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The hyperregulation of everyday life

Manifesto club logo Over at Spiked Online, a brilliant extended essay from good friend of Big Brother Watch (and contributor to our new book) Josie Appleton, of the Manifesto Club. It actually makes for rather painful reading for anyone who cares about freedom in this country. Just an extract:

From 2000 onwards – when the gloss of Cool Britannia had worn off – the hyperregulatory machine really cranked into action. The Terrorism Act 2000 introduced a broad definition of terrorism which could be used against political demonstrations; the Race Relations Act 2001 created an obligation on schools to report ‘racist incidents’, including one kid calling another ‘chocolate bar’; the Criminal Justice and Police Act 2001 created zones in which the police could confiscate bottles of wine from picnickers and also made it an offence to protest outside somebody’s home. The Sexual Offences Act 2003 made it an offence to get somebody drunk, and criminalised teenage canoodling; the Anti-Social Behaviour Act 2003 created dispersal zones in which groups could be broken up by the police, and also introduced on-the-spot fines for graffiti, noise and truancy. The Licensing Act 2003 created the aforementioned regulation of clowns, poetry-reading and pub singalongs. The Hunting Act 2004 banned foxhunting with dogs; the Health Act 2006 banned smoking in public spaces.

The Protection of Vulnerable Groups Act 2006 meant that the nine million adults who work or volunteer with children would have to go on a database. In the same year, the Identity Cards Act introduced ID cards; the Violent Crime Reduction Act provided for ‘drinking banning orders’; and the Racial and Religious Hatred Act threatened to criminalise risqué jokes. And so it went on…until Labour finished with a flurry of regulations targeting lapdancing clubs (which under the Policing and Crime Act 2009 require a ‘sex licence’), football supporters (subjected to ‘football banning orders’), and drinks offers such as ‘free drinks for the ladies’ (banned under the Mandatory Drinking Code 2010).

There are few areas of life that have not been touched. From football clubs to pubs, foxhunts to poetry readings, circuses to the backs of the school bike sheds, playgrounds to political protests – everyday activities are either now banned or highly regulated.

Each point hits home, and a terrible picture of modern British society emerges (there are dozens more such examples in the piece). It's depressing but essential reading. Do go over and read the whole thing.

By Alex Deane

Posted on January 7, 2011 by Big Brother Watch Posted in Home
  • http://profile.typepad.com/cholten99 Cholten99

    I’m a big fan of BBW and agree with a lot of the above but some of this is just irritating hyperbole:
    > Act 2001 created an obligation on schools to report
    > ‘racist incidents’, including one kid calling
    > another ‘chocolate bar’
    Are you saying that this is acceptable behaviour? I think the majority of people would disagree.
    > The Sexual Offences Act 2003 made it an offence to
    > get somebody drunk
    When done on purpose with the intention of assaulting someone this seems entirely reasonable to me.
    > The Hunting Act 2004 banned foxhunting with dogs;
    You would hope that in the 21st century we would be past getting our thrills from animals tearing each other apart.
    > the Health Act 2006 banned smoking in public spaces.
    Given the overwhelming evidence of the effects of secondary smoke this isn’t a bad thing.
    > In the same year, the Identity Cards Act introduced
    > ID cards
    Proposed it – now removed.
    In short there are so many valid things in this list but by diluting it with extraneous items it just weakens our cause.

  • The Chicken

    For me the smoking ban is symptomatic of government’s continual spineless caving-in to single-issue pressure groups that masquerade as charities, which they themselves fund (ASH are a great example), instead of applying common sense. The recent damning report on the government’s failure to cull these wasteful quangos will sadly ensure that such hyperregulation will continue for years to come.

  • http://profile.typepad.com/6p0115723fadaa970b Peter Thurgood

    Oh dear Cholten99, you say “diluting it with extraneous items it just weakens our cause”. These items may be “extraneous” to you, but I can assure you that they aren’t to millions of people in this country, and the “cause” that you mention as “ours”, what exact cause is that, and what exact group do you belong to, that you express as “ours?”
    Your other points regarding so called “extraneous items” are very old fashioned and ill thought out.
    You think it racist for a young child to call another ‘chocolate bar’? As far as I am aware a chocolate bar is not an offensive word, I hear people use it all the time in my local newsagent’s shop, who incidentally is Asian, and I know for a fact that he doesn’t take offence at this, as he is a very good friend of mine.
    Your next assumption, is that because we are now in the 21st century, that nobody should be allowed to use dogs to hunt foxes. Maybe you would like to give a better alternative on how people in the countryside could keep down the threat that foxes pose to their livestock then? Poison maybe? Or clubbing them over the head? Anything as long as the so called “toffs” are not seen to be enjoying it eh?
    You say the Sexual Offences Act 2003 made it an offence to get somebody drunk? I am not 100% sure on this, but surely this is a mistake? What on earth has getting “someone” drunk, got to do with sex? Ah, but then you go on to say that when done on purpose with the intention of assaulting someone it seems entirely reasonable to you. All I can say is that the public is very lucky that you are not a judge.
    Regarding your statement on the smoking ban; I would very much like to see the “overwhelming evidence” of the effects of secondary smoke that you speak about? There is, as we all know, a massive hype surrounding this subject, and the smoking-ban itself was brought in upon this very premise, but as time marches on, so to does the propaganda and hype, which has even gone as far now, as to suggest banning the sale of electronic cigarettes, which produce nothing more than vaporised air, something like the majority of your statements.
    The majority of scientist now agree that secondary smoke is harmless, but of course, if you know better, then please point us towards some serious scientific facts to prove otherwise.
    I might be wrong, but I thought Big Brother Watch, was a site to combat these type of things, not to extol their virtues, as you seem to be doing?

  • http://profile.typepad.com/alexdeane Alex Deane

    Peter – you’re not wrong! :)

  • http://profile.typepad.com/harleyrider Harleyrider Davidson

    They have created a fear that is based on nothing’’
    World-renowned pulmonologist, president of the prestigious Research Institute Necker for the last decade, Professor Philippe Even, now retired, tells us that he’s convinced of the absence of harm from passive smoking. A shocking interview.
    What do the studies on passive smoking tell us?
    PHILIPPE EVEN. There are about a hundred studies on the issue. First surprise: 40% of them claim a total absence of harmful effects of passive smoking on health. The remaining 60% estimate that the cancer risk is multiplied by 0.02 for the most optimistic and by 0.15 for the more pessimistic … compared to a risk multiplied by 10 or 20 for active smoking! It is therefore negligible. Clearly, the harm is either nonexistent, or it is extremely low.
    It is an indisputable scientific fact. Anti-tobacco associations report 3 000-6 000 deaths per year in France …
    I am curious to know their sources. No study has ever produced such a result.
    Many experts argue that passive smoking is also responsible for cardiovascular disease and other asthma attacks. Not you?
    They don’t base it on any solid scientific evidence. Take the case of cardiovascular diseases: the four main causes are obesity, high cholesterol, hypertension and diabetes. To determine whether passive smoking is an aggravating factor, there should be a study on people who have none of these four symptoms. But this was never done. Regarding chronic bronchitis, although the role of active smoking is undeniable, that of passive smoking is yet to be proven. For asthma, it is indeed a contributing factor … but not greater than pollen!
    The purpose of the ban on smoking in public places, however, was to protect non-smokers. It was thus based on nothing?
    Absolutely nothing! The psychosis began with the publication of a report by the IARC, International Agency for Research on Cancer, which depends on the WHO (Editor’s note: World Health Organization). The report released in 2002 says it is now proven that passive smoking carries serious health risks, but without showing the evidence. Where are the data? What was the methodology? It’s everything but a scientific approach. It was creating fear that is not based on anything.
    Why would anti-tobacco organizations wave a threat that does not exist?
    The anti-smoking campaigns and higher cigarette prices having failed, they had to find a new way to lower the number of smokers. By waving the threat of passive smoking, they found a tool that really works: social pressure. In good faith, non-smokers felt in danger and started to stand up against smokers. As a result, passive smoking has become a public health problem, paving the way for the Evin Law and the decree banning smoking in public places. The cause may be good, but I do not think it is good to legislate on a lie. And the worst part is that it does not work: since the entry into force of the decree, cigarette sales are rising again.
    Why not speak up earlier?
    As a civil servant, dean of the largest medical faculty in France, I was held to confidentiality. If I had deviated from official positions, I would have had to pay the consequences. Today, I am a free man.
    Le Parisien
    .

  • http://profile.typepad.com/daveatherton Dave Atherton

    Liberty is not an a la carte menu which you pick and choose which liberties are allowed and which ones are not. Liberty is a smorgasboard with everyone having their rights to respected.
    Fox hunting for example. I have ridden a horse once, never been on a fox hunt, and quite sentimental about animals but believe that fox hunting should never of been banned. It was more about class spite and Big Brother being in control than the welfare of foxes. Soon after the ban came through the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons published a report that said fox hunting was the most humane way of killing them. Death is instant unlike shooting where up to 50% walk away to die on agony.
    “A Veterinary Opinion on Hunting with Hounds was written by Dr.L.H.Thomas and Professor W.R.Allen.
    “Hunting with hounds is the natural and most humane way of controlling the population of all four quarry species”
    - Supported by over 540 members of the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons
    “…the short final phase of the hunt, usually less than 2 minutes, will involve stress but this, in physiological terms, will be no more than that experienced by the extended athlete or racehorse.”
    “..one may conclude, as did the Committee of Inquiry, that death was almost instantaneous.”
    “However, shooting is intrinsically unsafe and inevitably produces a percentage of animals that are wounded. Shooting can only be as certain and quick as death by hounds when a close or point blank shot is applied directly to the cranium.”
    http://www.vet-wildlifemanagement.org.uk/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=30&Itemid=32

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