Britain's Big-Brother Ways

If the word liberty won't soon be scrapped from British dictionaries, at least it will have to be set in extra-tiny type.

The country's cities and villages are dotted with over four million closed-circuit TV cameras — that's more video surveillance than can be found in any other nation, and the number is still growing. The government is continuing apace with its plans for a national ID card, an idea that Tony Blair renounced as an ill-conceived Tory plot until he came to power.

There is also Britain's new militia to consider — poorly trained semi-cops known as police community support officers (PCSOs) who are said to frequently go a little power-mad.

According to a first-person account by Nicky Samengo-Turner in the U.K. Spectator, he recently underwent a late-morning vehicle search in central London after police officers, aided by PCSOs, randomly pulled him over. He readily gave his consent for the search because, he says, "I was pleased that the government was doing something to keep us all safe". Samengo-Turner's naïveté kind cooperation was promptly punished, as he was carrying in his briefcase a fearful weapon indeed: a Swiss Army pen knife, sheathed in a small webbed case.

>> They behaved as if they had never seen a penknife before, pulling out the bottle-opener, the corkscrew, the thing that gets stones out of horses' hooves. "This device has a locking blade," said the constable, after which a short, whispered debate ensued. My goodwill towards the police began to give way to alarm. I reached for my mobile to ... explain that I was going to be late for my meeting, but the constable stopped me. "Turn that phone off," he said. "You're about to be arrested for possessing offensive weapons and carrying a bladed instrument in public." ... "You've committed an offence, mate, and you'd better get used to the fact that you're going down for six months," said one policeman. <<

Samengo-Turner was taken into custody, fingerprinted, taunted, thrown into a jail cell, and formally charged. Good thing he got through to his lawyer on the phone, who finally sprang him free by day's end.

He speculates that once the national ID card is a reality, in four short years,

>> ...who can doubt that [constables and PCSOs] will be able to demand the production of an ID card, and detain you if you fail to produce it? <<

Further evidence that the U.K. is well on its way to becoming a police state abounds. Just two months ago, the British parliament passed the Civil Contingencies Act, a law that gives the government the awesome power to declare and maintain a state of emergency for as long as it wants.

And don't even get me started on the proposed British law that will make it a crime to speak critically of another person's religion.

Blair's government has interpreted "Rule Britannia" as "Rule Britannia with an iron fist." It is disheartening to see a former bastion of civilization and fairness take on the nasty edges of a third-world dictatorship.