the wilted rose

Source: Forbidden Planet

The BBC is reporting that Jacqui Smith’s Home Office is planning to tender out a gargantuan big brother database that will contain everyone’s “telephone calls, emails and internet use”.  So if you phone your nan or email your girlfriend, the Government will know.

Why is our private correspondence or communications their business?  This is a despicable escalation of the police state and is an unwarranted intrusion into our homes.  After all, our homes are the private domain – and, as long as we don’t commit any crimes, the Government should keep its nose out.

But assuming, as authoritarian and anti-civil-liberties Smith obviously does, that we are all guilty until proven innocent is a major step backwards for the country that introduced parliamentary democracy and the Magna Carta.  

It’s all in the name of anti-terror legislation, no doubt (but why should they snoop on 60,000,000 people to try to catch no more than a handful?).  Labour again uses a nuclear warhead to crack a nut.  Brown might well think he has saved the world (tell that to currency  investors who’ve sold sterling), but he’s certainly not saved our democracy, liberty, equality, or fraternity for that matter.

It’s time that we say NO to this illiberal and Fascistic Labour government — before it’s too late.  And a Happy 2009 to you all too.