Here is a letter I wrote to forth.ie

Sir,

On 7 December I wrote an opinion for this site about the launch of identity cards in Manchester. I received one comment, from Joan Burton, who wrote: “It’s a cliche but a true one – if you’ve done nothing wrong you have nothing to fear.”

One of the problems about the current UK government’s overarching surveillance project has been a lack of debate, both publically and in parliament, so I welcome any engagement with these issues.  I have heard the above sentiment voiced before and I address it here to provide clarification and, I hope on Ms Burton’s part, reevaluation.

Public protection from criminal activities is a key responsibility of the state but this should not allow the state whatever means it wishes in the pursuit of this goal.  Governments need to keep in mind that their populations predominantly comprise law abiding citizens whose rights and wishes should be balanced against any reasonable requirements the state may have to pursue its duties.  The ‘done nothing wrong/nothing to fear’ paradigm ignores any need for balancing public and private needs to the extent there is nothing that cannot be justified by its invocation.  It would, for instance, endorse the enforcement of the fitting of positioning devices to everyone living in or entering the UK, something that might drastically reduce crime but at the expense of massive state intrusion.

Thinking this way ignores the need to evaluate state surveillance projects and dismisses those who object as oversensitive to individuals’ rights, or failing to see the threat that we face.  The point I wished to make about ID cards is that not only are they intrusive, but they fail to meet any of their objectives, even though these objectives have changed over the years.  Now, more than ever, the UK Government must be careful with its taxpayers money and, civil liberties issues aside, that project of the expense of that of the ID cards is now being promoted as first and foremost a convenient way to prove identity at the post office is of concern in itself.

Finally within ‘done nothing wrong/nothing to fear’ thinking there is a tacit assumption that governments are inherently benign and have the interests of their populations at heart.  Whilst this may be broadly so for the UK it is foolish to think that this is a universal attribute of governments or that adverse change is not possible.  It is a sad fact that the majority of acts of violence committed in the modern world have been visited by those in governmental power against those who are out of power.  Indeed the word ‘terrorism’ actually dates from the French revolution and refers to the use of terror by governments against their own populations (1).  One estimate holds that during the 20th century governments killed 7.3% of their populations.  ID cards have  been documented as having been assets in mass killings both recent and historical and continue to be used to target vulnerable populations.

Yours etc.,
Dr. Stephen Ginn MD,
London.

References:

In Kafka’s The Trial (buy Amazon), published in 1925 Joseph K, a bank clerk, is unexpectedly arrested by two unidentified people for an unspecified crime.  Although the novel was never finished (and Kafka actually wished it destroyed) in what exists K spends his time trying to navigate a legal system which is at once ubiquitous, immensely powerful and totally lacking in transparency.

This novel comes to mind whenever I think about control orders, which were introduced by the British Government in the Prevention of Terrorism act in 2005 in response to the House of Lord’s ruling against indefinite detention without charge or trial for foreign nationals contained in the Anti-terrorism Crime and Security Act 2001.

Control orders enable the Home Secretary to impose an unlimited range of restrictions on any person he or she suspects of involvement in terrorism. Among the restrictions that can be imposed are curfews of up to 16 hours enforced by an electronic tag, restrictions on the use of mobile phones and the internet, vetting of all visitors and meetings and restrictions on an individual’s movements. The Home Secretary also has the power to add new restrictions or obligations as he sees fit.  Based on suspicion and secret intelligence, those subject to an order do not know the accusation or case against them and are powerless to dispute it or show their innocence.

Legislation which severely curtails personal liberty in this way, which can be enacted on the basis of vague criteria, and which has inadequate oversight is more than just concerning.  The legality of control orders is currently being tested in the High Court following a critical House of Lord’s judgment in which Lord Hope said:

…a denunciation on grounds that are not disclosed is the stuff of nightmares. The rule of law in a democratic society does not tolerate such behaviour. The fundamental principle is that everyone is entitled to the disclosure of sufficient material to enable him to answer effectively the case that is made against him.

The Liberty 75 conference was attended recently myself and, more notably, Mahmoud Abu Rideh who has been subject to a control order for the past four years.  Prior to this he was interned for three and and a half years without trial.  Mr Abu Rideh must comply with a regime of telephone reporting three times every 24 hours; daily reporting in person to a police station; a 12-hour daily curfew and meetings outside the house and visits to anyone in the house prohibited except for persons cleared by the Home Office.

Mr Abu Rideh’s mental health appears to be severely compromised by his situation and he has made several suicide attempts and at one point was on hunger strike.  And control order do not only affect the person to whom they are subject as their families suffer alongside their subject, as this article explains.

The civil liberty pressure group Liberty are campaigning against control orders and their director, Shami Chakrabarti has said:

As stupid as they are cruel, control orders are the worst hangover from Britain’s War on Terror. No real terrorist is ever going to comply with house arrest and a large number of suspects have disappeared. But an innocent person can be subject to indefinite and severe punishment without ever having been charged or brought to trial.

I agree; the UK Government should show its hand and prosecute any persons who it is currently subjecting to a control order as anything else is cruel and degrading.  I am not aware of any representation having been made on behalf of doctors on this issue but there is a policy (broken link) adopted in 2003 by the World Medical Association that suggests we should be heard.  It states that there is an:

..ethical obligation on physicians to report or denounce acts of torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment of which they are aware.

Addendum 9 September 2009 Most control orders likely to be revoked after terror suspect freed

The Metropolitan Police have launched a new poster campaign clearly pitched to engender paranoia and anxiety in London’s population.  A picture shows a wheelie-bin brimming with carelessly discarded toxic chemical containers accompanied by the smug caption:

‘These chemicals won’t be used in a bomb because a neighbour reported the dumped containers’

At the edge of the shot – to remind us what is at stake – a mother and child approach, totally unaware that such danger lurks in their community.

The scenario is clearly simplistic, as well as being inconsistent with previous government statements.  Are these terrorists, so overcome by fanatical zeal they find themselves unable to dispose of incriminating evidence with necessary care, the same terrorists whose plots are so devilishly complicated that investigators supposedly needed 42 days to unravel their schemes?

For several years now, the Government and security services have been feeding us information about the ever-present threat to us from international terrorism in the shape of Al-Qaeda.  Al-Qaeda is apparently well financed, well organised and poised to strike at the heart of our freedoms.  The danger is so serious that it necessarily requires a government and security force with increasingly wide ranging powers to defeat it.  But their threat has also not materialised, and in 2005 the only significant attack on UK soil has not been successfully linked to them.  So, with international terrorist attacks increasingly appearing largely a fantasy, and in the face of civil liberties protests against draconian and frequently misused police powers, the Met’s posters are more about maintaining the police’s might and authority by reiterating the precariousness of our security, and the necessary evil of strong policing, than about catching terrorists (such as they do exist) per se.

Appealing to our wish for security is a technique at which politicians are already well practised.  The Government’s assessment of the current terrorist threat, made available in the name of keeping us informed, is ‘severe’.  This ‘threat level’ has been published since August 2006 and has since been either ‘severe’ (terrorist attack highly likely) or ‘critical’ (terrorist attack imminent) ever since.  With such an apparently unwavering crisis, one is reminded of the plot of 1984 wherein a state of perpetual war was used to justify the control of Oceania by Stalinist methods.  Constant news of inevitable attacks feeds the assertion that threats are all around us and can only be tackled by strong government, whose actions are all ultimately in the common good.  Furthermore, having over-exaggerated the security risk, continued absence of any attacks serves to strengthen their point, and ‘prove’ the success of their policies.

The social divisiveness of all this, and especially the current campaign, need hardly be pointed out.  Given that it’s almost impossible to differentiate between a man wearing a rucksack full of books and a similar man with a rucksack full of explosive there will inevitably be a large number of people falsely detained following the actions of well meaning, but ultimately misguided amateur anti-terrorist sleuths.  It pays to do a little maths;  imagine that there are 8 million people in London and that amongst their number there are 150 ‘terrorists’.  We know from this poster campaign that every member of the public is under suspicion.  Let us suppose that the intuition displayed by members of the public in spying on our neighbours with the aim of catching terrorists is correct an incredible  99.99% of the time.  Since our ‘test’ is very sensitive, our 150 terrorists are successfully caught, but it still gives a false positive rate of 0.01% which means that 80 000 people will be wrongly identified and possibly victimized.  Such simple calculations and the collateral damage they imply appear to have been entirely overlooked.

The Police and Government have a duty not to engender panic as a way of achieving their own ends.  Many people find modern life distressing enough without having to feel that they must be constantly on the look out for terrorist cells; the psychological health of society at large should be considered before the use of alarmist campaigns.  Successful society relies on mutual trust and widespread suspicion encouraged by this campaign is more akin to that seen in communist East Germany than to 21st century Britain.

Update – this piece appeared in the Daily Mail 15 April 2009 With recent police activity, anti-terror adverts and CCTV everywhere no wonder we’re all scared stiff.  Whilst I agree with much of what it says, it does read like the transcript of a right wing shock jock show.  Here’s the Mental Health Foundation report he talks about.

It’s not important to most people that my paper 3 MRCPsych results came out on Monday last, alongside the snow. Unremarkably, the pass list was first published on the internet before individual letters were sent in the post; despite passing, my name wasn’t on that list. When I’ve explained to people that I opted for my results to remain private, most of them have wondered why.  It seems to me that as individuals we’re expecting to have less and less control over what information is available about us.

Technology has changed a lot even in my lifetime. I’m old enough to remember the days before the world wide web and mobile phones, although it’s becoming harder and harder to believe that that time ever existed. I can actually recall the first time I tried to access a website; it didn’t load properly and I thought it was rather dull (I’m not a visionary). You don’t need me to tell you the opportunities that the world wide web has brought. But we’re still weighing up one of the major disadvantages of the new information technologies: the increasing ability of government and private organisations to capture and share enormous amounts of data concerning private citizens or ‘us’.

Most of us don’t seem to care too much, but I object to these invasions of my privacy. I don’t see why anyone should know my exam results apart from me and those people I might wish to tell. Equally plans which will require me to possess an identity card, not just a piece of plastic but backed up by a personal information database, to enable me to walk the streets are sinister and odious. Furthermore, the UK population is watched by four million CCTV cameras and 7.9% of the population is on the national DNA database despite an EU ruling that holding the genetic data of those never having been charged with a crime was unlawful. There are also proposals for a ‘superdatabase’ of citizens’ emails and mobile phone calls.  Clause 152 of the current Coroners and Justice Bill will allow government departments very broad powers to share personal information.  The plans for NHS records could mean that your notes could be read by over one million people (see below)

Of course I can’t say that this datasharing is without benefits. We must all give up a reasonable amount of our privacy to enable to fight against crime and to allow us to move smoothly through the days in a complex society. What I say is that the balance is wrong and that our data is being collected to deal with vague and insubstantial threats and/or ruthlessly mined by poorly regulated commercial organisations whose intentions are unclear. Either way we are being carelessly treated and the UK is sleepwalking into a surveillance nightmare where privacy is seriously compromised.

There are signs of a return of sense.  Publishing last week the high profile authors of a report published by the House of Lords today agree that privacy is under treat. The committee chairman Lord Goddard said:

“The huge rise in surveillance and data collection by the state and other organisations risks undermining the long-standing traditions of privacy and individual freedom which are vital for democracy.

If the public are to trust that information about them is not being improperly used there should be much more openness about what data is collected, by whom and how it is used.”

Privacy is a precondition to a life of quality and also at the root of freedom. I think it’s important to fight back where one can. The Government has a plan to make all NHS patient records part of a nation wide ‘spine’, where potentially every NHS employee, of which there are over a million, could access your records. The Big Opt Out website tells you how to remove yourself.

At the end of this month The Convention on Modern Liberty is being held. No2id are an organisation campaigning against ID cards. Here they tell you why ID cards should concern everyone who lives in the UK.

I would normally shy away from committing to print any feelings I may have on the Israeli-Palestine conflict, as feelings run high and the issue is thorny. But today the death toll is reported to exceed 1000 and the UN relief headquarters has been bombed (described by British PM Gordon Brown as ‘indefensible’).

Also today Physicians for Human Rights Israel held a press conference ‘raising heavy suspicion of grave violations of international humanitarian law by military forces’

On January 9th this letter was published in the Lancet which finishes:

This report is for our colleagues around the world who might be unaware of the deliberate erosion of human rights in both the West Bank and Gaza. We suggest that, in view of the failure of other measures to influence those in power, serious consideration be given to targeted academic and trade boycotts.

While this blogger reports that medics and ambulances are fired upon.

This shames us all – please note and distribute widely.