Cameron's weakness and Labour's opportunity?: an in/out referendum on the EU

Prime Minister David Cameron has announced through the Downing Street press office that his 'long awaited big speech' on Britiain' s future relationship with the European Union (EU) will be made on Friday 18th January.

This is when he is expected to indicate that after the next election (depending on a Conservative majority I would think) a referendum will be held. The thing to be decided however is, what exactly will it be on?

There are many people in this country who want a straight in/out referendum on our membership of the EU, notably in the UK Independence Party (UKIP) and many in the Conservative Party.

Opinion polls on the question of our relationship appear to show around half of the population would like to withdraw, but polls should always be treated with caution as all they are is a snapshot of opinion at a moment in time.

However, our relationship with the European Union in its various guises over the decades has certainly been a difficult one. Right from when the post-war Labour government of Clement Attlee refused to even join the negotiations on the Schuman Plan, which led to the establishment of the European Coal and Steel Confederation.

But it is for the Conservative Party that the issue has proved to be a fraught one, and as former Defence Secretary and leadership contender Michael Portillo once said, "Europe is the curse from which the Tory Party never escapes."

Ever since Harold Macmillan became the first British Prime Minister to attempt to take Britain into the European Economic Community (EEC) in 1961 was met with a French veto, and a repeat occurred in 1967 when the Labour Prime Minister Harold Wilson also attempted to take the United Kingdom into what was then the club of six.

Eventually it was a Conservative, Edward Heath (who incidentally had spoken up for joining the ECSC in his maiden speech in 1950), who took Britain into the EEC in 1973, but not without a struggle, and opposition across the Conservative and Labour Parties, but eventually 67% of the members endorsed membership.

In the mid-70s the question of our continued membership arose and the then Prime Minister Harold Wilson agreed to a referendum which was held in 1975. The referendum had been pledged in Labour's February 1974 manifesto, and the eventual question was

'Do you think the UK should stay in the European Community (Common Market)?

But although the question looks a straight in/out one, Wilson had maintained control of the debate,  and made it about renegotiated terms, and he won it decisively 67%-33%.

Margaret Thatcher's arguments with and about the EC are well known and too many to go into here, and are for another time, although perhaps two particular moments can be highlighted. The signing of the Single European Act in 1987, followed just three years later by her famous 'no, no, no!' at the prospect of even further integration. It was somewhat ironic that this was followed just five weeks later by her resignation as Prime Minister, the issue of Britain's relationship with the EC being the catalyst.

Throughout John Major's Premiership he too had his run-ins with members of his party, but unlike Thatcher who was brought down (ostensibly anyway although there was more to it than that) by the pro-Europeans in her cabinet, it was a small group of anti-EU MPs (including the 'bastards' in his own cabinet) that caused him most grief. This led to him resigning as leader in 1995 and inviting them to 'put up or shut up.' The challenge was accepted, and then Welsh Secretary John Redwood stood against him, being decisively beaten.

The Labour government of Tony Blair was much more enthusiastic about Britain's EU membership and was seen as a much more positive member of the club. Some have argued that all he did was give away too much, including a chunk of the rebate much-loved by the Conservatives after Margaret Thatcher fought so hard for it in the early eighties.

However, it was the Blair government which in 1999, despite his own leanings towards it, that decided that it was not in Britain's interests to  join the Single European Currency. In a further irony, it has been argued that the Single European Act and the Maastricht Treaty (1992) had already given away much of Britain's 'sovereignty.'

Ever since David Cameron became Prime Minister he has tried to tread a fine line between the various versions of Euroscepticism  amongst his MPs. He has attempted to face both ways, and appear as though he is standing up to the other principle European leader, Angela Merkel of Germany and (then President) Nicholas Sarkozy of France.

However this led to confusion as he claimed to have vetoed a treaty when nothing of the sort had happened, and he was made to look very foolish as opposition and many of his own backbenchers ridiculed him in the House.

More recently negotiations over the new EU budget caused Mr Cameron other problems and the defeat for the government's official line of insisting on a real terms freeze in the EU budget, by an unholy alliance of fifty-one Tory backbench MPs and the Labour Party in favour of calling for a cut in the budget.

The Labour Party have been accused of rank opportunism over this, although in 2007 Ed Balls wrote a pamphlet for the Centre for European Reform in which he called for many reforms in the European Union, especially the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) and budget.

So now we come once again to the question of what is the United Kingdom's future relationship with the European Union, and whether our future lays inside or out. This isn't the first time this has happened in this Parliament, with a debate on whether there should be a referendum in October 2011 following a petition. I have written about that debate here and perhaps David Cameron's biggest problem is that his position hasn't moved on one iota.

He is still trying to face both ways on the debate and it's not clear exactly what it is he's going to be asking for. It seems likely he will announce plans for a referendum after 2015, but we can't be sure as to what will be the terms.

Mr Cameron has spoken vaguely of 'fresh settlements' and 'seeking consent' and will be setting "out his views on the future of the European Union, how it needs to develop and how Britain's relationship with it needs to develop."

But this language if repeated in his speech is unlikely to quell dissent within his party, as it appears to fall far short of the straight in/out question many want. Indeed, I would prefer that even though I would be working for an 'in' vote, because at least the terms of the argument would be clear.

Ed Miliband has accused Mr Cameron of 'sleep-walking' the UK out of the EU, and this is true. The irony is that both David Cameron and the Chancellor George Osborne are in favour of maintaining Britain's membership, but outside of the occasional reference, he hasn't really laid out why he does.

In fact I do think Mr Cameron's weakness lies in trying this 'all things to all men' strategy, and they seldom end well. He should state his own position clearly and stick to it. Whatever the British public might think of particular politicians, they admire those prepared to state clearly what they believe, even if they disagree.

To me David Cameron sounds like he wishes to try and copy Harold Wilson, but he lacks that old stager's wiliness, honed by years in Parliament having first been elected in 1945, and taking nearly twenty
years and experience in many portfolios before becoming leader and Prime Minister. Mr Cameron may have spent time in PR and as an adviser, but he lacks real political guile (perhaps an accusation that could be made of many modern politicians), and therefore makes too many poor judgements.

Mr Cameron has always said he wants to 'repatriate' some powers from the EU, but is reluctant to be clear as to what he wants, and there is some debate as to what he can really get. This is where he has boxed himself into a corner and is in danger of 'sleep-walking' the UK out.

If he is unable to get what he wants, he has given himself little option but to offer a straight in/out referendum, but this time handing control of the debate to those wishing to withdraw. Very few people are completely happy with the way the EU runs itself, and the arguments are over what changes can and should be made to its institutions and legislation. But the way David Cameron is conducting himself in this debate just weakens his position, and by extension  of those who wish to remain inside but seek fundamental changes.

So from my own point of view I'd like to see the Labour Party seize the initiative here, state that if we win the next election we will hold a referendum, and that we would be fighting to stay within the Union. This does carry risks, but perhaps the time has come to take one and lay this ghost to rest for the foreseeable future.

It would also enable the pro-EU supporters to set the terms of the referendum and the debate, and hopefully, unlike the disastrous AV referendum of 2011, be based on facts and interpretation of what is in Britain's interests.

The debates will be heated, with politicians, business leaders and others putting their side of the arguments, but it would be with a clear objective in mind, in or out. David Cameron is in danger of just muddying the waters of debate, and as Ed Miliband has accused him, of 'sleep-walking us out of the EU,'not because he doesn't want to stay in but because he didn't have the courage to stand up for what he really believes.

As I've said, I would campaign to stay within the European Union, which I believe politically, trade and for business reasons in the United Kingdom's interests. However, it is pointless going into details as to why here, and that can be left for a referendum itself, if it ever happens.

 As to whether a referendum would heal the enduring sore within the Conservative Party is doubtful, because the differences within the party go far deeper than whether we stay in or leave the European Union, there are fundamental disagreements over what being a Conservative is which will just continue.

  


  

1984 rebuffed or postponed?

Earlier this year I wrote a very critical blog on the coalition government's draft Communications Data Bill which was being scrutinised by a joint committee of the Commons and the Lords. Finally the committee's report was published in early December 2012, and it was very critical of not only the bill itself, but also of the way it was written.

Right from the beginning the report gives a hint of how importantly it took its job, and its view on the government's role in security, of balancing, 'the safety and security of its citizens,' but with a duty to respect their rights, 'without avoidable intrusions on their privacy.'

The committee then get straight into their core criticism, and it is one that demonstrates why this bill should alarm us all: 

we believe that the draft Bill pays insufficient attention to the duty to respect the right to privacy, and goes much further than it need or should for the purpose of providing necessary and justifiable official access to communications data. Clause 1 would give the Secretary of State sweeping powers to issue secret notices to communications service providers (CSPs) requiring them to retain and disclose potentially limitless categories of data.

The committee is also very doubtful of the claims by the Home Secretary, Theresa May, that she would not use the powers in ways that would be considered overly intrusive and so recommends, 'that her powers should be limited to those categories of data for which a case can be made.' Indeed later on they say explicitly that current safeguards actually work better than is believed, and so prefer to see a strengthening of the roles of the Interception of Communications Commissioner and the Information Commissioner.

As I wrote in my original blog, the police and security services already have sufficient powers to investigate possible criminal and terrorist activities, and the committee is saying that is enough. Indeed they go on to say that if a case can be made for a future increase in powers then proper Parliamentary scrutiny would be required, and it should also apply if powers were to be extended beyond the many agencies, as well as the police, who already have access to the data already available.

The committee, unlike the government, seeks to enable the necessary agencies to properly investigate activities, without, 'the risk of intrusion into the privacy of the vast majority of honest citizens.'

Until 1984 who had access to communications data and what could be done with it was not protected by law, but it was in 2000 and the passing of the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (RIPA), that an attempt to regulate who could access what data and what they could do with it was made. But unlike the new bill it did not dictate which information should be retained, but dealt only with acquisition and disclosure. The new bill, on the other hand, expects data to be stored that is of no use to the service provider, and as I said previously, if the government don't want to access what is being said, why keep it?

I was equally critical in my previous blog of the Labour government which had a similar bill, but dropped it following protests from civil liberties groups, and the opposition in the House from all sides, including the Conservative and Liberal Democrat parties and the Information Commissioner was not convinced as he wrote, "that the case has yet to be made for the collection and processing of additional communications data for the population as a whole being relevant and not excessive." Eventually the proposals were dropped due to the amount of opposition, and the impending General Election in 2010.

When the coalition was created in May 2010, the agreement stated, 'We will end the storage of internet and email records without good reason,' but as we see it hasn't taken them long to go back on that. This is despite the Liberal democrats long, and creditable record in opposing such legislation, and the Conservatives own document published in 2009 Reversing the Rise of the Surveillance State.

The report includes a large number of examples of what it calls, 'a major encroachment into individual liberty,' which is quoted in the annual report of the Interception of Communications Commissioner. These include things like there being 1.85 million CCTV cameras in the UK (1.7 million being privately owned), the DNA Database, the ELMER database of suspicious activities, the National Pupil Database, and this is all in addition to the trail we leave in our electronic communications.

There are also examples of how communications data was used to prevent a terrorist bombing in 2002 or to catch the murderer of Jessica Chapman and Holly Wells. It has also been used in uncovering major cases of tax evasion, but as we can see, these already be done using the current legislation, so again I ask, why do they need to store more unless they intend to use it?

However, although the report cites many reasons as to how communications data is invaluable in catching perpetrators, this is to put it all in context, and is not to defend the intentions of the bill.

The committee spent a lot of time, and heard and read evidence from many sources on both sides of the argument. Much of the written and oral evidence can be found here on the committee's web page, although some of it remains secret.

Part of the government's defence is that some 25% of communications data is unavailable to investigators, and will increase with technological progress. But it is unclear where this figure comes from and the committee deems it to an 'unhelpful and potentially misleading' figure as there has not been a 25% drop in the amount of data available. Indeed they say that with in arrival of social networking since the passing of RIPA in 2000, the amount of available data has actually increased.

The service provider London Internet Exchange (LINX) wrote:

Certainly, as people make ever greater use of Internet‐based services, there is an ever greater quantity of data that either exists, or could be brought into existence by statutory requirement. However to say that this “is no longer always retained by communications providers” is highly misleading: communications providers are retaining more communications data than ever before and making it available to public authorities under existing law. The mere fact that even more data could be created, collected and made available hardly constitutes a loss.

However, the committee says that the real issue is not missing data, but 'a lack of ability on behalf of law enforcement agencies to make effective use of the data that is available.' That does not need new legislation to address this problem, but training and resources.

Although many service providers from the United Kingdom and overseas were invited to ask the Home Office questions, they were not consulted on the proposals, although the Home Office claims that they would have been aware of their thinking from the discussions had over time. But, and this is damning, the committee then more or less accuses the Home Office representative of lying and that the Home office were giving a different version to that of the CSPs and that 'On the face of it, there is an inconsistency between these two accounts.'

In the end the first view the CSPs had of the draft bill was under embargo, just a week before its publication. This is despicable behaviour by the government in my opinion, as they have sought to present Parliament and the service providers with a fait accompli and prevent proper scrutiny. 

The committee condemns the government's actions and attitude:

The evidence we received shows that United Kingdom CSPs were not given any details about the possible content of notices before the draft Bill was published, overseas CSPs were not consulted about the draft Bill at all, nor was there any further public consultation.

I think it is becoming plain that what the government is trying to do is predict what may happen in the future, and as we've seen with weather and economic forecasts over the centuries, these are notoriously inaccurate. The committee rightly comes to the conclusion that there is no good reason for granting such wide powers at this time, or that Parliament should do so on a 'precautionary principle.'

The committee, however, whilst aware of the dangers does seem a little complacent on the threat to web logs believing the safeguards in the bill as well as their recommendations would be sufficient. But they do go on to suggest that the Home Office investigate the technological, operational and financial implications of asking CSPs to only keep web logs on services that enable communications between individuals.

There are additional concerns which the report highlights, such as cases where information access has been self-authorised, which means that within the system abuse is possible. Another case was where it was used to track whether or not an applicant for a school place actually lived in the area, which is a ridiculous use of data supposed to prevent criminal activity.

These cases demonstrate just how easy it is for this information to be abused, and that if more data is stored then the opportunities for incorrect use will increase and that's without it being used for obviously criminal activity.

Then we come to the issue of which reasons data is accessible; national security, preventing crime and disorder, illegal financial activities, public safety, or to assist in identifying a deceased person. Now these by and large are areas where we might consider some limited access reasonable.

But then there are also a number of reasons for accessing data I find of great concern; 'interests of the economic well-being of the United Kingdom,' protecting public health, to assess or collect taxes and duties due. These seem to me to far beyond interest of national security, and although they might be in the public interest, that does not mean they should fall within the auspices of a bill such as this and are open to wide interpretation and would just be abused.

The bill does not come without an intense sense of irony, if unintended, there being an annex that links the bill to the European Convention on Human Rights which expressly says, 'Everyone has the right to respect for his private and family life, his home and his correspondence.' 

So once again government shows it has a different interpretation of this from the rest of us. The committee has further concerns with the reasons listed earlier and in the chapter's summary state:

We are concerned that the long list of permitted purposes for which communications data can be requested adds to public disquiet about the breadth of the Bill. While we do not make specific recommendations about how this list could be shortened, we recommend that the Government should consult on whether all the permitted purposes are really necessary.

Another issue to me is that are seven different Commissioners proposed for communications data oversight in the United Kingdom, and surely this is too many? Indeed the Information Commissioner, Christopher Graham, has said something similar, 'that there ought to be either a single privacy commissioner or a sort of primus inter pares,' and that not much thought had been given to whether these roles could be carried out by existing commissioners without creating others, and the committee supports this by calling for rationalisation of the offices.

There also appears to be a lack of thought going into how those who misuse data (see examples above) should be treated, as the committee actually feels the need to call for imprisonment as a punishment where serious cases occur. This strikes me as either incredibly complacent or evidence of sloppy drafting and the bill should be rejected on those grounds alone.

The report condemns the government even more  when it comes to costs and benefits describing them as, 'misleading and fanciful,' and a new cost benefit analysis included with a new draft bill. Wider and proper consultation should be undertaken and most importantly, the impact assessment should be more detailed and not used to basically try and delude Parliament into passing the bill.

The committee's overall conclusion is:

that there is a case for legislation which will provide the law enforcement authorities with some further access to communications data, but that the current draft Bill is too sweeping, and goes further than it need or should.

Whilst it is acknowledged that technological advances over time will change the nature of communications data, I am concerned that any bill of this nature will be the government's wedge into ever expanding intrusion, and they will be wanting to actually read our communications in the future.

The Conservative chair of the committee has said there should be a 'substantial rewriting' before the bill is presented to Parliament, and the Shadow Home Secretary Yvette Cooper has agreed with the findings of the report saying:

This detailed and thoughtful report shows the Government is making a complete mess of a very important issue...It is important that the police and security services can keep up-to-date with modern technology, but this bill is too widely drawn... and gives far too much power to the Home Secretary without proper safeguards,... provides too little protection for people’s privacy...  The Government have been slipshod with this bill from the word go...the Home Secretary needs to urgently rethink this legislation and get her approach right so that the police can do their job in fighting crime whilst the public have confidence their privacy is well protected too.

Although how this will translate when or if the bill is presented in the House I don't know. The Labour Party could either go down the road of outright opposition, (and as I've said previously I would rather be hypocritical for opposing this bill when we had something similar in mind, than for proposing it when we had been against in the past) or, and more likely I would think, proposing amendments along the lines recommended by the committee.

I am unable to find an official  government response to the report as yet, but David Cameron has said it will be rewritten, but he still insists that he is committed to giving the police and security services new powers to monitor internet activity, pointing out that the committee had said that there was a justification for doing something.

Still, it became an opportunity for Nick Clegg to show just how different the Liberal Democrats are from the Conservatives by threatening to 'block' it unless there was a 'rethink.' This in effect is a repeat of what committee member Julian Huppert said early in the committee's scrutiny, 'If, at the end of the process, the Home Office cannot come up with a bill that is acceptable to Liberal Democrats, then there will be no bill.'

That is a real danger that this bill, in whatever form it is presented to the House will become about politics rather than security or public safety and catching paedophiles and other criminals. The Conservatives want to be seen to living up to their reputation as the strong party on law and order, the Liberal Democrats as the defenders of civil liberties, and Labour as standing up for freedom but needing to be seen as strong on crime and the causes thereof.

The debates will generate a lot of heat, and will not about deciding which is the best way forward, but who can score the most points off each other.  My own preference is for there to not be a bill at all, as the principle of wanting to be able store and potentially read our communications is of itself wrongheaded.

The powers to investigate all these crimes exist now, we don't need to do anything other than clarify the definitions of what is communications data, and I'm sure there is a simple way of doing that without bringing in such a bad and over reaching bill.

The report is probably one of the most critical a Parliamentary committee has ever produced regarding a proposed piece of legislation, and the rigour with which they approached the task, shows that this is an approach that should be taken to more legislation.

The weaknesses in the draft are plain to see, and this is in addition to the basic problem of the government seeking to have our communications data stored 'just in case.' I hope that there is enough support in Parliament on all sides to vote this down when the government eventually gets round to presenting the rewritten bill, though I suspect they will await the outcome of the next General Election first.

The road to 1984?

In June of this year the government published its draft Communications Data Bill, which, if passed would give the government far reaching powers to search and store private information. The government naturally have all sorts of justifications, principally security concerns, yet they successfully opposed a similar bill which the previous Labour government attempted to introduce.

The Coalition Agreement clearly states,  “We will implement a full programme of measures to reverse the substantial erosion of civil liberties and roll back state intrusion,” and, “We will end the storage of internet and email records without good reason.”

The previous government's draft bill had been originally been published in May 2008, and the then opposition parties, the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats were instantly raising concerns. The Shadow Home Secretary of the time Dominic Grieve said, "Putting all this data into the hands of the government, will threaten our security not make it better." At the same time, Chris Huhne the Liberal Democrat spokesman was calling it, "an Orwellian step too far."

Such was the outcry that in April 2009, the government dropped this 'Intercept Modernisation Programme' (IMP), but carried forward with plans to require internet service providers to gather more data on customers activities. This is on top of the existing police and security service powers to, "read your emails, tap your phone, plant hidden cameras and microphones in your house and intercept your internet use. All of which can be done without any approval of a judge."

Such were the concerns that Grieve published a document in September 2009 entitled Reversing the Rise of the Surveillance State in which eleven proposals were outlined to protect personal privacy and hold government to account.

As the document rightly says in the executive summary:

New Labour has excessively relied on mammoth databases and wide powers of data-sharing, on the pretext that it will make government more effective and the citizen more secure. Its track record
demonstrates the opposite, with intrusive and expensive databases gathering masses of our personal information - but handled so recklessly that we are exposed to greater risk.

He boasts that any Conservative government's approach would be 'fundamentally different.'

They would hold fewer personal details, held only by those needing them, and, "Wherever possible, personal data will be controlled by individual citizens, who have the power to decide which agencies can access or modify this information."

The document emphasises that private citizens would be protected from the 'surveillance state' as part of a Bill Of Rights. The British Bill of Rights may still happen, and perhaps that will be brought up at the Conservative Party Conference, but it would not seem to tally with the draft Communications Data Bill currently being examined by a joint committee (of Commons and Lords) to report in November.

Considering the song and dance the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats performed when Labour brought forward their proposals, it doesn't really do much to build public trust, when as soon as they're in government, the coalition bring forward their own version.

As I said earlier, the authorities already have far reaching powers to use surveillance where they have genuine cause, such as in the case of six suspects arrested in July this year.  So to widen that to include the emails, texts and various other communications of citizens, seems unnecessary and contrary to the civil liberties rhetoric the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats have espoused over the years.

When first announced, Home Secretary Theresa May defended it as a way to catch more criminals, and to keep up with the technology they were using (though I'm sure the determined ones will find a away round this anyway), though as Conservative MP David Davis said, that it was 'incredibly obtrusive,' and would only, 'catch the innocent and incompetent.'

Mrs May's second defence was that it was different to Labour's bill, which wanted the data to be stored in one place. With the record of these big projects over the last few years, it was a good job it was abandoned, thanks in no small measure to the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats in the House. But it seems to me that more than anything the government is missing a principle here.

The problem is not really where or how the information is stored, but that it is tracked and stored in the first place, this is what is wrong.They stopped the I.D. Card legislation shortly after taking office, because they felt this was in intrusion into privacy, and against civil liberties in the United Kingdom, but it appears that has all changed now they're in government.

The full Draft Bill is available here but let's look at what it actually says, and demonstrate just what an attack on the rights of us all this bill would be.

In her foreword Mrs May says:

Communications technologies and services are changing fast. More communications are taking place on the internet using a wider range of services. As criminals make increasing use of internet based
communications, we need to ensure that the police and intelligence agencies continue to have the tools they need to do the job we ask of them: investigating crime and terrorism, protecting the vulnerable and bringing criminals to justice.

On the face of it this sounds perfectly reasonable, but within it there are many things to be concerned about. First of is the line about criminals making more use of the internet to communicate. It's almost as if that justifies tracking everyone's just in case we're doing something illegal. Jack Straw's attempts to significantly widen the DNA database in 2001 raised precisely these concerns.


Criminals also use cars, but are the police going to be checking us everytime we go out to make sure we're obeying the law? No they won't, because it would be too expensive and difficult, this however, in the great scheme of things is easy. The technology to track us already exists, and is stored in various places anyway, so the government is seeking to make it legal to delve into every aspect of our lives.

As for the safety of that data, considering the ease with which groups such as Anonymous (and individuals with a bit of know how such as Gary McKinnon) are able to break into supposedly secure databases, the thought of government also holding that information does not fill me with confidence.

In the opening paragraph you see what just how much information on your communications would be accessible without even reading them:

Communications data is information about a communication. The term is carefully defined in existing legislation and described in codes of practice and includes data about a subscriber to a mobile phone or email account, the time, duration, originator and recipient of a communication and the location of a communication device from which a communication is made.

So as you can see, immediately they can see who you contact, how often you contact them via mobile phone or email, and where you are contacting them from. It reminds me of that scene in the X-Men where the professor is able to track the movement and location of every mutant on the planet.

Naturally the government seeks to reassure us that this data is not the same as actually reading those communications, but the fact that they could read those emails, or read the transcript of a conversation if they 'had cause' is disturbing.

Now I don't think any of us would say that the ability to trace and track communications was wrong when the need arises, or if there is strong evidence of nefarious activities being planned. But being able to retain day to day data is just asking for trouble.

As you can see here, communication in many cases is already required to be stored for a time, with access by the authorities allowed under the right circumstances:

Companies providing communications services are currently required by law to store some communications data which they have business reasons to generate or process. They are not required to retain data which they do not need. The police and some other public authorities can then access specified communications data held by the service providers on a case by case basis. But
they must first demonstrate that the data is necessary to their investigation and proportionate to their aim and objective. The police have no power to get access to data where it is not connected to a specific investigation or operation.

There will be readers of this who will fundamentally disagree with this amount of storage and access, and indeed they may well have a good point. Some will take an absolutist view that none should be stored, but I think most of us would accept that a balance does need to be struck, and I would say that this is already as far as it needs to go, and some should be reined back. I would also repeal the legislation that enables so many CCTV cameras, but there is not space to go into in in this essay.

The government is expecting these companies now to store much more information, as it is harder for the authorities to access this data (I'm sure we've all seen TV detectives trace communications through telephone bills), and as is plainly stated, " the proposals set out here will require some communications service providers to obtain and store some communications data which they may have no business reason to collect at present."

The government is demanding data be stored purely for the government's own purposes, and of no value outside of that, therefore we need to know, what extra security will be provided to ensure this information is not accessible to other agencies? The plea is that existing safeguards will be extended, but I honestly don't think they can guarantee that, and as was mentioned earlier, supposedly the most secure agencies in the world are vulnerable. The government also tell us that 'nothing will authorise the interception of the content,' but if the content can not be read if deemed 'necessary' then what is the point of storing it in the first place?

One of the problems the government of a state has is to balance security, often cited as a government's first priority, and democracy and freedom. Admittedly we in Northern Europe have been fortunate in that since the Second World War, we have not had to face the threat of dictatorial governments. The only countries that have been under military and dictatorial rule in the time have been Spain, Portugal and Greece.

We looked to the east, to the Soviet Union and its satellites and decried the way they sought to control the lives of their citizens. If dissent rose, it was quashed as the likes of Andrei Sakharov and Anatoly Sharansky were imprisoned for raising their voices. If countries showed signs of going a different way from that dictated to them by the Soviet Union, such as Hungary in 1956, or Czechoslovakia in 1968, the tanks would roll in, crushing the rebellion and either killing or replacing the leaders.

Oh how we cheered as we saw the Berlin Wall come down, and invited these now free states to join us. Germany reunited, and many of those formerly under the Soviet yolk have become full members of the European Union.

We also rather complacently read the dystopian novels of Aldous Huxley and George Orwell, believing it could never really happen here. Orwell's 1984, a satire taking its ideas from Soviet and National Socialist ideology, is most often cited, a world in which a citizen's every move is watched, and even thinking the wrong thoughts can find you in room 101.

But it seems our complacency is becoming more and more misplaced as time goes on. In the United Kingdom we had found a need for a number of anti-terror laws as the troubles in Northern Ireland, but other than this we felt safe.

Peace, or at least the perception of it, in Northern Ireland led to these acts being superseded by the Terrorism Act 2000 and later the Prevention of Terrorism Act 2005 which was enacted when provisions in the 2001 Act were deemed to violate the European Convention on Human Rights.

Thus began the Labour Party's problematic relationship with civil liberties, the most well-known aspect being the attempt through the Counter Terrorism Bill 2008 to raise detention without trial to 42 days. There was a great outcry about this and the Conservative Home Affairs spokesman David Davis resigned his seat, and fought a by-election over the issue.  The measure was eventually dropped altogether, and in its early days, the coalition government reverted to 14 days.

Labour's original Data Communications Bill was an attempt to put into legislation the EU Data Retention Directive 2006, "which provided for a mandatory framework for the retention of certain communications data." This was first enacted in a 2007 Act, then superseded by the The Data Retention (EC Directive) Regulations 2009 (S.I. 2009/859), which meant internet and various types of telephone communications had to be retained.

Therefore, it seems even more puzzling that the government feels it is necessary to bring bring forward this legislation, as it already exists in sufficient form to do the required job. It is also politically hypocritical as they opposed and succeeded in bringing down Labour's own version.

It would seem it's all the fault of the defence review carried out by the new government in 2010 which allowed , "law enforcement agencies to obtain communications data within the appropriate legal framework ." It is also tied in very closely to RIPA (Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act) which ensures that the data collected is in accordance with the European Convention on Human Rights.

So it is obvious that it is not only in its political institutions that a democratic deficit exists, but also its legal ones, and any reforms must also focus on these areas.

As I have gone through this potted history of this sort of legislation, and the government's reasoning behind this new draft bill, there is one thing that keeps nagging at me, what are they not telling us? They can already do many of the things this bill would enable them to do, but also give them the power to demand communications organisations retain data they have no use for.

So what does the government want it for? They have successfully foiled terrorist and criminal plots over the last few years under the existing legislation, although it has also led to many arrests and releases as well.

Civil liberties in the United Kingdom have always been conditional, and free speech has been reliant on the tolerance of the government of the time. In the Elizabethan and Stuart periods, any criticism of the government was been treated harshly, and whilst Walsingham was Elizabeth's principal secretary Tudor England is often regarded as having been a 'police state.'

There are many who believe the modern Britain has reverted to this, as we are unable to escape CCTV cameras almost wherever we go. This being an example of unintended consequences from legislation passed by the last government. The British became known as the most watched people in Europe, and it was even satirised by The Simpsons.


And this new bill is rife with the dangers of unintended consequences, as data is held on every communication every citizen of this country makes. As I said earlier, holding the data under the circumstances mooted seems pointless without being able to access the content if it was felt needed. After all, there doesn't seem to be much difference between information about the communication and the actual content.

I few months ago I said to Labour Party leader Ed Miliband, that New Labour had, with some justification, been condemned for its approach to civil liberties, and that we should oppose this bill out of principle.

I am pleased to say he agreed, and so I am a little disappointed by Yvette Cooper's response which although it raises many importance questions, falls a long way short of outright condemnation. We will have to see how it is played when the joint committee reports, but I will be lobbying extensively to the leadership to reject the bill out of hand. I would rather Labour be hypocritical for now opposing something we once attempted to bring in ourselves, than for supporting a bill that my party brought down.

There are many reasons for opposing this bill are in this article by Henry Porter, and he sums it up much better than I could:

One good reason, as the Cambridge academic and database expert Professor Ross Anderson points out, is that old trick from the Labour years, which was to allow the secretary of state to make additions to the bill after the fact. This means that we have no idea what the legislation will eventually look like and it allows the secretary of state enormous discretion when it comes to the use of statutory instruments and afterthoughts of an oppressive and invasive nature.


Therefore I urge everybody to oppose this bill in whatever form it emerges from the committee, as our liberties really are at risk, as Dominic Grieve's document cited earlier amply demonstrates.

It is a sad indictment of modern government that they have come to believe that we can only be free and safe if they are more and more aware of where we are, who we're talking to and what we are saying.

1984 could be closer than we ever thought really possible.  

The Super, Summer of Sport

For once the hyperbole and the hype were justified, it really has been a super summer of sport. There are so many great events to write about, and that's without the Olympic and Paralympic games.

To my mind it actually started on Sunday May 13th, when Manchester City won the Premier Division for the first time, and their first championship in 44 years, as it encapsulates the sheer drama of sport. Sergio Aguero's goal deep into injury time, virtually the last kick of the season, as Alex Ferguson and his Manchester United team, could only wait expectantly.

This is what sport is about, as success and failure are divided by small margins, whether it is 100ths of a second in a 100 metre race, or if the referee adds on 30 seconds too many which gives a team time to get that winning goal.

Only days after this Chelsea, against all expectations, overcame Bayern Munich in a penalty shoot-out to lift the Champions' League for the first time. This also brought in the fairy tale element, as the popular Roberto Di Matteo had taken over earlier in the year when Andrea Villas-Boas had been sacked. Di Matteo was only supposed to see Chelsea to the end of a season which was largely written off, yet he finished with two major trophies, as the F.A. Cup was also placed in the trophy cabinet.

It wasn't long before the European Championships started, and although England did better than expected, they did manage to once again lose a penalty shoot-out at the quarter-final stage, this time to Italy after being totally outplayed for 120 minutes. I expect I wasn't the only person to say 'at last!' when we thought the Italians had scored near the end. But the whole championship was a feast of football, and watching the way the great Spain team took the Italians apart in the final was a delight to witness.

Whilst all this was going on, Wimbledon was  also dominating the sporting headlines, and two weeks of really high quality tennis, culminated in a men's singles final between six time champion Roger Federer, and Britain's Andy Murray, the first British man to reach a grand slam final in 76 years. As an aside, that there have have been three British female grand slam champions in that time; Angela Mortimer, Ann Jones and Virginia Wade is almost completely ignored, in the typically British way disappointment being preferred to success.

Unfortunately Murray was unable to prevail despite being on top for the first two sets, but Federer worked his way back into the match, and eventually won his record equalling seventh title. However, Andy Murray's tearful speech afterwards, for the first time endeared him to many tennis fans, as for they realised just how much he really cared.

But the pre-Olympic drama hadn't ended, as for the first time in many years, the Tour De France became a mass television event as a British rider, Bradley Wiggins, was the favourite to win. With the magnificent support of his fellow Team Sky members, Wiggins did indeed come through after twenty hard stages, through the French countryside. Wiggins became the first British winner of the event, and added the yellow jersey to the Olympic golds he had won previously.

Wiggins' victory was sealed on Sunday 22nd July, and was a great precursor to the big event of the summer of 2012, the Olympic Games. The following Friday, a packed Olympic Stadium, and a worldwide television audience of billions, watched Danny Boyles' stunning and evocative opening ceremony, which set the tone for over two weeks of incredible sport.

It's impossible to sum up the first part of London 2012 in a few words, so I don't think I'll try. A week after his Le Tour triumph, Bradley Wiggins was amongst the favourites for the men's road race, along with his colleague Mark Cavendish, but perhaps a combination of poor tactics and tiredness meant that they were well down. Team GB had to wait until the following day to win its first medal with Lizzie Armistead winning a silver in the women's road race.

Indeed it seemed to take the British competitors a few days to really get into having the games in their own country, and there were fears that after so much hope, it might turn out to be a damp squib after so much hope. Fortunately those fears were unfounded, and a couple of further silver medals followed, before on the Wednesday August 1st, Helen Glover and Heather Stanning brought home gold in the women's coxless pair, the first of four rowing golds for Team GB, three of them from women's teams.

Later that day Bradley Wiggins added the time trial gold to those he had already won, but it would take too much time, and be too boring to write about all Team GB's gold, silver and bronze medals, and a full list can be found here.

But it would be wrong to leave the Olympics without mentioning those victories that particularly stand out, Mo Farah's great 5000 and 10000 metre double. Jessica Ennis heptathlon, and Greg Rutherford's shock long jump gold medal on that 'super' first Saturday of the athletics programme.

There were historic moments too as Nicola Adams became the first women's boxing gold medallist, which was backed up by further boxing golds for Luke Campbell and Anthony Joshua (a medal I felt he was lucky to get personally).

The track cyclists did us proud as usual although there were also some more forgettable moments, Victoria Pendleton being downgraded in two of her three events, but winning the other. Chris Hoy came away with a pair of golds to make him Britain's most successful Olympian ever. Although I think Ben Ainslie would probably think his record fourth sailing gold was equally as valuable, as he only gets one go a games.

There were surprises too, as our slalom canoeists picked up gold and silver, but the big one was Jade Jones' in taekwondo, as she beat higher ranked opponents all the way through to cap off a great night on August 9th.

There were, of course, stunning performances from Non-British competitors, with Usain Bolt becoming the first man to retain the 100 and 200m gold medals, and David Rudisha's great world 800m record, perhaps the run of the games. Although I make no excuses for this blog being mainly about British successes.

Team GB exceeded the medal target it had set itself, but more importantly the games themselves outdid anything that could have been predicted. The transport system worked (though probably down to the fact there was a dearth of visitors who weren't attending events), and after a tricky start due to sponsors not taking up seats, once that was sorted out, the crowds flocked to all sorts of events, with only the football missing out in the main.

The spectacular closing ceremony, brought down the curtain temporarily, as a three week hiatus set in before the start of the paralympics, although the football season did kick off. If one thing stood out during this time, it was not only that England beat Italy in a friendly, but that we actually passed the ball, and didn't give it away as much as usual.

On August 29th the opening ceremony for the Paralympics (meaning parallel), which started at Stoke Mandeville Hospital in 1948, a centre for spinal injuries, although the first official games took place in Rome in 1960.

Once again the opening ceremony was a feast, as more countries than ever before took part, and over 4000 competitors prepared for competition. Team GB (or Paralympic GB as it was known) had much higher expectations than ever, and  a target of over 100 medals was set.

From the first day British medals stacked up as Sarah Storey won the first of her four gold medals, and Jonathan Fox gained a surprise one in the pool. Swimming proved a very successful event in the paralympics, unlike in the Olympics where Team GB came away with just three medals, two of which belonged to Rebecca Adlington.

Day after day the Paralympians served up an amazing set of sporting achievements, from Hannah Cockcroft's jet powered chair, to the sheer determination and strength of David Weir, whose four golds at 800m, 1500m, 5000m and the marathon show that disability is no barrier to sporting excellence.

 

 As earlier in the summer, the cyclists brought home medals galore, although it is Jody Cundy's red mist when not allowed to restart one of his events that most will remember.

Team GB won medals across the board, where other nations that had done well in the Olympics such as the United States fared much worse, and is perhaps an indicator that they have yet to embrace the idea that disabled athletes too can thrill the crowds. As with the Olympics there isn't space to talk about all Britain's medallists, but you can find the full list here.

The paralympics were a supreme example of sporting endeavour, as athletes overcame all sorts of disabilities, overcoming them in various ways, to achieve remarkable things. An example being the American 'armless archer' Matt Stutzmann who uses his feet and his teeth to fire his arrows.

My favourite moment of the games came from double amputee Richard Whitehead, whose performance in his 200m event even now amazes me.

Or the amazing 34pt 4 x 100m women's relay in the pool where Australia beat Great Britain by 3/100ths of a second. That sort of drama is found hardly anywhere else but the sporting arena.

The Paralympics also have their fair share of superstars, and I have already mentioned a couple, Hannah Cockroft and David Weir. But there is also Ellie Simmons, Jonnie Peacock, Annis Al Hannouni, Marie-Amelie Le Fur, Natalie De Toit, and the one who currently surpasses them all, Oscar Pistorius

The South African sprinter, who also became the first Paralympic runner to compete in the Olympics, is a real superstar, and has raised the profile of Paralympic sport immensely over the last few years. Although this time he was overshadowed by Jonnie Peacock in his 100m, and Oliveira's in the 200m, and his reaction to that defeat which many saw as sour grapes. However, he came back to win the final event, the 400m in fine style.

But in London in 2012, the Paralympics themselves became their own ambassador, as the world watched these amazing athletes compete at a level many able-bodied people can only dream of. The dedication that the athletes put into their sport is there for all to see, and perhaps one day, it may be possible to fully integrate the two, so they really are the Paralympics?

So how do we cap all of this? It had been 76 years since a British man had won a grand slam, as we saw earlier, Andy Murray broke that chain by reaching the Wimbledon final. Well at the Olympics he went one better, and after dispatching Djokovic in the semi-finals, beat Roger Federer in straight sets win claim the gold medal. Then in partnership with Laura Robson, a silver was added to the tally in the mixed doubles.

Murray and Robson carried this through into the US Open, with Robson defeating first, three times former champion, Kim Clijsters, then world number 9 Li Na reached the fourth round. Murray on the other hand, took full advantage of the absence of Rafa Nadal, and the surprise defeat of Federer, to battle through to the final, where he faced defending champion Novak Djokovic. In what was a final filled with incredible rallies and  remarkable shots, Murray took a two set lead, which Djokovic brought back to 2-2. A year ago, Andy Murray might have buckled under this pressure, but last night he dug into his reserves to win a famous victory, and earn his place in the record books.

So a truly remarkable summer of sport comes to an end. A summer filled with incredible achievements, and drama of the highest order, and it will not be forgotten in a hurry.

12 steps to education heaven?

Education, Education, Education: Reforming England’s Schools by Andrew Adonis (Biteback Publishing Ltd, London, 2012)

Andrew Adonis was the principal driving force behind the education reforms of New Labour, his main contribution being the development of the academy system to improve the standards of failing comprehensives. This book describes how and why he arrived at this conclusion, and what he believes is the way forward. 

The child of a Greek-Cypriot immigrant brought up in a Camden Children’s Home, Adonis’s father and social worker gained him a place at Kingham Hill Boarding School in Oxfordshire.  His final headteacher David Shepherd urged him to try his old college Keble in Oxford, where he studied history, before eventually becoming a historian and lecturer himself.

Andrew Adonis became an education advisor in Tony Blair’s Labour governments after 1997, and inspired by his early experiences writes in the foreword:

“All this gave me a burning sense that education matters fundamentally. That inspirational teachers, and all who work with children, matter fundamentally. That institutions matter fundamentally. And that values, sometimes through religion, matter fundamentally.”

Lord Adonis puts forward a twelve point plan for reforming schools in England. There are a number of ideas in here which I can agree with, subject specialism for teachers through most of the school system, greater democracy and citizenship (including votes at sixteen), greater provision at the pre-school stage, and streamlining of governing bodies.

He doesn’t hold back, stating that in the eighties and early nineties comprehensives were ‘palpably and seriously failing.’ But he also holds himself up as a radical who is fighting against the tide, quoting Machiavelli from The Prince, “For the initiator has the enmity of all who would profit by the preservation of the old institutions and merely lukewarm defenders in those who would gain by the new ones.”

He embarked on his mission to transform what he saw as the ‘secondary modern comprehensive,’ schools he believed little better at best, and in too many cases no better, than the secondary moderns they had replaced. But he faced obstacles, especially from those involved in schools on a daily basis. His concern was, “How to end the bureaucratic levelling-down culture within the teacher unions, the local education authorities and the education department itself?”

He felt the Thatcher government’s Grant Maintained Schools had failed because they had weak leadership, were in the firm grip of Local Education Authorities and ‘militant’ NUT involvement. They were not improving, the initiative placed little emphasis on setting up new schools and there were no new governance models.

Indeed, it was the little known City Technology Colleges (CTC) that impressed him, the key being they were independent, had sponsor/promoters, were not for profit, and non-fee paying. That they had been largely ignored by the outgoing Conservative government, meant that Labour in 1997 were not under any pressure to abolish them, which seems to have suited Adonis down to the ground.

                                Thomas Telford School a CTC that inspired Andrew Adonis

 

Quality of leadership is vital in any organisation whether school, business or government for that matter as he rightly says about comprehensives, if these things weren’t already in place before taking on CTC status, then merely renaming them wasn’t going to solve the problems.

Adonis seems to see academies as the only way to improve educational standards in underperforming schools saying, “It is urgent that all underperforming schools, primary as well as secondary, become academies.”  

However, he is uncritical of how the coalition government reversed the policy, when instead of concentrating on the failing schools they set about turning outstanding schools into academies. Although this was the end game of Adonis’s policy he fails to defend it, as there remain some 650 failing comprehensives which you’d expect him to believe were the priority.

One of the big concerns with academies was how they would affect surrounding schools, taking away funding for these big new projects. He is very dismissive of these, saying that the evidence shows surrounding schools raised their standards to compete. However, he doesn’t say how these schools were doing before the academy came into being, whether they were good schools, or improving, as otherwise they would have been academy candidates themselves.

Adonis does not really acknowledge the doubts that parents and indeed many educational professionals have with sponsors,  principally that as academies are outside of local authority control, these sponsors could have a counter-productive influence on the curriculum and the running of the schools.

He also doesn’t really address another reason for opposition and how experience, as well as ideology will have affected views. He writes extensively about the failures of past reforms but doesn’t consider whether this is what worried opponents, another expensive and complicated reform, that would do little or nothing to improve education or the life prospects of children.

Sir Michael Wilshaw now Ofsted chief was head of Mossbourne Academy which replaced the closed and failed Hackney Downs School.

 

Andrew Adonis supports the free schools which Michael Gove has introduced, seeing them as, ‘academies without a predecessor state school.’ He completely avoids telling us that free schools can be established in any building that is not necessarily fit for purpose, and that they do not have a requirement to hire qualified teachers. 

He does not mention at all the New Schools Network which has the sole responsibility for deciding whether a free school has a viable business plan and as we have seen in recent weeks, there are faults, as schools can have their funding withdrawn very late, meaning parents and local authorities have to find places very close to the new term. Whatever you may think of the academy system, and the way it’s set up, Andrew Adonis can’t be accused of not caring about, or thinking about how it should work, and went about it with rigour.

One theme that Andrew Adonis keeps going back to is the small number of graduates that come into teaching from Oxbridge and the Russell group universities, seeming to believe that only top graduates make good teachers. He heavily promotes the Teach First model, a private charity which selects apparently quality graduates from the top universities. They are then put through an intensive period of summer training, then placed in schools in deprived areas, on a two-year placement. 

The principles of Teach First are laudable, and they seem to be very good at what they do, though currently it is they, and not the school, that pick who goes where, which Adonis feels should change. If I have one bone to pick, it’s that in his promotion of Teach First, Lord Adonis should declare an interest and mention he’s a founding ambassador and trustee of the charity.

As a member of the Labour Party and someone who works in education, I was very keen to read this book and I certainly found it very interesting.  The journey to academies is painstakingly described, but he does tend to gloss over some of the problems, and like a true evangelist, focusses on the positive, whilst downplaying the negatives.

The idea of Andrew Adonis’s I am most enthusiastic about is that specialist teaching should not only be guaranteed, but should start sooner. I wouldn’t go as far as to start it in year one, I think for the first three to four years of schooling other things are as important as academic education. I would start specialising at year four, or five at the latest, and encourage a middle-school system. Many academies in the early days set themselves up for the 14-19 range, and this would be ideal I believe.

The Conservatives in government will love this book, because it supports their ideas that it is by involving those considered the drivers of the economy is the best way to go. The left will generally hate it, especially those who were against the academy idea from the outset, as it confirms all their prejudices, not only about New Labour but also about the possible dangers of allowing companies to take over schools.

The twelve point plan is somewhat utopian, especially in the idea of schools as community hubs, but it is only by aiming for the best, and constantly striving for it, that you have any chance of attaining it. I admire Andrew Adonis’ zeal, and his genuine goal to improve the education in English schools. He tends towards a one size fits all approach, which is ironic as that doesn’t seem to be his intention. Schools can’t all be the same, because the children aren’t. 

The book sells itself as a series of radical reforms by a ‘professional optimist,’ something anybody seeking to reform education in England needs to be.