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Nick Clegg’s speech on civil liberties

Nick Clegg As Dylan flagged earlier, Nick Clegg has today spelled out a very welcome series of reforms that we hope will roll-back our overbearing and intrusive government. Inter alia:

* ID cards out
* Biometric passports stopped
* No e-mail control without specific need
* CCTV regulated
* Innocent people off the DNA database
* No ContactPoint
* No fingerprints taken from children by schools without parental consent
* Removal of restrictions on right to peaceful protest
* Review the thousands of criminal offences created by New Labour which made criminals of ordinary people
* Review of the anti-terror powers. Back to "great British freedoms."
* Defend trial by jury.

All featured in our Manifesto and all are good news. But, while we welcome these promised changes, the real challenge will be implementing the reforms in the face of strong internal opposition from the civil service.

Local councils and the police are very protective of CCTV and the DNA database; bureaucrats love their power; there will also be calls for a system to replace the ContactPoint database. This government must learn from the mistakes of its predecessor and not bow to such pressures.

This is the legacy of our previous government – thousands of bullying laws that had no popular support and damaged the lives of millions of law-abiding people. With this programme of reform we hope that this legacy can be reversed.

By Alex Deane

Posted on May 19, 2010 by Big Brother Watch Posted in Home
  • opsimath

    If this is the kind of thing that a coalition government can bring us, it’s a terrible shame we didn’t have one earlier, before ZaNuLabour tried to turn us into their vision of ‘Brave New World’.
    I wasn’t all that keen on a coalition, but this looks very promising – all power to them!

  • http://alastairs-place.net alastair

    We didn’t need a coalition government for this. The Tory manifesto was already full of it, which isn’t a great surprise as a lot of it was lifted wholesale from Daniel Hannan and Douglas Carswell’s book, The Plan.

  • guy herbert

    On ContactPoint, though it is good it is going, it is relatively benign and simple. The real challenge is to tackle the pernicious universal intrusiveness of Every Child Matters and the eCAF that goes with it.

  • Growler

    If Clegg delivers half of this I will be dancing in the streets. Incidentally, this is very amusing and worth a peek!!
    http://lookingforavoice.blogspot.com/2010/05/am-i-only-one-to-notice-labour-uncut.html
    That Sion Simon can get nothing right!!

  • Demeter

    Of notable absence in these repetitious announcements is any mention of abolition of the odious ISA/VBS.

  • Growler

    Quite right Demeter. I have just called and e mailed Clegg’s office to urge the abolition of this useless and expensive quango

  • Phatboy

    Have they decided to do away with biometric passports? I thought these were required to enter the USA?

  • Travis Burns

    That’s the spirit Cleggy – the Tories wouldn’t have approached the matter in as bold and resolute manner. They want to repeal the HRA – how is that reconcilable with a party that values the importance of rights? On this matter, the Tories show their true colours. Long live Cleggism!

  • guy herbert

    @Phatboy:
    No. The Home Office and last government were continually misleading people on this point. The current UK ePassport is fully compliant with ICAO rules, and is valid for entry to the US on visa waiver. If your passport is older than October 26, 2006 it need not be an ePassport.
    http://www.dhs.gov/files/crossingborders/travelers.shtm#2
    The current ePassport is ‘biometric’ in a very loose sense that the Home Office uses when it suits it and not otherwise. Home Office statements are habitually profoundly misleading, and should be read literal mindedly, without assumption, and *with* detailed reference to the original documents they purport to refer to. (I don’t know whether dealing with that culture that is on the coalition’s agenda or not.)
    What the Home Office formerly intended to do was to ‘upgrade’ the ePassport from 2011-12 by fingerprinting all applicants (all 10 fingers, though only two would be held on the passport), and at the same time collecting additional personal information and mass-enrolling all applicants onto the National Identity Register.

  • Purlieu

    Correct me if I’m wrong, but for a “full” biometric passport to work i.e. actually actively use the fringerprint info, you would need to have dabs taken at the checkin/destination and then compared with the stored version. Of course those places won’t store anything permanently.

  • NeverSurrender

    Hooray! Up yours Big Brother NuLabour Stasi!
    Sorry, I just couldn’t resist that.