I sent the following letter to my MP. If she agrees, I will post the response here. Her speeches are usually full of low-grade management speak bullshit and she has her head firmly up the party arse, but who knows – maybe she will surprise me.
Dear Sarah McCarthy-Fry,
I am writing to take issue with your party’s continuing assault on
civil liberties.The suggestion that all email, phone calls and web site access should
be monitored is another step towards a truly Orwellian society.The argument that such means are required to catch wrongdoers is bogus.
If CCTV was installed in every room of every house it would massively
reduce domestic violence and drug use, help catch paedophiles, prevent
terrorists making bombs and more. Hopefully though you can see that
this is not justification for the massive invasion of privacy. I
understand that it can be difficult, but you must try to balance the
“even if it saves just one child argument” against the far more
difficult to justify but equally, if not more important than civil
liberties and privacy.We already have the RIP Act, 28 days detention and anti-terror laws
being used to spy on people by their local councils or freeze the
assets of the Terrorist Nation of Iceland. Naturally the police and
security services will always ask for more power, but it appears that
they are now simply asking for things which will make their life easier
rather than being essential. Making things easier when there are other
alternatives, even if they are difficult, is not acceptable.If serious crimes are being committed, there will always be physical
evidence. Even if computers are fully encrypted and secure, a person
cannot prepare for a terrorist attack or manufacture child pornography
without doing other things which can be detected and used for a
prosecution.Gordon Brown has recently shown fantastic leadership and a willingness
to do difficult things. I hope this is an issue on which your party can
show similar courage and principals.This is an open letter which I will post on my blog. Would you mind if
I posted your response?