House of Lords: rise of CCTV is threat to freedom

Is this perhaps an encouraging sign, maybe Britain is showing signs of waking up at last instead of sleepwalking into a surveillance society.

The steady expansion of the "surveillance society" risks undermining fundamental freedoms including the right to privacy, according to a House of Lords report published today.

The peers say Britain has constructed one of the most extensive and technologically advanced surveillance systems in the world in the name of combating terrorism and crime and improving administrative efficiency.

The report, Surveillance: Citizens and the State, by the Lords' constitution committee, says Britain leads the world in the use of CCTV, with an estimated 4m cameras, and in building a national DNA database, with more than 7% of the population already logged compared with 0.5% in the America.

The cross-party committee which includes Lord Woolf, a former lord chief justice, and two former attorneys general, Lord Morris and Lord Lyell, warns that "pervasive and routine" electronic surveillance and the collection and processing of personal information is almost taken for granted.

Have a look at this map as well, what kind of society are we living in??

READ MORE at:-
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2009/feb/06/surveillance-freedom-peers

Download the report on the surveillance society (pdf)

Download the UK data sharing report

Why protesters are now stalkers

An article written by George Monbiot

Did you know ... a law passed to protect people from stalkers is being used by the government to prosecute protesters

One of the most heartbreaking articles I have ever read was a response column published recently in the Guardian. Edward Countryman explained that he was writing on behalf of his wife, Evonne Powell-Von Heussen, "who could not bear to face" the unintended consequences of the thing she had created.

For 17 years she was the victim of an aggressive stalker, who attacked her and held her captive. She spent five years running a brave and vigorous campaign for an anti-stalking law, to ensure that nobody else's life could be ruined as hers was. Now she has seen how that law – the 1997 Protection from Harassment Act – is being used for a completely different purpose. She is so upset by the "perversion of its intentions" that she cannot bring herself to confront it.

Powell-Von Heussen "took great care that the act would protect frightened, endangered individuals from their assailants, and only such persons". But the first three people to be prosecuted under it were all peaceful protesters. Since then it has been used by the police and courts to criminalise almost all forms of dissent.

The law creates an offence of pursuing "a course of conduct which amounts to harassment of another". Harassment is defined as "alarming the person or causing the person distress". The act can be used to impose injunctions on people, criminalising their previously lawful activities. As the injunctions use civil law to create criminal offences, they require a much lower standard of proof: hearsay evidence and untested and unproven allegations can be used to criminalise any action the police or the courts wish to stop.

READ MORE at:-
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/feb/05/anti-stalking-liberty-central

WATCHING THE POLICE

I stumbled across this article on another blog

Secret Policemen are having a ball at our expense
The Big Issue, December 2008
By Heather Brooke

Once upon a time people complained of rarely seeing a bobby on the beat. Now they’re lucky to get a full glimpse of a policeman’s face.

Watching the video footage of police searching the office of MP Damian Green I noticed that practically the first words out of the investigator’s mouth were: “turn that camera off.’ This was in response to another MP daring to film the police in action as they searched and seized Green’s possessions without a warrant.

According to the Tory party, the posting of the video footage was delayed because the Metropolitan Police demanded that the officers’ faces be blanked out. Why?

Robert Peel created the principals of policing when the Metropolitan Police was first created in 1829. He ensured every police officer be issued a badge number, to assure individual accountability. His most famous principal:

Police, at all times, should maintain a relationship with the public that gives reality to the historic tradition that the police are the public and the public are the police; the police being only members of the public…

That’s worth keeping in mind as the police increasingly demand special rights which they deny the law-abiding citizen. Here’s an example: Go to any protest or an event held outside Parliament and you will see police officers filming people who have committed no crime yet if any Joe Public attempts to film the police he will quickly find himself harassed, threatened with arrest or have his camera seized or film deleted.

Go into any police station and you will find yourself under the gaze of CCTV, yet if you dare to get out your own camera you’ll be ordered to stop immediately; if you persist you’ll be threatened and likely ejected from the building.

Don’t be fooled. This is not about security. It is about power. We know it’s about power because if citizens wear masks, the police force their removal. Being able to identify someone is the primary way of holding that person to account.

It is well documented that people behave differently when granted anonymity, and not usually for the better. In a crowd or under the orders of a powerful leader, people will commit all sorts of outrageous behaviour, say all kinds of offensive things if they feel cloaked by the mantel of anonymity.

The police have a monopoly on force so it is right that in a democracy, police officers are individually accountable for how they exercise this force. Anonymity invites abuse. Yet police forces are increasingly demanding anonymity for their officers. The officers who shot Jean Charles de Menezes remain unidentified, as do the officers who killed Derek Bennett, 29, when they thought his cigarette lighter was a handgun.

I’ve worked as crime reporter in the US and the default position there is the opposite: police are identified by name and their photographs are published unpixilated. Anonymity is granted rarely and only if there is a quantifiable threat to the officer. Even FBI agents are named in court cases. Individual accountability is the cornerstone of public service effectiveness. Common to all totalitarian systems is that agents are hidden. Is this what we want from our police?

It is not yet illegal to film the police or to disclose information about an individual officer’s behaviour. But it soon will be. Part 7, item 76 of the new Counter-Terrorism Act 2008 would make it a criminal offence to elicit information about a constable which is ‘of a kind likely to be useful to a person committing or preparing an act of terrorism’ or ‘publishes or communicates any such information.’

That last bit is incredibly wide-ranging and completely open to abuse. It allows the police to decide what should and shouldn’t be published about them. Such a law would effectively criminalise the disclosure of such vital pubic interest matters such as the behaviour of the Met Police in the immediate aftermath of the de Menezes shooting. And bear in mind, too, that the bar is now set low on what is considered an ‘act of terrorism’: heckling outside the Labour Party conference, wearing a T-shirt criticizing the Prime Minister, daring to publish empirical facts about Government policies, all that’s been deemed a threat to our security.

The police need to get back to basic Peelian Principals. They can’t expect to have the trust of the public when they are ashamed even to show their faces.

WHAT DO THEY DO WITH OUR DATA?

Ever wondered what the government does with our personal data that they compel us to hand over to them?

Think of all the information we provide when we fill in our tax return, electoral register, council tax form, census return, licence application, passport application, apply for a loan, get married (or divorced), tax your car, appear in court etc etc

I would like to think that my data was treated confidentially, stored securely and only used for the purpose it was gathered for.

Unfortunately that is not the case, it gets sold to whoever is willing to pay the price, to credit checking agencies, banks, direct marketing companies and people such as http://www.govtregistry.com/ and http://www.oscar-research.co.uk/

They have the cheek to tell us to beware of identity theives and keep our details secure............................

ARMY OF HEALTH VISITORS

The NSPCC is calling for an additional 4,000 health visitors to be employed in response to their report of 45 under fives being killed between 2007 - 2008.

Whilst we would not wish to see ANY children die or be killed, this must be seen in context - there are over 3 MILLION under 5s in the UK, 45 is a very tiny percentage and I don't believe it justifies an additional 4,000 health visitors. (It might be worth noting that there are some 70 deaths annually in police custody, should we therefore employ 7,000 people to check up on people in police custody to reduce this figure?)

The NSPCC are assuming that we must all be monitored, as parents cannot be trusted to care for their children. There is far too much state intrusion already and rather than assume that ALL parents should be checked on, why not decide which ones may need extra help and support?

The horrific case of Baby P is used to help justify yet more intrusion into family life, yet he was known to the authorities and had been visited, an extra 4,000 health visitors would not have done anything to help save this child.

Virtually every mother to be comes into contact with a whole range of health professionals during her pregnancy, surely it is only necessary for a GP or midwife to be able to express concerns (NO WE DON'T NEED A BIG DATABASE TO DO THIS) and for the health visitors to prioritise their visits to those concerned rather than trying to cover everybody (badly).

If you are looking for a needle, don't make the haystack bigger!

Common Purpose

I keep stumbling across an organisation called Common Purpose and quite frankly they worry me.

One of their stated aims is to produce the leaders of society:

The leaders of this civil society are likely to be leaders already within their own areas: companies, hospitals, communities. But they need to see themselves as leaders of society too - and use their talents accordingly.

Common Purpose is all about finding, encouraging and developing these leaders: wherever they are and whatever they are currently doing.

We aim to open people's eyes. Show them where the levers of power are and how they work. Give them the information they need or show them where to find it. Introduce them to their peers in other fields.

In a similar manner to Patrick Henry College in America, Common Purpose seem to be infiltrating all levels of government and state administration but in many more countries. They claim not have an underlying agenda, I have trouble believing that.

Common purpose have a very cosy relationship with Government,
The former Department for Education and Skills concluded a contract in September 2004 for £28,800 and April 2005 for £22,900 with Common Purpose to provide challenging and diverse learning experiences for future leaders.
In addition Common Purpose South Yorkshire currently has free use of a small accommodation unit in the Sheffield site of the Department for Children, Schools and Families.
Hansard 3rd Sept 2007

Yet another step towards global government perhaps?

Where are we heading?

HE PARENTS WELCOME CHILDREN'S SOCIETY REPORT

The Good Childhood Inquiry by the Children's Society will release the results of its study this week. 
Home educators have welcomed the review which reports that the children of Britain need more parental attention, more freedom to play, more access to the outdoors, and are harmed by junk food, peer pressure leading to consumerism and experimentation with alcohol and drugs, and the stresses of bullying, academic competition and exam anxiety.

These stresses and strains are some of the reasons why so many parents make the decision to home educate their children. Home educated children have greater familial contact and much less exposure to the negative social and academic pressures endemic in schools. They also have far more access to play and to the outdoors and are free of the rigours of constant testing and standardisation. Recent studies also show that most watch far less television than their schooled peers, and become more self-aware and community minded. [1] All of these are exactly what the Children's Society recommends for a happy, healthy childhood and by extension, a happy, healthy society.

"When I went to school I was bullied and I didn't get any help from the teachers. Now I'm doing home schooling, I get help if I need it and I don't get bullied." - H, aged 12.

"I am loved and cared for and have great fun everyday, exploring, exercising, laughing and talking!" - A, aged 11.


A 'slanderous' review
Home educators were angered on 19th January by the announcement by the Department for Children, Schools and Families of an Independent Review of Home Education [2], the fourth such consultation since 2005. The review was especially surprising as guidelines to Local Authorities on home education have only recently been issued as a result of previous consultations.[3]
This review targets home educators as potential abusers, but has nothing to say about the well documented abuse of children within the schools system.
Home education organisations have repeatedly asked for statistical evidence to back up these claims, but according to Vijay Patel of the NSPCC there is no such evidence [4] and requests continue to be ignored.

The DCSF is ignoring the problems with their over-worked, under-funded and under-trained social care workers [5] and instead is looking into adding to their workload with the monitoring of a home educating minority, justifying their stance with unsubstantiated rumour, hearsay and little else.


Criticism for the DCSF

The DCSF has been criticised for its methods from the start of this review. Home educating parents in their hundreds have decided to use FaceBook as a tool to organise their protests, contesting the rights of the DCSF to interfere with their freedom to educate at home unmolested by bodies who have a history of hostility towards them and little apparent understanding of them. Several conclusions have been reached:

The branding of home educators by this review as potential child abusers is discriminatory and incites prejudice which actively harms children and their families.

There are concerns that issuing press statements that home education may be a cover for abuse may violate Article 17 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. [6]

Article 17 says that the Government must not allow the mass media to publish things which harm children, but "the media, with Government backing, has inferred that many children are being abused by dint of the fact they are home educated," says Techla, a home educating mother from North Yorkshire.

"My children are hurt and angry at the suggestion, and at the thought that their non-HE friends will think this is the case." Other children have also expressed their feelings that inciting suspicion against mum and dad is causing them distress.

Also, by not considering disabled children or those with Special Educational Needs the review's consultation of Local Authorities may actually be illegal. [7]

In-house Social Services and Local Authority publications have carried letters and articles criticising home education, and reports are that memos have been circulated advising on how the Local Authorities consultation should be answered. This will have undue influence over the results of that consultation.

Many children were removed from school because of bullying, abuse, neglect, or the lack of provision of a suitable education. In many cases the Local Authorities were at best apathetic, at worst openly hostile to the needs of the child. To suggest that these children and their parents should be investigated by the very agencies that failed them is insulting and dangerous.


Home education provides a good childhood

Independent research has shown home education provides many of the qualities that the Good Childhood Inquiry finds essential to a happy, healthy childhood, and therefore to a happy, healthy society. Home educators then ask why the Government is apparently intent on the regulation of HE in the face of yet another indictment of their failing schools system. The DCSF's attitude seems to be that childhood should be managed by the State at any cost. The conclusion seems to be that parents will necessarily abuse or neglect their children if they are not supervised. With their placing of the rights of Local Authorities above those of parents and children, as advocated in this Review of Home Education, it looks like the Children's Society report will fall on deaf ears.

As home educators and parents we support the findings of the Inquiry as outlined above and feel we demonstrate the positive nature of many of their recommendations. Home education should be seen as evidence of a supportive, loving and nurturing home, not as a potential cover for malefactors.


Issued by the Home Educators of FaceBook
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=45453211491 - "Stop the UK Government Stigmatising Home Educators!"


--------------
Link for reference:

[1] "How Children Learn at Home" by Alan Thomas, 2007.

[2] http://www.everychildmatters.gov.uk/ete/homeeducation/

[3] Elective Home Education: Guidelines for Local Authorities, October 2007.
http://www.dcsf.gov.uk/localauthorities/_documents/c
ontent/7373-DCSF-Elective%20Home%20Education.pdf

[4] Jeremy Vine show, Radio 2, 20th January 2009:
JEREMY VINE: "Vijay, have you got any statistical base at all?"
VIJAY PATEL (NSPCC Child Protection Policy Advisor): "We... the inf... We don't have the evidence there statistically, no."

[5] UNISON report "Still Slipping Through The Net?" See
http://www.publicservice.co.uk/news_story.asp?id=8347

[6] http://www2.ohchr.org/english/law/crc.htm

[7] The LA questionnaire asks about children who are statemented for SEN. This ignores children with other disabilities and those which have SEN but are not statemented (parents of many home educated children with SEN prefer that they not be statemented). Government has a legal duty to consider disabled/SEN children (statemented or not) in all its documentation.
http://www.dotheduty.org/