28 November 2008

The Fear of Openness...

...strikes again:


A political row erupted last night after counter-terrorism police arrested the shadow Home Office minister, Damian Green, after he published leaked documents allegedly sent to the Tories by a government whistleblower.

...

George Osborne, the shadow chancellor, told the BBC: "I think it is extraordinary that the police have taken that decision. It has long been the case in our democracy that MPs have received information from civil servants. To hide information from the public is wrong."

This is getting serious.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Yes. Its really really really serious. p

Anonymous said...

Thanks for the link Glyn. It pretty much sums up the situation, doesn't it?

I'm not sure what I find the more worrying, the arrest itself or the public denials from senior ministers that they knew anything about this.

The array of controlling technology that pervades our public spaces and our daily administration (technology that the majority of the public has IMO failed to be duly concerned about) could become very frightening and oppresssive indeed if such authoritarian events continue and begin extending into other domains.

I see that yet again anti-terrorism units were involved, despite the fact that there is no question of terrorist activity having taken place. Between them, the police and the government seem determined to bring anti-terrorism measures into disrepute.

Glyn Moody said...

The other thing that's frightening is the lack of public outcry: haven't people understood, or don't they care?

Anonymous said...

Glyn wrote:

"The other thing that's frightening is the lack of public outcry: haven't people understood, or don't they care?"

I suspect that they're waiting for a really thick slice of salami:

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=IX_d_vMKswE

(Safe for work ;-)

Glyn Moody said...

I have doubts about their ability to judge thickness....