The news that there are to be tightening of ‘snooping’ powers to include technologies like Skype and mobile phone calls etc should strike fear into the heart of every single Liberal Democrat within the party.
I find it utterly incredible that anyone within the party would support something which is so inherently against liberal values and beats at the door of what we as a party hold as one of our deepest held values.
Its even more worrying when Nick Clegg makes comments like this:
“All we are doing is updating the rules which currently apply to mobile telephone calls to allow the police and security services to go after terrorists and serious criminals and updating that to apply to technology like Skype which is increasingly being used by people who want to make those calls and send those emails.”
I find it utterly indefensible that Nick Clegg and possibly the rest of the parliamentary party would even dare to support this when the entire grass roots of the Liberal Democrat party seems so utterly against it. You can read the briefing memo here from the party but frankly its simply not good enough.
Serif says:
As someone who has worked on the technical side of an ISP for the last fifteen years, and who takes more than a passing interest in such matters, the proposals so far as I and my colleagues understand them are trivial to work around for anyone remotely interested in doing so. At the same time they’ll impose onerous technical requirements which will be expensive to put in place and may well decrease the quality of service we’re able to provide to our customers. It’s almost as though the powers that be would quite like a police state, but are too incompetent to work out how to do it properly.
As regards an electoral death wish, well coincidently my party membership is up for renewal this month and I’m looking forward to the discussion of why I’m letting it lapse.
Spidey says:
I confess I am getting more and more annoyed with the way that the leadership are ignoring the wishes and views of grass roots campaigners. I can’t help but think the sooner Clegg is gone and the party can rebuild, the better!
Thanks for the comments btw