excise."

I don't care what Blunkett thinks. The fact is that he is changing the machinery of the state in a way that makes its power easier to abuse. That's not a good thing and you can take that to the bank.

Health food at play time

Dumb Jon speaks:

A four-year-old girl was barred from eating a packet of chocolate buttons at her Cheshire primary school.

The school said sweets had been banned under its healthy eating policy because children were bringing in too many.

This practice of dictating to parents what their children can bring in to school to eat at snack time also goes on at the school that my boy goes to. No crisps, no chocs, no joy. They also have a thing called fruit and veg Tuesday when, horror of horrors, they request that a piece of fruit or veg is supplied as the child’s snack by their usually loving parents.

I have to tell you now that this fruit and veg Tuesday IS NOT followed by a jam and cigar Wednesday to balance things out! Yes, I know, hardly fair.

I had mixed feelings about the issue when my good lady first told me about it; I couldn’t decide whether I should jump up and down and froth there and then in the Kitchen or walk to the hall to do some stomping about (the wooden floor is great for stomping). I chose the former.

Needless to say we have come to a compromise, as so many do, so as not to bring down unwanted fury onto our son when all he wants to do is chomp and play. He takes one of those fake snack health bars packed with calories and chocolate disguised as raisins. Hehe, stick that in your face Miss.

This is not the end of the story though. I have to tell you that there is a certain amount of hypocrisy going on here and this hypocrisy takes the form of a pudding (much in the same way as the destructor took the form of the Mr. Stay puf marshmallow man). The day after we received the snack request from the school my son enjoyed a rather marvellous (and we were told in some detail) jam filled doughnut for his school dinner pudding. Certainly more yummy than the smiley face fish cakes he’d had earlier.

And so, in closing, health fascists are everywhere. They know deep down that it’s too late for us and so they move on to our children, thinking that they can persuade them to walk on the path of righteousness instead. That will be their undoing. Trust me, it will.

The Home Office had been warned

David Blunkett, the Home Secretary of darkness, opportunistically suggested that ID cards could have prevented the deaths of the 19 migrant Chinese cockle pickers who died after being caught out by high tides. I heard his claims while driving home from work and was utterly flabbergasted. David Carr of samizdata felt the same:

I don't think any of us truly appreciate just how badly our Home Secretary, David Blunkett, wants a national ID card system but the desire must be intense enough to burn a hole in his soul. It has now got to the stage where there is no bad news too pathetic enough not to be manipulated into a ID card propoganda opportunity, be it a shooting in Shropshire, a murder in Manchester or a child-abduction in Cheltenham.

Via Paul of the Manchester United Ruined My Life blog we have a White Rose posting which continues with the debunking:

It simply shows that if you are willing to break numerous laws, that the police can't enforce anyway, then further legislation introducing ID cards, is a futile measure when it comes to stopping criminal activity. In fact the only people ID cards will significantly affect are the law abiding citizens of the UK who will not doubt adopt and follow the rules to the detriment of their own personal freedom.

So it seems that many of us are far from convinced that Blunkett’s ID cards could have saved the unfortunate immigrants.

However, I am far more willing to believe that their lives could have been saved had the Home Office taken note of a previous warning that they were given about the dangers of migrant cocklers and the sands:

A Morecombe MP is meeting the home secretary to discuss what action needs to be taken over last week's drowning of 19 Chinese cocklers.

Geraldine Smith warned Home Office ministers last year about the risks to migrant cocklers in Lancashire.

A warning that some would say verges on the prescient. Yet nothing was done because of resource issues.

Still, never mind. Onwards and upwards with the plastic cards eh David?

A foxing tale - continued

Here's a little more information on the hunt saboteur story I blogged about the other day. It doesn't make for pleasant reading:

"I really feared for my life as last year a hunt saboteur had threatened to kill me - at one point one of the attackers had his foot on my throat while the others were hitting me. My wife tried to help but was also pushed to the ground and my children fled the scene. It took me over an hour to find them - that was the longest hour of my life."

Let's just take a moment to consider the position of these saboteurs. It's not the killing of foxes in the countryside that is the issue but, instead, the way they are killed. The saboteurs.....lets refer to them as thugs in this instance...the thugs high ground is one based upon cruelty (namely them being against it) and yet they seem perfectly capable of using it themselves as a weapon when it suits their beliefs.

The Countryside Alliance has expended a great deal of time and effort changing the public perception of hunters as toffs on horseback out on a jolly with some success. I would say that the saboteurs have a far bigger public image problem these days and I also suspect that they have no idea that this is the case. Too bad for them.

Hunt sabs...thugs...damned if I can tell the difference.

A foxing tale

Some time back, while I was in a queue at a petrol station I overheard one of the stations staff, a young girl, talking to some young guy. She was explaining that she would not be around on the coming weekend because she was out on a fox hunt as a saboteur. Her friend was intrigued, as was I, and asked what kind of thing she got up to. "Well", she said, "last time we bashed the hunt hounds with sticks".

Since then I have stopped being surprised by reports such as this one.

Claims a fox hunt master was dragged from his horse and assaulted by protesters are being investigated by police. The Countryside Alliance said 38-year-old Graeme Worsley, from East Grinstead, received hospital treatment after being assaulted by saboteurs.

An open letter to Thames Valley Police

It saddens me that Chief Constable Peter Neyroud thinks it appropriate to suggest that it should be illegal to buy and sell replica firearms:

The move is part of the Anti-Social Behaviour Act 2003. Anyone carrying an imitation firearm or air weapon in public without reasonable excuse* may face a six month prison sentence or £5,000 fine. Chief Constable Peter Neyroud said: “I welcome this but I would like to see further legislation making it illegal to buy and sell replica firearms.”

Such legislation would effectively destroy the popular and legitimate pastime of Airsoft enjoyed by thousands of honest and hard working people across the UK.

He already has the necessary legislation to stop criminal misuse now that the Anti-Social behaviour bill has become law and I suggest that he uses it.

Further failure to curb such illegal use should be put down to lack of manpower or mismanagement of resources (too much red tape, too high wages for Chief Constables etc) and not used as an excuse to once again limit the liberties enjoyed by honest men, women and children.

I also note that the Chief constable uses the language of the state when issuing his suggestion. He would like to destroy legitimate use without having to pay compensation, hence the phrase make it illegal "to buy and sell" rather than to ban outright (which would require compensation).

The Chief Constable has all the legislation he needs. Now let's see some results.

Can't catch criminals? Hey, just pick on someone else instead.

It looks like the Express newspaper is at it again. This time, instead of columnist Carol Sarler describing all shooting sportsmen and women as perverted we have the editor of the Sunday Express, Martin Townsend, calling for the outlawing of the sport of shooting completely. Why? Well let’s hear it from the man himself:

My problem is that, outside of the military and the farming community, I don't understand why anyone really needs to own a gun. Can anyone explain it to me?

Sure. People need to own guns to, among other reasons, go clay pigeon shooting, hunt game and vermin, compete in shooting competitions and the like. Of course, Mr. Townsend, being poorly informed probably thinks that only farmers hunt vermin on their farms (like they haven’t got anything else to do), thinks that clay pigeon shooting is for crazy people and that owning guns for any kind of competitive shooting throws doubt on your suitability to, well, own guns. Think I’m exaggerating?

And whose are the "right hands" to be holding a gun? The sportsman with his ear protectors who lines up targets in a gallery and practises, practises, practises? What's he practising for? When more and more of his shots go clean through the centre of the target, what's going through his mind? That he can win every competition? I would love to believe that every amateur marksman has the same innocent thought.

There you are.

Townsend is exhibiting the same kind of dangerous thinking that, contrary to his intention, actually ends up increasing gun crime. He wants the government to spend a fortune (and it will cost a fortune) to ban a sport and legitimate pass time when that money and time would be better spent catching criminals and ending the smuggling of guns into the UK.

It’s about time that people like him took on the responsibility of the kind of country they have created. A country where resources are misdirected away from where they are truly needed because of ill thought out personal crusades. A country where freedom is ok as long as it’s the same freedom that media managers subscribe to. A country where, unscathed, you can get away with hate speech against a sporting community but not against a terrorist.

(PS. I cannot find an online resource for this article so see below to read it in its entirety, including an email address for the author of the article. He is clearly looking for responses.)

Sunday Express 18th Jan 2004

A word from the Editor

MARTIN TOWNSEND

'We are all going to have to stop tinkering with
firearms laws and outlaw guns completely'

IN RECENT weeks, a policeman has been shot dead in
Leeds; a retired colonel, living in a tiny village,
blasted to death on his doorstep and a couple murdered
by gunman or men at their Cornish petrol station. Just
a few months ago a jeweller was shot dead at her
family-owned shop in Nottingham and a former bodyguard
cut down by bullets as he left his gym.

Guns, it seems, are everywhere. A friend of mine, who
owns a shop in west London - a family man with three
children under 10 - stepped out to buy a sandwich one
afternoon last summer and found himself at the centre
of a gunfight. It's something you only read about in
books, he told me afterwards, but he felt a bullet
whistle past his ear. Over Christmas a child in our
area was partially paralysed when he shot himself,
accidentally, with an air pistol.

In my street, just a few weeks ago, an elderly man
awoke to find someone had blasted an airgun pellet
through his porch window. The police said such
incidents were all too common in the area but there
was little they could do. These guns are increasingly
getting into the hands of 11 and 12-year-olds, they
explained, and the rules need tightening up. The usual
targets are birds, cats and dogs.

My problem is that, outside of the military and the
farming community, I don't understand why anyone
really needs to own a gun. Can anyone explain it to
me? The "huntin', shootin' and fishin"' lobby would
argue their corner, of course, but it worries me that
the word "shooting" has insinuated itself so
comfortably into that phrase. Book-ended by two
pursuits over which far too much Parliamentary time
has already been wasted, shooting seems to have
escaped similar attention except in the knee-jerk
aftermath of the Dunblane tragedy. But the popularity
of shooting and the resulting widespread ownership of
"sporting guns" gives shooting a legitimacy - and an
armoury. It means that there are a lot of guns around
that have to be accounted for, stored and moved around
in order to be maintained. I am sure that the vast
majority of those charged with such duties exercise
them with due care and responsibility. But not all.
Guns will go missing. They will be stolen. They'll end
up in the "wrong hands".

And whose are the "right hands" to be holding a gun?
The sportsman with his ear protectors who lines up
targets in a gallery and practises, practises,
practises? What's he practising for? When more and
more of his shots go clean through the centre of the
target, what's going through his mind? That he can win
every competition? I would love to believe that every
amateur marksman has the same innocent thought.

Of course the majority of guns in criminal hands come
from the black market: sold out of the boots of cars
at the back of pubs and on motorway hard-shoulders.
Society is awash with such weapons and the armed
burglar is not exceptional any more. It's perfectly
understandable, therefore, that listeners to Radio 4
have called for a "Martin's Law"-named after burgled
farmer Tony Martin, left - to give them the right to
defend themselves and their property by whatever means
are necessary.

But we all know that such sentiments, together with
the constant calls for the police to be armed, mean
that we are beginning to teeter down a very slippery
slope.

At some point, very soon, we are all going to have to
make a very 21st century decision -and that is to stop
tinkering with firearms laws and outlaw guns
completely.

To prohibit the manufacture, import, ownership and use
of firearms for all but the most essential
non-military purposes. The numbers of guns in use,
even in these areas - farming, say, or pest control -
should be strictly controlled and the ammunition
clearly marked for use only with that weapon. It will
be an unpopular, expensive and difficult undertaking,
but it's one that we must consider unless we want to
descend further into the American nightmare of a
society ruled by the gun, and "policed" by a pro-gun
lobby.

The Editor, Sunday Express, 245 Blackfriars Road,
London SE1 9UX.
Fax. 020 7922 7055/7794:
e-mail Sunday.exletters@express.co.uk

Replica Guns

Here is a BBC report on a call for greater control of replica guns because they are being misused by criminals and thugs. The BBC are seeking submissions and here is mine:

The usual solution of banning an item because it is misused by a minority will no doubt be top of the control freaks agenda, focusing as they do on the object rather than the criminals and thugs actually responsible for the misuse of the object. We have already travelled very very far down that road; for instance consider the complete ban on all real handguns. All this has achieved is to destroy a sport and ensure that only criminals have guns, and we have seen in recent years that they have them in abundance.

Now plastic BB firing replicas are firmly in the sights of those that believe they have a God given right to dictate what their fellow citizens should be allowed to do in their spare time and what they should not. For instance the sport/hobby of airsoft skirmishing is one of the fastest growing legitimate and safe pastimes in the UK, but the control freaks will not bat an eyelid when it comes to trying to prevent others from following the hobby. It is in their nature to scapegoat the innocent and they must take responsibility for the results of their actions.

For instance, the 170 million pounds the government spent removing legally held guns from sportsmen and women could have been used on resources to get guns out of the hands of criminals but, instead, it was frittered away. And still the killing goes on.

We have some of the harshest firearms legislation on the planet and it is failing. That is the result of identifying an object with criminal behaviour rather than getting down to the business of fighting crime, deterring criminals and punishing the wicked.

Sandringham - a letter to the Daily Mail

I would like to congratulate the education authorities in Norfolk. The letter from school children in Dersingham complaining about pheasant shooting at Sandringham displays a mastery of spelling and grammar far above the level one would expect from children of primary school age. Or perhaps the well-constructed sentence "Lots of us were extremely upset, especially our wildlife teacher, Mrs Bryan" reveals they were engaged in a dictation exercise from a teacher with her own political agenda? I am amazed that a school with such close links to an estate such as Sandringham has failed to point out the benefits which shooting brings for the local economy, the conservation of local wildlife and woodlands, and of course the inescapable link between the death of animals and meat on our plates.

Simon Clarke,
BASC
Press Officer

Countryside alliance campaign for shooting

This from their grass roots mailing system:

STRENGTHEN THE CAMPAIGNING VOICE OF SHOOTING

To protect and promote our sport the shooting community must increase the size and strength of its campaigning 'voice' as the pressure on all forms of shooting increases. 'Mainstream' organisations like the RSPCA are actively targeting shooting and the reality is that unless everyone who shoots engages in its promotion and defence the sport could all but disappear.

Unlike the hunting community, shooting itself does not yet have the organised campaigning structure, which could give these efforts, and those of all pro-shooting bodies, far greater political clout.

To do this we need to know where you are and who you are - not only you, but your friends, guests, syndicate members, tenants, beaters and pickers-up.

Please go to www.foresight-cfs.org.uk/pdf/datasheet.pdf where you can download forms to take on shoots to be filled in by all those who care about a future for shooting.

The repair robots are beginning to break down

Natalie Solent feels it too. Adding to the concerns I raised in my policeman and the sportsman post and to David Carr's constitution post, Natalie remarks:

In a quiet way it's beginning to be a little bit frightening the way minor miscarriages of justice don't seem to get fixed nowadays.

Zero-tolerance cases in school, the sacking of prison officers for insulting terrorist leaders, the Metric Martyrs are some of the examples she uses.

I realise this is very vague. I realise that much worse things happen and have always happened than any of the cases I mention. (And I realise that I haven't put in any links. Sorry, no time.) Yet I do sometimes think that there our society's repair robots, the ones that say "hey, you can't do that," are beginning to break down.

So, it seems, that if I am imagining the whole thing at least I am in good company. Natalie, on the other hand, is a little less fortunate.

The policeman and the sportsman

For not upon these hills alone
The doom of sport shall fall;
O'er the broad face of England creeps
The shadow on the wall.

I’ve been watching an online debate the past few days about freedom in the UK. A sportsman, who has had his liberty to pursue his sport removed by the state, was accused by a police officer of having a very different idea of freedom than his own. Effectively the sportsman said that the states destruction of his sport was singing from the same song sheet as other forms of oppression and was just another symptom of decline of freedom in the UK.

The officer would not concede the point. My view on freedom lies a long way from your own he said. I could almost see the superior disregarding wave of the hand.

He stated that the loss of the sport is not a symptom of a more general decline in freedom. A decline in freedom is instead categorised by things such as the prevention of public demonstrations or by the incarceration of people for their personal beliefs. These are the characteristics of a decline of freedom. The imposition of legislation that destroyed the pastime of a minority is not.

What struck me about this exchange is the officer’s notion of freedom and also his inaccuracy. It’s clear that he only considers the major freedoms as defining factors in the overall freedom of a country and in the direction that the country is heading. Little incidentals are not of concern and if those little incidentals affect only an unpopular minority then so much the better. Such things can be safely discounted.

He is tragically wrong.

That is exactly how freedom is lost, over time and in small steps. And when the slide beings it is the unpopular minorities that are the first to feel its effects. I would say that such things are not only on the same song sheet as the officer’s larger freedoms but actually characterise the opening verses. Without them there would be no song.

Then we come to the officers big freedoms and even with these we can see the cracks. For instance we have the man in Exeter arrested for telling someone off for celebrating the terrorist attacks in New York in 2001. We have the sacking of a prison officer for making an allegedly insulting remark about Osama bin Laden. We have the arrest of Robin Page for urging that the rural minority be given the same legal protection as other minorities. We have a recent police investigation of the Bishop of Chester for his sermon about homosexuality. We have the alleged use of the anti-terrorism act to impede demonstrators at a recent arms show. I am sure that if I browsed a few British blogs I could come up with many more signs; indications of the path we are now on.

Then we see another characteristic of the decent. An increase in legislation and power afforded to the state without essential controls to ensure the liberty of the citizen. We see a change in the machinery in favour of government and slowly the whole idea of a government that is there for the people flips into one of a government that is there primarily for itself.

When people like Lord Woolf call for new constitution on this very basis we begin to see how far we have decended and how dangerous things have become:

A written constitution may be needed to protect judges and citizens from the Government's "disturbing" legal changes, according to Lord Woolf, the Lord Chief Justice.

Woolf thinks things are getting so bad that us British now need additional constitutional protection. Protection from whom? Not from an enemy that threatens our shorelines but from our own government.

And then of course we come to the principal agency for enforcing current and future government restrictions and oppression, the UK Police Force. Perhaps now we come to the reason why the officer and the sportsman differ in their idea of freedom and differ in the degree to which they think this country has descended.

One is in a privileged position, afforded a level of power over his fellow citizen by the state. One is not.

David Carr, over at samizdata.net writes on this very subject concluding:

So what then must we do? To be honest, I cannot point to any specific remedy. But I do think it would be a good start if we could simply get the message to enough of our fellow citizens that the traditional Anglo-Saxon common law freedoms they take for granted are in mortal danger and that they are sleepwalking into a state of despotism.

Come in here dear boy

Things like this make me want to go out and buy a cigar.

Smoking should be completely banned in the UK, according to a top medical journal.

One day cannabis and tobacco will pass each other on the legality scale. When that happens we will be able to sit with the lunatics who have taken over the asylum and share a spliff whilst giggling to each other about how ludicrous things have become.

Obviously, with tobacco being banned, we would have to find some other suitable combustible with which to fabricate the spliff. That's what I'm told anyway.

Visit Lileks bleat today for a remarkably smooth tasting coincidence. Link out of date tomorrow, which might be today depending upon when you are reading this.

In fact I declare today National Smoke a Cigar Day!!

(Who do you think you are? - Ed).
(Shut up and spark me up).

Dredd hails anti-social crackdown

Measures to tackle anti-social behaviour will "make a considerable difference to people in Mega City One", Judge Dredd says. Dredd, giving his monthly press conference, said the changes will start coming into force in February. Not only will people see more Judges on the streets, but Judges will have the power to issue on the spot penalties and to close down nuisance city blocks, he said.
"When these changes on anti-social behaviour come in next year, they will be a very, very big thing indeed."

Laughable ejections from government

This could become a series on this blog, if I could be bothered to track them all, but here is a laughable press release from government, this one made by the Home Office (079/98) on 27 February 1998. It came as the government finished its confiscation of private property from tens of thousands of honest British citizens and put an end to popular participation in a sport for which the British are well respected internationally:

The Government fulfilled its pledge to remove all handguns from the streets of Britain today as the final phase of firearms surrender came to a close.
...
Welcoming the end of the hand-in period, Home Office Minister Alun Michael said: "We have now held a successful firearms surrender for large and small calibre handguns, which I believe has put a firm brake on the development of a dangerous gun culture in the UK."

He should be made to eat every last one of those words.

Trust and ID cards

Peter Hitchens wants you to get angry now:

We will become just like other countries where arrogant power will not let us walk down the street without poking its nose into our affairs. When this happens, England will cease to be England for ever and it will be far too late to be angry.

So please, get angry now.

I'm way ahead of you on this one Peter but as you note here:

Hence the dispiriting parrot-like squawk of 'If you haven't done anything wrong, or have nothing to hide, then you have nothing to fear', which comes from those who are happy to be tagged and docketed and scanned by the authorities

it does seem that many are quite happy with the idea of carrying an ID card around and, presumably, would think nothing of handing it over for inspection for no other reason than they have been asked to produce it.

It's fundamentally a question of trust, I guess, and a great many people's default position is to trust government and to trust that it will always have their interests at heart.

The way to win is to persuade those that have always trusted government that things can take a turn for the worst and that very bad people with evil ideas can get into positions of power. This is extraordinarily difficult to do with the current track record of British government at home throughout recent history.

Unless you have been unfortunate enough to have been a member of one of the minorities that the government has disenfranchised you will not really have a basis on which to mistrust them. You will buy the idea of ID cards and even welcome them with open arms.

You don't say

An 'expert' believes that a ban on hunting with dogs could lead to a serious breakdown in relations between police and rural communities. Well, what do you expect when 40,000 people sign a declaration saying they will deliberately break a law banning hunting before the law is even passed.

I'm sorry, did I say 40,000? That can't be right, the population of a good sized town saying up front that they are willing to break a future law? Ridiculous. Something must be done.

The Association of Chief Police Officers (Acpo) has made it clear it will enforce any ban passed by Parliament.

Indeed, like they enforce the ban on burglaries and muggings. Or better because, you know, at least the hunters have the courtesy to wear a distinctive uniform.

Alistair McWhirter, an Acpo's spokesman, says he is well aware of the implications of a ban for police community relations in the countryside. That's nice to know.

We've been working hard to get the confidence of the people in the rural area and, as a rural chief constable, we work constantly to keep a blue light presence in rural areas and so on.

Blue lights and so on. That's marvellous.

...I would say is that there are quite a few people in rural communities who are anti-hunting just as many as there are pro-hunting. So we have to balance those needs of those communities out against each other.

Yes, that's right, your job is to balance communities out against each other, after all, legislation allows for this kind of balancing doesn't it?

Perhaps you'd like to do a bit of re-balancing between the law abiding home owner and the members of the burglary fraternity, you know, given that you are in the balancing mood?

Or perhaps arresting some fox hunters would be better for balancing out some crime figures.

Again the smiling hedgerow
Shall field from field divide;
Again among the woodlands
The scarlet troop shall ride.

You can't miss them.

A dinner party

My wife and I joined six others at a dinner party this Saturday at the home of a good friend. During the main course the subject of ID cards came up (no, I didn't start it) and, not being in the habit of keeping my mouth shut when it would probably serve me to do so, I promptly disagreed with the speaker who was firmly in the "I think they're a great idea" camp.

As it turns out I alone was of the opinion that ID cards would be a bad thing. There were a couple of abstainers and five firmly for the plans with one of those deeply concerned about this whole issue I seem to have with the state. I supplied enlightenment by telling him it was simply the size of the state I had a general problem with but I made no progress with the ID card issue (except for one I know what your saying acknowledgement).

So far this England project seems to be going badly, though our victory over the French on Sunday was some consolation.

ID cards

The Spectator has an article up on ID cards. There's lots in there but for me these are the money quotes:

In addition, they inconvenience the individual. The Guardian’s Brussels correspondent recently noted how he had visited the Belgian police one morning to make a complaint about noisy neighbours, only to find himself being reprimanded for not having his ID card on him. In such ways do these devices needlessly turn the victims of crime into perpetrators.

I would say that's slightly more than an inconvenience. It's a telling off, if you like, from an agent of the state for not complying with one of their administrative requirements. I'm not sure how I would react to such a situation but if my Italian heritage has anything to do with it I suspect there will be a lot of shouting and hand waving.

Further:

And here’s the rub. Why should I have to have this thing? Mr Blunkett says that although his cards will be compulsory, one won’t have to carry them at all times. This rather defeats the purpose of the whole exercise. In any case, his scheme still undermines individual liberty. Say I happen to pop out to the local shop and find a policeman en route who asks me to produce my ID card. When I can’t, he orders me to turn up with it at the station within 24 hours. Well, why should I have to? I’m not an illegal immigrant. I’m a generally law-abiding person. I don’t mind paying £40 if I know I’m going to get £40 worth of something back. But what am I getting for it beyond a singularly expensive rectangle of plastic? To be forced to pay for something that will only inconvenience me is an outrage.

Anyone who has had to produce their driving license at a police station after a random roadside check will know how inconvenient and annoying this can be. However, with driving licenses it is different because it's not unreasonable to have to prove to the police that you have passed the compulsory competence test. What do I have to prove to the police with an identity card? Well, my identity of course, but why do they need to know that? Surely this would only be acceptable under very very limited circumstances and that does not include a walk down to the local shops.

But of course, the supporters of the scheme will say that this will never happen. It is a contrived example, they will say. You will never need to show your card unless there was a very good reason.

Perhaps I give supporters of the scheme a little too much credit. Perhaps supporters will say that it is perfectly reasonable for the police to want to check my identity to make sure that I have the right to be in the country.

"You do look a bit foreign after all."

ID cards

I'll carry an ID card as soon as they crack the technology required to have one tattooed to my arm.

If you, on the other hand, are not as accommodating as I am I suggest you go here and register your support.

For more information on ID cards visit the White Rose blog and Stand.

Imagine no more law making

Perry de Havilland points to some particularly lame behaviour from a 'politician' keen to limit the freedoms of law abiding citizens in the UK.

...the Honourable Member of Parliament for West Bromwich East calls for more regulation and makes it clear that fireworks will simply be banned if that does not produce the desired effects. And yet when talking about an incident in which a woman was injured by some idiot throwing a firework he himself notes:

Granted the little thug that conducted this assault was breaking existing laws

…and then proceeds to ignore that fact from then on.

Another example of the ban cycle that passes for serious crime prevention these days.

Imagine, for a moment, what they would all do if it became impossible to pass any new laws for a period of, say, ten years. Let's make it easier for them and say that thay can pass laws that deal with new technologies or situations that have uniquely come about in that time.

Instead of trying to address criminal behaviour by passing new laws they would be forced to put up or shut up. They would have to enforce existing legislation without bleeding away our freedom to enjoy our lives unmolested by the state (don't even think about saying "Yes, but what about the freedom of people to walk down the street without getting attacked by thugs with fireworks". Just listen to yourselves).

They would cry "Absurd! Ridiculous! How can we run a country like that". The answer is they probably can't. Not because it isn't possible, but simply because they don't know how.

The ban cycle

Labour MP Diane Abbott is urging the government:

to consider banning the manufacture, sale, transfer and importation of all imitation weapons which can cause a dilemma for police who do not know whether a firearm is real or not.

That's basically all the Auto-Electric, Gas Blow Back and Spring guns used in Airsoft skirmishing, a pastime in the UK that's growing in popularity. It could also see off the use of such equipment in the practical pistol discipline, which still survives in spite of government attempts to kill it off.

In many cases it could result toys like those in your kids toy basket being banned.

None of this will result in a reduction in gun crime, but at least it makes it look like someone is doing something. Why they can't just hold another amnesty is a mystery to me, after all those things are always fantastically successful.

Let's not mention the fact that the new anti-social behavior legislation makes it illegal to have in your possession a replica gun in a public place without good reason. That's only a law. What we need is something more solid like....like a law.

The Hunt

David Carr is reminded of a 'spaghetti western' by the pro-hunt movement. I've been receiving the Countryside Alliances grass e-route mailings since the early days of the organisation and have been very impressed with the sheer level of organisation and commitment shown by it and its members. They are a serious bunch of people who are, effectively, fed up to the hind teeth with the government and anti-hunt types trying to stomp on them. Their feelings are all too apparent so when David said:

It is still not clear whether the government will press ahead with the abolition of hunting in England and Wales (the ban has already passed into law in Scotland). But, if they do, and these people are good to their pledge, then they are quite capable of making life very difficult indeed for the authorities. In effect, a low-level civil war will be waged in the English countryside.

I found myself nodding in agreement.

When this does kick off you just watch the anti-hunt brigade bleat about how outrageous it is for the hunters to disobey the law, quickly forgetting their own law breaking as hunt saboteurs.