The Soixante-neuf of Liberty

"Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the arguement of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves".
William Pitt


Or is it ? It appears certain that Gordon B-ruin is going to sign off on ID cards , the contracts are already out and we are right to be concerned . With CCTV and the nascent self propogating technologies I worry that there is too much bourgeois affectation. Some people do not like being filmed driving to fast in sports cars while young women on tough estates would have no freedom at all without CCTV. But is it all about revenue ? The £3 billion Brown is soaking out of landfill tax , for example ,is passed onto us as recycling fines by such weird and wonderful methods as cameras hidden in tins of beans and bricks the fines we pay cover the costs .The EU dimension is terrifying with the emergence of a cross border data base and the sheer technology confuses 'could' with 'should'. The government would ideally like 90 days of detention and while they say Terrorists we are right to think ..‘me’ . I am firmly against
On ID cards the sheer cost is absurd even by the governments highly optimistic measure and I cannot see any benefit while there are great dangers. The Conservative party have given a commitment to rid us of it and it is to their great credit.Census information is sacrosnact until it isn`t as in the case of American Japs rounded up during the war...24 pages they want in 2010

Freedom is not a one way argument though at 40 mph you have a 10% chance of surviving an impact at 20mph a 95% chance. With 35,000 deaths and serious injuries a year that’s a lot of families to tell you that if people will not slow down they will have to made to. In particular young drunk drivers are an annual source of carnage 27% of 17-19 year old males are involved in a crash in first year behind the wheel and every year 100 deaths are killed in accidents involving 17 to 25 year olds usually drunk and usually male. “Those who give up their Liberties in the name of safety deserve neither Liberty nor safety” said Benjamin Franklin but try that glib little sentence on a bereaved mother. I have come to see that speed cameras properly used are a net good the handling has of course been woeful in the best Labour tradition.

I have never been a great fan of Liberty. Libertarians like to sit on a piano Conservatives play it . We need a balance of Liberty and order and there are tempting gains to be had from the national DNA base for example ( see 66).The worry is that like the quangos now costing £190 billion per year the process has its own momentum and the possibilities are not properly discussed with freedom balanced in the mix. . Here are some illustrative facts I have gathered with a number designed to create the pretence this is not an obsessive non funny excavation of data . Sorry it is ….my hopes for readers are low.
Sadly the number of real X ray cameras able to see you naked hidden in lampposts- Nil( Despite the Sun story suggesting otherwise)



Soixante-neuf - Liberty facts

1 The elite fire arms unit responsible for the death of Charles Menzes CO…..?-CO19
2 Armed Met Officers-2060
3 Safety Camera Partnerships budget for operating speed cameras-£95,000,000
4 Gloucestershire Safety Camera Partnership’s budget for advertising-£326000
5 Cost of next census in 2010-£300,000,000
6 Pages of information in 2010 census including religion and income-24
7 Fine you will face for not completing the 2010 census-£1000
8 Number of people in a U-Gov Survey who did not trust the government to keep national database information about them confidential- 66%
9 Numbers opposed to national ID cards on principle ( U Gov)-70%
10 Number prepared to pay no more than £66 for an ID card (U Gov)-85%
11 Number who approve of speed cameras (U Gov)-50%
12 No. times on average each Briton comes under the watch of surveillance cameras
each day-300
13 Number of Surveillance cameras4,200,000
14 Our position in league table of monitoring in the developed world -1
15 Number of countries developing biometric passports -50
16 Annual cost of identity fraud according to Tony Blair-£1.7 billlion
17 a )The amount of the figure £1.7billion not regarded as identity theft by the banks and b) the amount that is an illustrative thin air amount of the rest -£½ billion and 25%
18 Amount of crime prevention budget spent on CCTV by the Home Office-78%
19 No. of recognition reads by speed cameras by 2008-50,000,000
20 Number of civil servants with access to national at base information-400,000
21 Number of recorded prints that Lantern the electronic checker can compares yours with-6,500,000
22 proposed fine for failing to I form the authorities of a change of address under the national ID system-£1000
23 No, of requests made by the Police to see Oyster card movement records-2040
24 Number of unsolved cases for which the Head of the Homicide and serious crime squad of the Met feels we need ensamples from babies to solve-300,000
25 Government est. cost of the ID database-£5.4 billion
26 Independent Estimate -£21 billion
27 Proportion of people who voted for the Hunting ban as their top law to repeal on the R4 Poll-52%

( The next was29% who wanted to repeal the European Communities Act of 1972)
28 The number of requests made to under the freedom of information act and the number that have not been granted- 65852 And 26083
29 Number of separate data bases from national Insurance to the DVLA to be allowed to share information under Labour plans -8
30 The amount by which photographs of homes taken for tax purposes increased from May 2006 to January 2007-514000 to 2,200,000
31 The amount spent on , and the number of , digital cameras in the hands of Council Tax Inspectors -£483,739 and2126
32 Unequivocal commitment by the Conservative party to scrap the ID card scheme-1
33 Number of people held on a DNA database who have never been charged-140,000
34 Number of countries that will have access to the UK DNA database and fingerprints under a EU agreement -27
35 Number of heroic Peers who defeated an enlargement of the mental health bill whereby someone can be detained if it is merely “appropriate “ and not “beneficial”-71
36 The grant Dr. Richard Harvey is working with to perfect a system that will read lips from CCTV footage-£391,814
37 Cost the Government claims of the FOI act-335,000
38 The cost above which all cooperation can be withdrawn under the FOI act ( see cost of ID cards)_£600
39 No. of requests for bugging operations in a year-450,000
40 The cost per check and the number of organisations to be accredited to check data from the ID card scheme to offset the cots of the scheme-60p and 40
41 The accuracy of tax evaluation spy in the sky pictures currently employed in N Ireland to be introduced here after the election- 1 in 1250
42 The number of authorities installing talking CCTV to issue admonishments . Cost £500,000 from the “Respect budget”20
43 the amount of pieces of information required for a British citizen to obtain a passport-200
44 The number of civil servants involved in the granting of a passport-700
45 The number of countries with as many CCTV cameras per head as us -none
46 The number of offences that under EU law you can be locked up for in tn=his country which are not a crime in this country eg Holocaust denial-32
47 The number of years since the freedom to fish at sea was enshrined by Common law to be overturned by David Milliband who will require anyone over 12 to have a licence-800
48 The position of ID cards in the Telegraphs Poll of brainless laws-1
49 The number of ways the state has of entering your home -266
50 The number of statute rights to enter your home in the 1950s-10
51 Cost of a Camera Helmet for a Lollipop Warden Beijing tried in Oxford-£900
52 The amount raised by speed cameras in a year-£1 billion
53 The increase in child road deaths recorded between 2005 and 2006-141 t0 169
54 The number killed or seriously injured in 2006-31845
55 The amount of improvement from the previous year-1%
56 Survival chances at 20mph and 40mph respectively 95% and 10%
57 Landfill tax Councils would have to pay extra over the next four years( hence fines and cameras in tines of beans )-£3 billion
58 The proportion of requests granted under FOI since Jan 2005 and the proportion granted in the last quarter of 2006-59% and 17%
59 Number of forms to be filled in to perform a “Story telling “ act-6
60 Fine for stubbing a cigarette out on the street-£80
61 During the same period this shows the increase in cots deaths as against the amount of people smoking its supposed cause- Up 500% and halved
62 The figure somehow arrived at by the Study commissioned by 33 Coucil sof the annual number of deaths from passive smoking…(There is absolutely no evidence of this )-617
63 This many non smokers living with smokers were studied in the only ever serious research showing no significant risk over 40 years ( American Cancer Society)-35000
64 The height from which the micro drone ( new Police Toy) can film you -1600 ft
65 Number on the Police DNA data base as it stands -3,500,000
66 DNA matches last year for
Homicide -422
Rape-645
Violent crime-1974
Burglary-9000
67No. MPs backing the BMA`s call for 9 PM watershed for alcohol advertising -29
( Thats where it started for smoking)
68 Proportion of pub goers who smoke -80%
69 Amount Budweiser are sponsoring the Olympics for -£80,000,00