The Sweeping Power of the State
18th Apr 2009 09:02:31
There are so many things wrong with these recent news outbreaks that I'm going to have to split them up into easily-manageable bitesize chunks.
Damian Green
Quickly recap. Mr. Green is the Conservative Immigration Spokesman, arrested by the Police and held for "conspiring to commit misconduct in a public office, and aiding and abetting, counselling or procuring misconduct in a public office". in short, he acquired some leaked information that showed that the Home Office were completely incompetent and had no clue at all about the state of immigration, which is, to be fair, not news.
The police raided his office and personal home, taking even twenty-year old love letters from him and his wife. Then they dropped the case, of course, because there was none to answer, because of course he was right to publish that information, which was in the public interest.
Now it appears that police searched his emails trying to find emails from Shami Chakribati, the director of Liberty, a left-wing civil rights organisation, and totally unconnected to the trite charges in the first place. The Met Police have declined to discuss it (of course), and this whole situation sits as a worrying reminder of why people didn't like the powers that the Government and Police decided they had to have in the first place.
G20 Protests
Ian Tomlinson was assaulted and died on 1st April 2009, the day of the G20 protests. He was walking along the street, certainly made no aggressive motions or actions towards police officers, and then for reasons which remain unclear, an officer strikes him in the back of the knees, and shoves him hard to the floor. He falls, and dies minutes later.
This we know. But previously, we thought he died of a heart attack. Now, reports emerge that he died from internal bleeding. Now, this is bad, but the behaviour of two officers doesn't necessarily reflect on the behaviour and attitude of the Met Police as a whole, and it would be wrong to suggest so.
So, the police claimed they provided first aid initially, and that they were pelted with water bottles and other missiles as they attempted to do so. But The Times reports that only a single plastic bottle was thrown anywhere near the area.
Then Nick Hardwick, the chair of the IPCC said there were no CCTV cameras near filming the incident. But to cut a long story short, there were.
Counter-Terrorism Laws Being Abused by Councils
As if we didn't know this already. Councils using anti-terrorism laws to target people leaving bins out early and rogue dealers. Epsom Council has used them to spy on unliscensed taxis. Overall, the Liberal Democrats have found:
A survey of more than 180 councils discovered that:
- Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (RIPA) powers have been used 10,288 times in the last five years
- 1,615 council staff have the power to authorise the use of the RIPA
- 21% (340) of these staff are below senior management grade
- Just 9% of these authorisations have led to a successful prosecution, caution or fixed-penalty notice
It's a terrible abuse of an authoritarian piece of legislation designed to keep the public scared of terrorism, rather than combating the pathetically tiny threat we face. The billions of pounds we have spent "combating" it could have been better spent on the NHS, schools, road repairs, or just decreasing taxes rather than throwing money down the toilet.
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