The Snoopers Charter - Why?

The recent horrific murder of a soldier in London has caused our politicians in the UK to have a knee jerk reaction.

The Communications Data Bill (or Snoopers Charter) was previously knocked back because of fears of invasion of privacy.

In essence it means that communications providers (ISPs, telecomms providers) would have to keep records of the detailed activities of their customers.  These details could be requested by certain authorities without requiring a warrant, though this would still be required for the content of the communications.

Therefore your ISP will keep records of your web searches and pages viewed, Skype will keep details of your calls, mobile phone providers will keep records of your calls and texts, the list goes on.

By stating that a warrant will be required to access content it is clear that this must also be retained.  Your every move is effectively tracked (for example the location of your mobile when you make or receive a call).  Big Brother really will be watching you!

Now it seems that they want to dust it off and bring it back.

What is the point however?  All of this data retention and indexing will cost money, and ultimately it will be us that pays.  Those of us who are innocent will be monitored.

Those with something to hide, those criminals or terrorists that the bill is intended to track, will however find a way around it.  It is already very easy to buy a Pay As You Go mobile for cash without supplying any details.  Likewise internet access 'dongles' which enable browsing, web mail products and so on.

There are also likely to be 'underground' internet systems with ISPs who perhaps don't believe in government edicts, and what about foreign ISPs?

The proposal is full of holes and will only result in the innocent being even more put upon.

What if I use a taxi firm which turns out to have a driver with criminal connections, will my phone links to them result in me being monitored?  Or perhaps a friend of a friend on a social networking site turns out to be a drug user, is my name blackened by association?

I think this bill will be an expensive waste of time and should be stopped.  It is in many ways similar to the National ID scheme launched by the previous administration - supposedly to prevent terrorism but in the Madrid train bombings I believe all the terrorists had their ID cards, it didn't prevent the attack though.

I shall be writing to my MP, I suggest you think about this and if you agree then please write to your MP.

The Environmentalists Are Running The Asylum

It seems more and more that our politicians are bowing down to the environmentalists.  It is bad enough when politicians try and run the country themselves, but when they start listening to environmentalists the whole situation gets much worse.

In making these claims I must point out that I am accusing all the political parties, so this covers the present government and it's predecessors.

At various climate summits our politicians have signed us up to reductions in CO2 emissions which are not achievable.  This is just like  a salesman saying his product will do things it clearly does not.  Before agreeing these reductions perhaps our representatives should have taken expert advice on what can and cannot be done!

The same climate summits see other countries agreeing to far less severe reductions in CO2, with some such as China even suggesting they cannot reduce CO2 but are likely to increase.

This leads to unsustainable plans for wind farms, solar farms and so on to produce a fraction of the reduction we are committed to.

So the government attack the issue in different ways by trying to force us out of our cars and make us install ever greater levels of insulation in our homes.

The latest scheme however has to take the biscuit, whereby if you wish to carry out certain changes to your home you will be inspected and presented with a list of other work to be carried out - at your own expense - if you wish to go ahead.  Don't worry though as they will offer you a loan so that any possible savings will be lost when you repay this.

Two examples quoted so far have been boiler replacement and building a conservatory (and perhaps any type of extension).

The first will affect me, and many others. as boilers have a finite life.  My house was built in accordance with the building regulations and insulation standards of the time, but would now fall short and I have no doubt I would be expected to top up the loft insulation at the very least.  My loft insulation is the depth of the joists so in some areas I have boarded the loft for storage space.  This will presumably have to be taken up and more insulation added such that I can no longer use the loft for storage unless I raise the floor in some areas.

Perhaps I should just leave my old boiler in place longer, OK it is less efficient than a more modern boiler but the savings from the boiler are already hard to justify against the cost of installing it, let alone when it comes to the additional expense.

Madness!

What about people in older properties, particularly those with solid walls?  Their insulation factors may well be low.  Do they get forced to insulate the inside of the walls and make the rooms smaller and lose the character of the building, or perhaps insulate the outside, again losing the character.

The lunatics really are taking over the asylum. 

Religion and the State

Here in the UK our Prime Minister, David Cameron, held a meeting before Easter with church leaders during which he made a number of rather worrying comments.

As surveys and doubtless the 2011 census are showing, the number of people who feel they have a religion is falling.  As an element of this so is the number of those who claim to be Christians.  A recent survey commissioned by the Richard Dawkins Foundation for Reason and Science showed that of those who identified themselves as Christians many just did so because it was their parents religion.  Interestingly, amongst the Christians many feel as I do that the Church and State should be separate.

Having read the reports of this meeting, it seems that not only is Mr Cameron unaware of this, but that he is actively trying to fight against it (democracy?).

I felt driven to write to him about my concerns with his viewpoints and will update this post if I hear back, either from him or from one of his staff.

In essence he made a number of points as follows:

He believes that Christian values would create a happier and better society for everyone.  I will look at some of these below but for now I need to point out that Christians do not have exclusivity on morals and ethics and indeed these existed before Christianity.  Atheists also have morals and ethics and whilst any group will have 'bad apples' there is no reason to put Christians on a pedestal for their values.

He then went on to discuss the values of the Bible - this includes the Christian values he chooses to omit such as violence, explicit sexual references, child abuse, objectivisation and dehumanisation of women, aggressively genocidal racism, explicit animal cruelty and incitement to commit murder and hate crimes (my thanks to Rosa Rubicondior at http://rosarubicondior.blogspot.co.uk/2012/03/what-warning-would-you-put-in-gideon.html for the succinct list).

Many of these so called 'values' are clearly unacceptable in a civilised society, so perhaps Christians need to bring the Bible up to date.

Mr Cameron is also very keen to promote the teaching of religion within schools.  If this were objective then perhaps we should not worry because pupils would be taught about the various religions, the fact that many are atheists and agnostics, and then encouraged to think for themselves about what they believe.  This is not the case however, schools teach their own doctrine thus a Church of England school teaches their own brand of Christianity with little or no reference to the alternatives.  I have seen examples of this with my own nephew and niece - though they stood up and thought for themselves. Read more at http://scepticalcurmudgeon.blogspot.co.uk/2011/10/religious-indoctrination.html

Finally, he talks of suppression of Christian rights.  The issue that annoys me most here is prayers as part of council meetings.  These were recently declared illegal, however the PM has decided to change the law so they can be made legal again.  We have a very varied society and many council members will not be of the Christian faith, yet Christian prayers are to be imposed upon them.  This is unacceptable.  What is wrong with allowing a period before the meeting and separate from it in which those who wish to do so may pray or have a time of personal reflection - this should be acceptable to all as those who do not wish to partake simply arrive later for the actual meeting which constitutes the business of the council.

I feel that Christianity is being forced upon the country, whether we like it or not.  I doubt my letter to David Cameron will have any effect, but by that means and through this blog I am trying to show that we do not all agree with Christianity, or in my case any religion.

Dual Standards on Alcohol by the UK Government

We are hearing that David Cameron and his government are looking to impose minimum pricing for alcoholic drinks to address problems with alcoholism and drink fueled social issues.

At the same time, the Palace of Westminster where the government resides has a subsidised bar, paid for by the taxpayer, to ensure MPs and other staff can enjoy cheap drink.

If this is not dual standards then I don't know what is. Apparently there is already a history of drink fueled problems within this bar.

At the very least, the subsidies in the bar should be removed so that drinkers there pay the same prices as anyone else in pubs in that part of London does.  I think however it should be taken further perhaps and closed completely.  MPs are already capable of making daft decisions on their own without adding beer goggles to their armoury of decision making tools.

How many private sector employers actively encourage drinking during the working day by providing a bar AND subsidising the drink costs.  In many of the workplaces I have encountered drinking is frowned upon during the working day and some go as far as to have a condition of employment that you may be required to take a breathalyser test (certainly in my last employment where you could be asked to go home if the test was positive as safety standards could be breached)

I would also point out to the government that many alcohol fueled problems are caused by drinkers in night clubs and bars where prices are already exorbitant.  A minimum price will have most impact upon the moderate social drinker and not address the problem at all.

Motorway Speed Limits

For some time now there have been proposals to increase the motorway speed limit in the UK to 80mph (or its kph equivalent when the EU interferes!)

Personally I think this is a good idea with one caveat - it needs to be enforced properly.  Given that it appears many drivers already travel at this sort of speed, enforcing it positively will not mean much of an increase overall - though drivers who presently obey the 70 limit may well travel faster.

Opponents claim that speed kills and increasing the limit will increase road deaths.  This is somewhat of a fallacy as it is inappropriate speed that kills.  There are many instances where 70mph is far too fast on the motorway.

Only recently we had the horrific accident on the M5 near Taunton.  I have no intention of second guessing the investigation into the cause but given the reported weather conditions at the time it would strike me that this is one of the cases where 70mph would be far too fast.

I had a very personal experience of this some years ago, travelling north on the M6 near Birmingham.  As I was driving the fog became thicker and thicker to the point where I had slowed to about 20mph and was frightened by trucks overtaking with a very high relative speed.

With the conditions worsening I made the decision to leave the motorway at the next service station, contemplating spending the night there.  I went for a coffee and a meal and after an hour or so reviewed the weather.  There had been a significant improvement so I decided to refuel and continue my journey.

Whilst fuelling I talked to a driver who had just pulled off the motorway who told me of an accident that he had just passed.  It would appear that on the southbound carriageway there had been a significant pile up which had then triggered further accidents both in the traffic slowing down behind it and also on the northbound carriageway as people slowed to 'rubber-neck' the southbound carriageway.  Apparently drivers were still being caught out and he felt that more collisions could occur.

Drivers must adapt to the weather and road conditions.  The speed limit is just that, a limit, not a target to be achieved at all times.

I have however witnessed an amusing incident whereby a driver whilst probably travelling within the legal limit was too fast for the road conditions / his ability.  Traffic on the motorway had come to a crawl as a result of an accident and most drivers were filtering into lane one as indicated by the police Range Rover in lane two.  One driver was however not paying attention and by the time he braked it was too late and in a cloud of tyre smoke he slid into the back of the police vehicle.  Fortunately it seems that no one was injured as he had slowed a lot but I would have loved to have heard his explanation to the officer whose car he had hit.  Given that it was fully lit with flashing blues, the red lights they use and a message board he could hardly deny having seen it.

Our sympathies should be with those affected by the horrendous accident on the M5, and others, but it should not be used as a reason not to increase the speed limit.

Ban the Plastic Bag

We have been hearing a lot about banning the plastic throwaway bag so often handed out by supermarkets.  At least one of the tabloid newspapers seems to think they are 'leading the way' but then don't the tabloids all jump on to whatever is the current bandwagon to try and increase their popularity?

I am not interested here in the tabloids however, more in the underlying problem of the single use plastic bag.  It cannot be denied that they contribute a lot to our waste stream and thus increase the burden on landfill.  They also get into the environment and cause litter and problems for wildlife.

Part of the problem is how people use the bags, not just the bags themselves. 

When they were freely given out I tended to use them for bin liners in small bins, for bagging other rubbish before putting it in the wheelie bin, for separating laundry when returning from holiday, for storage of out of season clothing etc.  In short I tried to get as much use as possible out of them and in doing so avoided buying other plastic bags to address those needs.

Now I use bags for life for my shopping, which means I need to buy bin liners, bags for storage etc.  See the problem - in my case just a shift of bag type.

You also get the people who do see them as single use bags and just dump them.  Many of those that spoil the environment are probably just thrown away casually without even being placed in a bin which is why they end up in hedgerows, on beaches, etc.  Will the proposed charge for single use bags affect these people? Probably not.

Where a charge has been imposed it is likely to stop responsible people using so many bags - but those bags are the ones less likely to cause problems.

Charging is also a way of increasing the supermarkets profits - we have seen this already with a leading company who by charging for their bags cover all the costs of bag production, previously borne by themselves, and donate only the profits to charity.  Thus they increase their own profits - a fact they are rather quiet about!

Could we ban them altogether and insist shoppers either use reusable bags or boxes.  This is a possibility but I doubt it would go down well.  In the past I have used the trolley liners which did get heavy but you simply lifted them from the trolley to the car and then to the house.  Whoops, you must always take your car shopping!  The best solution which a now defunct supermarket had was plastic crates - they combined this with self scanning at the point of loading your trolley.  Simple checkout procedure but again you needed a car.  Reusing cardboard boxes that the goods arrive at the supermarket in was once used but probably waned as goods became more palletised.

What is the solution - I don't know, perhaps my readers have some ideas.

We must also consider the impact upon industry - if we do succeed in significantly reducing bag usage - will the businesses and their employees who make them be able to redeploy their resources without loss of employment?

One final note - everyone goes on about supermarket bags - what about the vast number of charity collection bags that come through our doors every year?  Most of these are likely to end up in land fill without even being taken out of their (plastic) wrapper.  The solution here is perhaps to just pop a small leaflet through the door inviting people to use their own bag if they have goods to donate.  The leaflet can be recycled as paper and maybe we can even reduce the frequency of these calls on our unwanted goods - frequently I have nothing to donate when a bag comes through (and before you comment - I reuse these as rubbish bags also)

Big Brother and 1984

Yesterday we had a protest on the M1 in the area by motorcyclists against proposed new legislation from the EU.  This took the form of a peaceful go slow.

They were taking issue with proposed new legislation for motorbikes from the EU.  Some of the new legislation makes sense but much of it is a combination of Nanny State and Big Brother.  It may also be a sign of things to come.

One element that I think has a grounding in common sense is a proposed requirement for motorcyclists to wear high visibility clothing - something which a reasonable number already do as it helps protect them from other road users who don't see them (it can do nothing for those who don't look unfortunately)

Then it starts getting more controlling - severe restrictions on what changes may be made to the motorbike from it's factory specification.  I know bikers like to customise their bikes and I am sure most do so in a perfectly safe and sensible manner - after all they are more at risk than car drivers if something does go wrong.  We also have the MOT test to oversee vehicle safety.

The most worring element as far as I am concerned is the planned requirement for all new bikes to be fitted with a GPS tracker to record the details of all the bikes journeys.  I don't recall whether the plans were for this requirement to be retrofitted to existing bikes but if not now, then I am sure it will be.

This would then open the way for the legislators to expand the scope to cover all motor vehicles.

Once this has been done, what would the data be used for.  If only to provide an impartial witness in the event of an accident by recording what happened in the run up to the accident then that seems fine.  But in reality we know that the information will be used for more than that.  What is more with a number of high profile data losses by public bodies, you can never be sure who will get hold of the data.  Or in times of financial hardship, who the data will be sold to!

Even for accident analysis I would be concerned.  Without expensive additional components (and services that as yet may not be available everywhere) a GPS derived position is not accurate enough to determine whether a biker was on the correct side of the road for example.  Use in Germany of GPS for road tolls has resulted in errors whereby drivers have been charged for being on a toll road when in fact they were on an adjacent local road.

Where will this end?  Maybe we should all have RFID tracking chips fitted now and the government can be sure where we all are at all times, even when we are not using our vehicles!

The Nanny State

It appears that once again our government are meddling where they aren't needed and won't have any beneficial effect.

This time it is an attempt to reduce the salt in our diets. 

Some time ago we read of a council which tried to reduce salt consumption by insisting that takeaway food shops, primarily fish and chips, only had salt cellars with a reduced number of holes as opposed to those with many holes commonly used.

I doubt that had any effect, people would just shake longer to get the amount of salt they wanted, and very much doubt anyone from the council measured whether there was any benefit.

This time it is being tackled at government level with instructions to manufacturers to reduce salt levels in food stuffs, bacon being a prime example.  Not only is salt a flavouring it is also a preservative.  We therefore risk having products that neither taste as good or last as long!

This has already been demonstrated with HP Sauce.  This already had a lower salt version available for those who choose to reduce their salt intake, but the government insisted the salt level in the standard version was reduced - to the disgust of lovers of the sauce.  It is not as if the changed level will have a significant effect anyway - a reduction of a fraction of a gram in one hundred grams of product translates into a minuscule amount when you consider how little sauce is consumed in any one meal.

What is happening here is that the public are not being given the choice of taking the existing low salt version if they wish, but being forced to have a low salt version.

What next?  Perhaps we will be told that plain crisps should be just that, no salt at all.  Then we can extend it across the rest of the crisp range - for example it will perhaps just be vinegar crisps!

Salt sales in shops will also have to be banned - or maybe put on ration coupons to prevent individuals getting too much.

The reality is that if people want salt with their food they will have salt with their food, whether this be as a constituent or an addition they make at home.

Some of my examples above are extreme and ridiculous - or are they?