"He loved Big Brother now."

posted by k

I'm waiting for the knock on the door.

My largely law-abiding life won't save me. They've invented new laws and then, just in case they've missed something, there are ways of personalising the law – devising special laws to get just one person. And I'm not talking about Brian Haw, who got the honour of a special clause in an act of parliament (which turned out not to work in his case after all). I'm talking about laws which might get me – or you. It wasn't always quite so bad.

Of course, there have been plenty of laws to trap the unwitting or foolish or honest. Don't tell a soldier you think he or she should have a change of career. That breaks the Incitement to Disaffection Act (1934). (I've broken that one a couple of times. I'd rather they arrested me for that because I did it deliberately - I think it's wrong to deprive anyone of freedom of thought and conscience.) And there are bad laws which have been repealed. Section 28, which scared teachers out of saying that Oscar Wilde was gay or that most of Shakespeare's sonnets were written to a fair young man, is no longer on the statute books. I'm pleased about that. But there are all those new, apparently well-meaning laws which seem to be used in unpredicted ways.

Take the law on stalking. One individual stalking another is a nasty, threatening matter. I've known young women in particular – though it's not only young women who are affected – really frightened by phone-calls in the middle of the night, threatening letters, displays of covertly-taken photographs. When victims complain and nothing is done, I'm angry. When victims, who may have been stalked for years, are beaten up and even killed, I start asking, “Why didn't they listen to her? Why don't they do something?” So the government responded. A minister could have pointed out that there were already laws against harassment or proposed a slight adjustment to existing laws. Instead we were offered a brand-new, shiny law which would protect the vulnerable from harm – and even from mild distress.

But it wasn't just used against stalkers. It was one of those all-purpose, catch-all laws which could be used against anybody who talked to or wrote to someone more than once. If I encounter an arms manufacturer on the train – it could happen; making weapons is big business in Britain – and find out about his profession, I might express myself strongly, even enter into an argument with him. And if I see him the next day, I might continue that argument – and he might be annoyed. Under the law, that would count as stalking and I might find myself in jail. If I were handing out leaflets and offered one to the same person twice, that might be considered a crime. It seems to me that if a friend and I had a row in a pub and one of us phoned the other to continue the row, that might be considered stalking.

The law is being framed to prevent awkward behaviour and mild distress – and the government seems quite pleased that it sweeps up political protesters and non-violent dissidents as well. Bu you don't have to break the law to get an ASBO. Anti-social behaviour legislation has been so widely framed that it's possible to construct a special law to limit the freedom of speech, action and movement of one individual who hasn't broken any law. That idea was controversial when it came in but now everyone's used to the idea that if your neighbour annoys you enough, you might be able to stop the annoyance with an ASBO. Sometimes ASBOs are used instead of charging someone with a more conventional crime. ASBOs allow magistrates to impose sentences that they make up: people can be banned from places and forbidden to act in a way that is perfectly legal for anybody else.

ASBOs lack the legal safeguards of conventional criminal laws and injunctions which protect individuals. If you break an ASBO – a law constructed just for you – you can land in jail. It's another convenient tool for dealing with protesters and dissidents.

Freedom of speech is being eroded too. I'm not an absolutist about freedom of speech. I'm not in favour of inciting hatred against anyone. Incitement to violence is dangerous. (I sometimes wonder why politicians are never charged with either offence.) There are many individuals and groups who suffer because of what is said about them – that's important for everyone to remember. Politicians and the people have a responsibility to counter a climate of hate. Silence won't achieve that. Nor will the competitive xenophobia of politicians.

Of course I'm sometimes hurt and offended by people's attitudes and what they say. I'm human. But my first action isn't to ring the police. I can see why an airport chaplain was offended by anti-religious cartoons, clipped from Private Eye, left in the airport chaplaincy – they were probably left there to offend. Leaving them there might have been a silly action but it surely doesn't deserve a criminal record. The church wasn't damaged. God wasn't damaged. It seems particularly ludicrous in a nominally Christian country where – archaically – bishops vote as unelected members of the second chamber of parliament and the Archbishop of Canterbury plays a key role in the coronation of the monarch. And – oh -dear! - I've made tactless and ill-judged jokes at times. Will the police come round to get me?

With any luck, the police won't kill me, though since the death of Juan Charles Menenez and the case of David Mery I've felt a little less confident on the tube. I usually find the police polite, even though I was caught in a kettle once and found my experience rather different from the police's official account.

But what would happen if the police came round and arrested me? According to the the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002, the police keep 25% of the goods and money they confiscate and the Crown Prosecution Service keeps a further 25%. The law was meant – so were told – to deal with major criminals and drug traffickers using threats and violence – and the standard of proof of how the money was obtained was changed, so that the “criminal” had to prove a legal right to the money. It sounds great when dealing with international criminals. It's more troubling when the police seize the jewellery – and even the life savings – of prostitutes working together for their own protection. Prostitutes are not .likely to go to court to recover their money, as the law requires. So cash-strapped police forces find that pursuing a particular crime is a nice little earner for the force, so long as the police forget that they are now living on immoral earnings – the usual definition of a pimp.

I could go one. I could go on. There are so many liberties trickling away. I've committed so many offences that might be arrestable. I even took a photo of the House of Commons – with a policeman outside. Governments don't usual restore the liberties they have taken – unless the people insist. And all around me are people who have forgotten the liberties they lost and adjusted oppressive, intrusive laws. I'm adjusting too. This time next year, I may have forgotten what liberty is. What liberties have I forgotten already?

The Lost Principles of Policing

The Nine Principles of Policing were written in 1829, expanding on Sir Robert Peel's original Nine Points of Policing. Copies were issued to all members of the Metropolitan Police. There is some uncertainty about authorship. What is certain is that over the last 180 years, the themes which lie behind these philosophical guidelines have been forgotten.

The Nine Principles of Policing:

1. To prevent crime and disorder, as an alternative to their repression by military force and severity of legal punishment.

2. To recognise always that the power of the police to fulfil their functions and duties is dependent on public approval of their existence, actions and behaviour and on their ability to secure and maintain public respect.

3. To recognise always that to secure and maintain the respect and approval of the public means also the securing of the willing co-operation of the public in the task of securing observance of laws.

4. To recognise always that the extent to which the co-operation of the public can be secured diminishes proportionately the necessity of the use of physical force and compulsion for achieving police objectives.

5. To seek and preserve public favour, not by pandering to public opinion; but by constantly demonstrating absolutely impartial service to law, in complete independence of policy, and without regard to the justice or injustice of the substance of individual laws, by ready offering of individual service and friendship to all members of the public without regard to their wealth or social standing, by ready exercise of courtesy and friendly good humour; and by ready offering of individual sacrifice in protecting and preserving life.

6. To use physical force only when the exercise of persuasion, advice and warning is found to be insufficient to obtain public co-operation to an extent necessary to secure observance of law or to restore order, and to use only the minimum degree of physical force which is necessary on any particular occasion for achieving a police objective.

7. To maintain at all times a relationship with the public that gives reality to the historic tradition that the police are the public and that the public are the police, the police being only members of the public who are paid to give full time attention to duties which are incumbent on every citizen in the interests of community welfare and existence.

8. To recognise always the need for strict adherence to police-executive functions, and to refrain from even seeming to usurp the powers of the judiciary of avenging individuals or the State, and of authoritatively judging guilt and punishing the guilty.

9. To recognise always that the test of police efficiency is the absence of crime and disorder, and not the visible evidence of police action in dealing with them.

Dodo

Did I miss something?

posted by k
(with apologies for double posting)

Did I miss something?

I read the newspapers yesterday and found that Gordon Brown (our prime minister - it's hard to get used to the change) was threatening a state of emergency. No-one seemed shocked or surprised. No-one made it the lead story in the papers this morning.

I keep looking at accounts of what was said. I keep hoping I've got this all wrong.

Gordon Brown said that he planned to ask parliament to double the time suspects could be detained without trial. He said there were two main options: either parliament would vote as he said or, whenever he wanted to hold suspects for longer, he would declare a state of emergency which would allow him to detain suspects for a further thirty days.

Presumably Mr Brown is talking about the Civil Contingencies Act 2004. This allows the Prime Minister or other Ministers to make legislation without consulting parliament in certain situations. According to section 19 of the Act, these are:

(a) an event or situation which threatens serious damage to human welfare in the United Kingdom or in a Part or region

(b) an event or situation which threatens serious damage to the environment of the United Kingdom or of a Part or region, or

(c) war, or terrorism, which threatens serious damage to the security of the United Kingdom

Presumably Gordon Brown will claim that section (c) applies. That won't be accurate. Gordon Brown is threatening MPs and peers with a state of emergency should they dare to vote against him. The "emergency" he claims is the failure of parliament to do the bidding of the prime minister. That's not how parliament is supposed to work.

Parliament is supposed to be a democracy. Our elected representatives are supposed to vote on the law.

The Civil Contingencies Act is a very dangerous law. It allows the Prime Minister, acting alone, to amend any Act of Parliament except the Human Rights Act 1998 for the period of the emergency. When the Act was debated, Members of the House of Lords attempted to protect laws that they regarded as fundamental to the British constitution. They were unsuccessful. If the Prime Minister declares a state of emergency he can even suspend the following laws:

Bill of Rights 1689

Act of Settlement 1700

Habeas Corpus Act 1816

Parliament Act 1911 (limiting parliaments to five years)

House of Commons Disqualification Act 1975

After thirty days, he has to ask for parliament's approval.

We have a new prime minister who has warned our elected representatives that if they don't do as he says, he'll stamp his foot and rule without them for a month. If they won't let him lock people up for longer, he'll say it's an emergency and do it anyway.

What else might Mr Brown do in those thirty days of emergency?

What would be left when the emergency was over?

Where are the protests?

"necessity, the tyrant's plea"

posted by k (again, a post taken from elsewhere)

Help! Panic now! This is DANGEROUS!!!!

Home Secretary John Reid - the one who's resigning with Tony Blair - has said he may declare a State of Emergency. This is because three non-dangerous prisoners who have never been convicted (as described here) have gone missing.

It seems a slight over-reaction. But according to the Guardian, which has recently transformed itself into a right-wing anti-libertarian newspaper (as demonstrated by some of its Comment columns), unnamed MPs fear their control orders may are turning them into "a laughing stock". And our leaders don't like being laughed at.

Besides that, John Reid has several complaints. For a start, control orders may be illegal. Of course, that would mean the government is breaking the law and not the escaped prisoners. Reid has been keeping them under house arrest regardless of a High Court ruling against him, in the hope that he can get support from the Court of Appeal or the Law Lords. Apart from control orders, MPs refused to let the Home Secretary imprison people without charge for more than 28 days. The courts and parliament are against Reid and people have started laughing at him. What is he to do?

So far as I can see, Ministers can declare a State of Emergency under the 2004 Civil Contingencies Act if there is a state of war, an environmental disaster, a major act of terrorism or a natural disaster. I wonder which of these categories includes the disagreement of parliament and the courts - not to mention the risk of public laughter.

It all sounds so unlikely. But the risks presented by this legislation have been identified. And it seems quite clear that the government wants to suspend parts of the European Human Rights convention - unless, of course, the judges do exactly as they are told.

Surely Parliament won't let this happen, Surely, if necessary, people will take to the streets and defend democracy and the rule of law. We know what happens when governments take power into their own hands and away from parliament and the courts. Don't we?