The fact that talks with the Conservatives have failed to come up with agreement at this stage suggests that this possibility has run its course.

The Social Liberal Forum Executive respect Nick Clegg’s commitment to talk to the party with the greatest mandate first and have suspended our judgement on what such negotiations might result in.

But the party has always been clear that this by no means was to offer them a blank cheque or even that a deal would necesarily result from these talks.

It is now apparent that David Cameron is not prepared to deliver a genuinely proportional voting system, nor offer a progressive agenda that Liberal Democrat members and voters rallied behind the party to secure. With Gordon Brown gone, so has the key barrier to a better alternative.

With this in mind, we strongly endorse the opening of talks with Labour. A progressive coalition, possibly involving the Green Party, Alliance Party, SDLP, Plaid Cymru and the SNP would command a majority mandate from the public. 52% of the public voted for either the Liberal Democrats or Labour, almost 56% if the votes of all progressive parties in Parliament are combined.

There is a progressive majority of opinion in this country and despite the deficiencies of our broken political system, our government should ideally reflect that.

Nonetheless we are realistic that such an alliance would be precarious. For it to work, legislation for fixed term parliaments, increased caps on election spending and caps on party donations must be prioritised. Extending fiscal autonomy to Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales would be crucial.

All progressive parties, including Labour, are committed to some form of electoral reform, but a commitment to a referendum on a proportional voting system must remain a deal breaker. To ensure a real change to our broken political system, Nick Clegg must be prepared to walk away and allow a Conservative minority government to go ahead if Labour refuse to allow the British people a say in how they elect their parliament. Needless to say, we also feel that the ‘red lines‘ spelt out by the Social Liberal Forum Executive this weekend still apply.

As with our statement over the weekend, which garnered the support of more than 30 parliamentary candidates, local party chairs and party members, please email us on admin@socialliberal.net to let us know if you agree with the sentiment of this statement, including what position, if any, you hold within the party. We really do value your input.

——-
From social liberal forum

I’ve been reading the headlines on both Left Foot Forward and Next Left over the weekend, thinking, “They’re not going to take the personal allowance proposal in isolation are they? Surely, this analysis must purport to show how, contrary to all the evidence I’ve seen, equalising capital gains, equalising tax relief on pensions, closing various other loopholes and introducing a mansions tax will actually have a minimal impact on the incomes of the wealthiest on society? That’s got to be some pretty bloody impressive research.”

How wrong I was because taking the personal allowance policy in isolation, it transpires, is exactly what Tim Horton and Howard Reed have done. They even preface their report by emphasising how much they approve of the Lib Dems’ tax raising proposals.

The fact that raising the tax threshold helps people on higher incomes more than people on low incomes is not, believe it or not, a startling revelation. We know. The party has never tried selling this policy in isolation; we’d be mad to attempt to because people would rightly ask where we propose trying to find £17bn. The two are meant to balance each other; that’s why we are calling for a tax shift and not either a rise or reduction in taxes overall.

In fact, just to be clear, with the banking levy, the Lib Dems are going into the election calling for an overall increase in taxes. The general line being put out at conference was that Nick Clegg ‘misspoke’ in his Spectator interview by ruling out Lib Dem support for any further tax rises in future to tackle the deficit, although sadly Clegg himself neither confirmed nor denied this when I pressed him on this in the Q&A.

But there are three other reasons why the policy is not only defensible but progressive:

1. An increase in the tax threshold will reduce inflationary pressure on wages at the bottom end of the scale and reduce the deadweight cost of employment. Anything that discourages the outsourcing of employment to other countries is a good thing, particularly at a time when the economy is so fragile, is crucial. The difference in income between someone working and not working at all is significant.

2. The fact that people on middle incomes do well out of this tax shift is an entirely good thing because we need middle-class buy in – again, especially during this fragile period. Campaigning for a massive shift in income between rich and poor which leaves those on median income out in the cold might be a nice example of hairshirt politics but it is unlikely to inspire the public.

Horton and Reed like to talk about deciles as keeping the argument abstract is helpful to them. Let’s try to move this a step or two into the real world though, shall we? According to the government’s latest equalities report (pdf), the weekly income at the 30th percentile (P30) is £292 while the income of the 70th percentile (P70) is £523, less than twice as much. There is actually a bigger gap between P70 and P90 than between P30 and P70. Individuals can shift between these abstract staging posts significantly during their working lives, and even within a few months. I’m a case in point, having gone from an income which put me in the top 70 percent to something approximating median income simply by shifting to a four day week to protect my job last summer.

So, am I concerned that our tax policies help people above average incomes? Not a bit of it, especially at a time when the average UK house price is, still, £160,000 (it wasn’t that long ago when a mortgage worth more than four times your income was considered the height of irresponsibility).

3. This policy represents a significant shift away from taxing income and onto taxing wealth. Shocked by the fact that there is a 4x income difference between P10 and P90? You should be, but you should be even more shocked that when it comes to wealth the difference is 100x. Any system which allows people at the bottom end of the scale a greater share of their own money whilst taxing the wealth at the top end of the scale will help to tackle that. It is, frankly, a greater priority.

None of this is to deny that the Lib Dems could go further. Personally, I would like to see a much bigger shift away from income taxes and onto wealth taxes. I’d be prepared to contemplate a flat tax and even the abolition of income tax altogether (although I have grave doubts about this being practical), which would almost certainly – in isolation – lead to a shift from low incomes to high. But crucially, I’d never want to see that happening without a corresponding increase in taxes on things like land. You could try to smear me as some kind of rabid, rightwing, Ayn Rand-inspired libertarian but frankly I don’t fancy your chances.

The Fabians’ own proposals in The Solidarity Society are very interesting and deserve a closer look. I have a lot of affection for the key commitment in the 1992 Lib Dem manifesto for a citizens’ income and would love the party to revisit it. But does anyone, least of all Sunder Katwala, Tim Horton or Howard Reed, believe that Gordon Brown is the man to implement a programme that even vaguely resembles universal welfarism?

In conclusion then, the Lib Dems’ proposed tax package would significantly reduce income inequality, go some way to addressing wealth inequality, would cut the deadweight cost of Labour and would benefit the middle classes as well during an extremely challenging economic period when solidarity between the poor and people on middle-incomes will be crucial.

A longer version of this post can be found here.

We might be able to let her off the title – Another invasion of liberty. And only the Tories are alert – as a bit of subbing hyperbole. I’ve written enough articles for newspapers over the years to know this happens. But she can’t blame the sub for the final paragraph:

Labour will not reverse this; only the Tories might. They promise to review CAF database, ditch ContactPoint for a small, targeted database, and invest in strengthening people’s relationships instead. It’s depressing that Labour supporters who believe in liberties, privacy and humanity should find themselves having to cheer the Tories on this issue.

I first became aware of ContactPoint due to Terri Dowty’s article in Liberator back in 2002.

I couldn’t actually tell you when the Lib Dem’s formally adopted policy to scrap ContactPoint but the line was pretty clear in 2007.

Here’s Annette Brooke raising the core concern about ContactPoint while the Childrens Act was being debated.

It formed a central blank of our Freedom Bill earlier this year. Vince Cable even called for it to be scrapped in his Reform pamphlet published yesterday. The Conservatives came off the fence this June.

I think we can rely on Cameron to scrap this database since it is £200m he will badly need. In better economic circumstances, I wouldn’t be so sure.

Either way, at a time when Guardianistas are habitually bemoaning how come the media don’t give Cameron a harder time, it seems odd to hand them so much credit and deny the Lib Dems even an acknowledgement.

Very briefly, on Thursday, the Telegraph published a carefully worded article about cosmetics and dusters ‘appearing on’ receipts despite acknowledging that items on her receipts which had actually been claimed for tended to be marked by an asterisk. The cosmetics were not, they have no evidence to suggest that they might have been claimed for anyway, and Jo Swinson herself completely denies that she did.

Even worse is not merely the article, replete as it is with innuendo about Jo Swinson being “known in Westminster for the attention she pays to her appearance,” but the way it was presented in print. The online version pointedly does not include the headline “Tooth flosser, eyeliner and 29p dusters for the makeover queen” and fails to include the nine photos used of Jo, taken over an eight year period, used to imply that she was constantly changing her appearance.

To make matters worse, other media outlets have now started reporting the story – often stripping it of the carefully worded ambiguity used in the original Telegraph piece. This of course includes usual suspects such as the Daily Mail and the Daily Star but more concerningly also includes the BBC and, in an article they have seen fit not to publish online, the Guardian.

As Mark Thompson writes, this is classic ‘Flat Earth News’ stuff. I’m not making a party political point here (I’ll admit to getting particularly worked up about this because Jo is a friend), nor is it to deny there is a very real scandal about MPs’ expenses being abused. But if all politicians are tarred with the same brush, in this case one of the leading reformers who has consistently campaigned for transparency and reform of the expenses system, then nothing good will come out of it. And in this particular case what Jo Swinson is being attacked for ultimately amounts to nothing more than buying makeup; the misogynist overtones are frankly outrageous and it is gobsmacking that a publication such as the Guardian has put aside its critical faculties in a bid to join the mob.

I’m asking people to spend a few minutes today to write to the Telegraph, BBC and Guardian to demand they retract the story and issue an apology to Jo Swinson. I’ve even made it easy for you. A line in the sand needs to be drawn here. We can’t allow the media to throw dirt at anyone on the most dubious of subtexts in the name of cleaning up politics – otherwise the opposite will happen.

David Davies MP has modelled himself as a staunch opponent of political correctness, but the truth is that he – like most people obsessed with the horrors of PC – is all for it really. He just has different political priorities, as his recent outburst shows.

Sadly, I suspect that Davies is rather more representative of his party than David Davis MP, as the fairly lamentable Tory showing at the Convention on Modern Liberty a fortnight ago made plain. Any party which has a Shadow Home Secretary who can utter the phrase “fewer rights and more wrongs” without cracking up can be fairly described as being “confused” (if one were feeling so generous).

It must be uncomfortable for David Davis to be constantly confused with a reactionary such as Davies. Given Davis’ own reactionary tendencies (before he managed to reinvent himself as a civil libertarian and self-appointed torchbearer for the modestly named “Davis Agenda“), that’s saying something.

This raises a serious question about how the Tories are treated by civil libertarians. One approach is to “hug them close” – i.e. applaud Conservative politicians whenever they make the right noises and emphasise how such behaviour is a clear sign of the party finally modernising and moving out of the Victorian era. The danger of that approach is that its own exponents end up being wary of criticising Tories when they say the wrong things and end up fooling themselves that a few speeches here and there will amounts to a shift in direction.

If the use of the carrot approach is limited though, the stick approach is not without its problems either. Specifically, treating the Tories as The Enemy is unlikely to achieve anything much in the short term. At best, it will embolden the civil libertarians within Labour (they do still exist, even if they can be deplorably craven at times) and help to ensure Labour makes the right noises when it returns to the opposition benches.

Ultimately, stroking politicians in Westminster will only have a limited effect. If you want a lasting reversal of Labour’s authoritarian agenda, you have to change minds across the country.

My thanks to Our Kingdom, Lib Dem Voice, Yorksher Gob and Wardman Wire for keeping it going over the past few weeks.

Would you like to host a future edition? If so, then drop me a line on modernliberty@quaequamblog.net and I’ll slot you in.

This week we have revelations that our government may be complicit in torture, ongoing attempts to undermine Freedom of Information, tasering children and nosy civil servants. But it isn’t all bad news, as the media coverage of the Convention has been reaching fever pitch.

If you are attending, make sure you head over to the bloggers’ summit at lunchtime, co-hosted by Liberal Conspiracy and Comment is Free. And whether you are attending or not, make sure you register on the new Convention social network.

Coverage of the Convention itself

Mainstream Media

Andrew Gilligan gives it a plug in The Standard: “In the Second World War, millions risked their lives for liberty; hundreds of thousands gave their lives. Now, when the risk is by comparison so much smaller, the death toll so comparatively tiny, we are shamed and surprised by our rulers’ surrender to repression.”

Bagehot in The Economist describes the Convention as “A mob of Britain’s finest eccentrics” and speculates whether the civil liberties agenda can get mainstream support during an economic downturn, but concludes “Liberty could turn out to be one of the few things that prosper in the slump.”

On a similar theme, Mary Riddell writes in the Telegraph: “No law of economics decrees that oppressive countries get richer faster. Yet already recession ushers in an age of presumed guilt. With war declared on bankers, terror suspects and children, we may soon see the green belt concreted over for Titan prisons, leaving only a rump of angry citizens to breathe the tainted air of British freedom.”

The Observer has produced a list of what it calls “The New Freedom Fighters.” Er, I’m not convinced this list comprises of much more than Robert McCrum’s regular dinner party set (worthy though they may be), a point which Anthony Barnett himself acknowledges on OurKingdom. Any nominees for the real new freedom fighters?

Writing to promote the Scottish Convention on Modern Liberty, Dr Geraint Bevan comes up with this rather useful metaphor in the Daily Mail has got in on the act (and it is a sign of the value of the Convention that it has even managed to get the Daily Mail expressing concern about civil liberties): “Town Hall Stasi routinely deploy anti-terrorist powers to snoop on dog foulers and families suspected of cheating school catchment area rules.”

Blogs, etc.

Spyblog has produced a fantastic list of “Practical things to do and bring to the Convention on Modern Liberty”

The Libertarian Party South East would like to remind you about their Alternative Convention on Modern Liberty.

Flesh is Grass welcomes the Convention, with some qualifiers: “Yes, as proclaimed on the front page, our fundamental freedoms are under attack from counter-terrorism. But terrorism itself is also an attack. When rights and freedoms butt against each other, how are decisions best made? I can’t see much about that in the programme.”

Paul Sims from New Humanist explains why they signed up to the Convention: “While at first you might think that New Humanist doesn’t have the same direct stake in these issues as groups like, say, Liberty or No2ID, the events of the past few weeks have shown how the right to free speech can be threatened by the actions of the British government. The implementation twice in one week of new rules designed to exclude foreigners expected to engage in “unacceptable behaviour”, firstly to ban the anti-Islam Dutch MP Geert Wilders from visiting the House of Lords, and then to ban the Westboro Baptist Church from picketing a play in Basingstoke, seems to have set a disturbing precedent.”

Simon Barrow from Ekklesia gives us his take: “Will faith groups turn in upon themselves, resort to aggressive popularism and shy away from sharing free public space with others? Or can they develop global understandings of citizenship and shared responsibility, rooted in the reflectiveness of their own specific traditions, which open doors and expose abuses of power?”

Dan Lockton on Design with Intent speaks for a lot of us: “I’m a normal person, trying my best to advance the progress of humanity, yet I feel that the government has contempt for me as a member of the public in general, on an everyday basis. Everywhere we go, we are watched, monitored, surveilled, threatened, considered guilty. We shouldn’t have to live like this.”

1000 words a day brings it all back to Margaret Thatcher’s dictum “there is no such thing as society“: “Having accepted (gratefully) Thatcher’s dictum, no organisation such as a corporation (or, somewhat bizarrely, government) need have any responsibility either for its own members (or employees) or for anyone outside itself. This is because a corporation is composed of individuals, and so is not a Society; and a corporation cannot itself be a part of a Society which does not exist.”

Identity Cards

One story which received surprisingly little comment outside of the computer press is the revelation that “staff at 30 local authorities have been responsible for ‘serious security breaches’ in the government database that will form the core of the national ID cards programme.” (ComputerWeekly). Ditto, revelations that the government is continuing to appeal a decision by the Information Tribunal (more of which in a moment) to release internal reports into the feasibility of the government’s ID cards programme on the grounds that doing so “would have jeopardised support from government agencies“. Hat tip to Helen Duffett’s twitter feed for both items of information.

Himmelgarten Cafe meanwhile comments on revelations that that researchers have found a way to bypass facial recognition systems on several laptop, its implications for ID cards and Meg Hillier, the government’s latest database state cheerleader.

War? What is it good for?

The answer to this perennial question has been blocked from release by Jack Straw this week, who has intervened to block the release of minutes pertaining to the decision to invade Iraq. Chicken Yoghurt comments: “Straw says he’s vetoing the release of 2003 cabinet minutes where the legality of the war was ‘discussed’ because they would do serious damage to cabinet government. What we know however, thanks to the Butler Inquiry is that, at the time, cabinet government was in the toilet.” David Hencke calls it a “disgrace.”

Meanwhile, Lib Dem Voice have been taking the Tories to task for looking both ways in the debate and David Davis’s muted response despite highlighting the dangers of such a blanket veto in the legislation when it was going through Parliament in 2000.

Finally, those perennial defenders of elective dictatorship Spiked have leapt to Jack Straw’s defence: “Democracy does not mean revealing every off-the-cuff comment made in committee meetings or rush-written ‘memo of concern’ sent between ministers; democracy is something more profound than that.” Er, no, it doesn’t Brendan, but that is why the government has a right to appeal and argue their case until the cows come home (which it has declined to use in favour of a blanket ban).

The UK complicit in torture and rendition?

This is also the week the government’s constant denials that they had in any way been involved in illegal rendition (and thus torture) finally ran into the ditch. Mr Eugenides contrasts John Hutton’s apology with Jack Straw’s categorical denial and accusation about conspiracy theories back in 2005. Not a sheep agrees.

Meanwhile, Binyam Mohammed has been released from Guantanamo Bay. The Guardian have issued his statement on return as a comment piece. David Milliband says that the government takes allegations of condoning or cooperating with torture seriously (presumably this involves calling the accusers “conspiracy theorists” a la Jack Straw). And Duncan Campbell draws an explicit link between Binyam Mohammed and Gary McKinnon.

Finally, former Labour Leadership contender Bryan Gould has “disowned this government.” Tom Harris MP’s reaction is an illustrative example of the degree of denial within the Labour backbenches and can best be summed up as “not listening, not listening, not listening… loser! Quitter! You can’t have an opinion if you live in New Zealand, anyway.”

Young People – a serious threat to our civil liberties

The police’s taste for tasering people has come under some scrutiny. Meanwhile, those stalwart defenders of our traditional liberties, the Conservatives, have come up with a tremendous new plan to deal with youth crime: home internment for up to a month on the swish of a pen by a magistrate. As Chicken Yoghurt asks: “So where’s David Davis, that doughty defender of civil liberties, when you need him? Didn’t he once accuse the government of ‘casually disregarding our civil liberties in the face of problems to which it has no adequate solutions’?”

Lib Dem Freedom Bill

Not surprisingly, this has been welcomed with varying degrees of ecstacy from Lib Dem bloggers such as Rob Parsons, Jonathan Calder and Alix Mortimer while the Tory Thunder Dragon snorts that “after a few headlines they’ll revert back to their authoritarian ways” (a comment which even taking into Huhne’s comments about Geert Wilders last week must rank as one of the most self-delusional of 2009 thus far).

SpyBlog has responded with some criticisms and a pinch of cynicism. The Libertarian Party has dismissed it as being “mere tinkering.”

More comment from teekblog and the Church of Atheism. Steven Farrington takes Huhne to task for misrepresenting George Orwell’s 1984 (he makes a fair point we could all do with remembering).

Next week…

The Carnival lives on! Jonathan Calder takes over next week over on Liberal England.

Let’s start with the Countryside Alliance. The CA is about a lot more than fox hunting, and in recent years, played a pivotal role in ensuring the success of the Sustainable Communities Act. The infamous John Jackson, the former chair, is a man I have got to know quite well. Far from being a tweed-jacketed toff, Jackson is a progressive, a solicitor and perhaps one of the best constitutional experts I know. Just read his columns on OurKingdom or his masterful chapter about the rule of law in Unlocking Democracy: 20 Years of Charter 88.

But since we’re on the subject of fox hunting, it has to be said that you can find no better example of Labour’s skewed sense of priorities.

Reeling from letting Tony Blair have his war in the Middle East, the Labour back benchers demanded a token so they could prove they were still somehow progressive. And what did they choose? To reverse the sinister dissolution on our civil liberties? To step up the fight against child poverty? Relax the restrictions on abortion? No, it chose to pass a poorly drafted law designed to prevent the poor cute wiffle foxes from being killed by the nasty-wasty toffs.

All this angst about a few rightwingers sitting on panels is absurd. It reminds me of the left’s reaction over David Davis’ decision to force a by-election over 42 days. Instead of viewing this as an opportunity to highlight the issue, most of the left instead chose to collectively shuffle its feet and find excuses. Davis isn’t a pure enough civil libertarian, they whinged. He isn’t, but in the grand scheme of things so what?

One of the anti-Conventioners objects on the grounds that the Tories are ‘The Enemy’. And Labour isn’t at the moment? What is it that Jacqui Smith has been doing recently that qualifies her as a fellow traveler? The generous redistribution of her housing allowance? Free advertising, at public expense, for Geert Wilders’ Fitna? Did politics really end with the miner’s strike?

It isn’t the Tories’ strong record of civil liberties which earns a number of their MPs a seat in the Convention, but precisely their lack of it. As Henry Porter has pointed out, it seems that only a Tory old guard actually care about these issues. David Cameron’s mealy-mouthed support for Davis when won his by-election was one of the most entertaining things in 2008.

The Tory Establishment are itching to take over and continue the “transformational government” agenda when Labour leaves in 2010. Anyone who professes to care about civil liberties should be determined to prevent them from doing so as much as possible.

Making civil liberties a mainstream issue and co-opting the Tories to the cause is a zero risk strategy. You won’t get the death penalty or even the abolition of the Human Rights Act by bigging up Davis; you will only make it harder for him to push these forwards. I suspect he realises this but unlike the Labour backbenchers I was talking about earlier, has a strong sense of priorities.

Conservatives (and Liberals) are often accused of being individualistic, yet I can’t help but feel that at the heart of all this moaning is vanity and the idea that an individual’s personal misgivings will always trump the wider issue. Is listening to the odd panelist you might not agree with so intolerable? I have no time for this exaggerated sense of self-regard; the stakes are far too high at the moment. The liberal-left should have little truck with it too.

Disclosure: James Graham is the Campaigns and Communications Manager of Unlock Democracy and a member of the Convention on Modern Liberty steering group. He writes in a personal capacity.

We believe the Liberal Democrats must continue “to be the party that guarantees strong public services and tackles inequality in a way that the Tories would never contemplate.”

Richard Grayson, our chair, argues that, “Social Liberalism is the mainstream of the party and has been for decades. But we need to ensure that social liberals within the party continue to innovate on policy as the challenges we face change and develop. I think that the Social Liberal Forum will be an effective and open place for the mainstream of the party to develop new ideas to contribute to the formal party policy processes.”

Steve Webb is chairing our Advisory Board, joined by fellow MPs Tim Farron, Lynne Featherstone, Sandra Gidley, Evan Harris, Paul Holmes, David Howarth, Matthew Taylor and Jenny Willott. Others on the Advisory Board include Claire Rayner.

The SLF will hold a launch event at the party’s Harrogate conference in March, on a ‘A Liberal Democrat Vision for Social Justice’. This will examine how the party can best present an energizing vision of a more equal society.

An executive team of Richard Grayson (Chair), Matthew Sowemimo (Director) and my (Treasurer) will also be organising discussion events throughout the year, and holding debates through the www.socialliberal.net website.

Winning the Right to Know

Is freedom of information a civil liberties issue? We could debate that for hours, but as (my, ahem, boss) Peter Facey says in Yes, Democracy Works (Comment is Free):

…a significant swath of the establishment fears and distrusts the public, treating us as compliant subjects rather than citizens. We are regarded as a problem to be controlled and managed and our fundamental rights and freedoms are paid lip service but considered ultimately to be an inconvenience. The impulse which has lead us to a national identity database, identity cards, the DNA database, photographers being detained for taking pictures in the street, parents being spied on to check if they live in the appropriate school catchment area, the drive to marginalise trial by duty and hold inquests in secret and suspending/habeas corpus, is the same impulse that assumes the public is neither entitled nor interested in knowing how MPs spend their expenses.

The plan to exempt MPs’ expenses from the Freedom on Information Act caused an uproar. The Campaign for Freedom of Information, Unlock Democracy and mySociety moved swiftly.

The move was opposed by Girl with a One Track Mind, Virtual Lancaster, Scunner Nation, Iain Dale, Open…, SpyBlog, davblog, ecomonkey, COPE, The Northern Light, Jason Kitcat, Rhetorically Speaking, Little Man in a Toque, Mush Kush, Duncan’s Blog and literally thousands of others.

And we won! At least for the time being. The Wardman Wire features a roundup to pay credit to the MPs who publically came out against the move – is your MP on the list?

On that inauguration

Meanwhile, over in the States, there is the small matter of Obama’s presidency. His first acts? Removing Bush’s restrictions on the US’s Freedom of Information Act (yes, they have one too) and shutting down Guantanamo Bay.

Mark Littlewood outlines the difficulties in closing Guantanamo and what happens next. Regardless of the practicalities however, Ken Gude argues that the symbolism of closing the detention centre will save American lives.

Tom Griffin notes Obama’s taste for quoting Thomas Paine and hopes that some of the English revolutionary’s zeal will come back to this side of the Atlantic as well.

Take Action

Protect Data Protection: NO2ID are launching a new campaign against the data sharing clauses in the Coroners and Justice Bill. As Program Your Mind says:

…the state has the power to watch you if it has sufficient belief that to do so would prevent a crime that would threaten the security of the UK, or the welfare of children, but no more than this. The new Coroners and Justice bill contains clauses that will blow this out of the water, completely destroy such boundaries to our civil liberties and allow the government to effectively become the managers of our personal data.

(Other Hat Tips: UK Liberty, Henry Porter)

(Of course, while these provisions are of course bad news, let’s not forget that the Coroners and Justice Bill is also seeking to allow for certain inquests to be held in secret on the vague grounds of “national security” – a less techie friendly issue perhaps, but still important nonetheless.)

Scrap 696: Sunny Hundal writes at Liberty Central about the nonsense that is the Metropolitan Police’s new Form 696 and its impact on the live music scene.

The Guardian’s Liberty Central, as well as providing a portal for civil liberty-related articles on Comment is Free, includes Liberty Clinic (an advice service in association with Liberty), a database of civil liberty related legislation and a noticeboard of upcoming events.

Food for Thought

• Costigan Quist ruminates on fear and how it corrodes liberty.
• Dominic Grieve’s Chief of Staff Dominic Raab writes on ConservativeHome that the Human Rights Act undermines our liberties and should be replaced by a “Bill of Rights, based on the core rights in the European Convention.” Last thing I saw, that’s what the Human Rights Act was, but then I’ve never understood the Tory line on human rights.
• The Campaigns Manager of Republic Graham Smith urges people to “look at the bigger picture” and recognise that our civil liberties can only be guaranteed if the UK becomes a republic.
• On a related note, Dr Evan Harris MP is introducing a new private members’ bill to end discrimination against Catholics and women in the royal succession. Republic thinks it is “pitiful” while the Catholic Herald’s editor Damian Thompson would like to tell Harris where he can stick his bill, not because he disagrees with it, but because Harris is pro-choice (hat tip: New Humanist).
• Unity wants people to stop banging on about the Database State and start worrying about the “Database Economy“.
• Over at Liberty Central, Ryan Thoresen takes British academia to task over its draconian attitude to porn.
• Duwayne Brooks argues that Trevor Phillips’ declaration that institutional racism is dead in the police force is a serious exaggeration.
• Over in Canada, InformedVote urges “Save the Economy: Legalize Marijuana.”

Outraged that your masterpiece isn’t listed here? DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT! If you would like your articles mentioned on the Carnival on Modern Liberty, submit them via this page.

The next edition of the Carnival on Modern Liberty will be next Friday on Our Kingdom.

Special thanks to the following for helping to promote the Carnival: The Daily Maybe, Stephen Glenn’s Linlithgow Journal, OurKingdom, LabourHome, Lib Dem Voice, Quaequam Blog! (yay me!), Yorksher Gob and Liberal England

It is crucial that the Convention leads to positive action by as many people as possible (I made some suggestions a couple of weeks ago – I’m sure you can think of others).

Our mission must be nothing less than a paradigm shift in how the general public perceives civil liberties.

That is an achieveable objective and has happened in politics over the years on numerous occasions, but the level of consciousness raising we need can’t be done by a single journalist or even pressure group.

What’s more, the need for action has never been more crucial. I write this having given up a substantial portion of my weekend doing stuff to block the Government’s plans to exempt MPs’ expenses from the Freedom of Information Act.

If liberty is to have any meaning, we have to be able to keep an eye on those we elect to serve. Otherwise we are no different from the animals at the end of Animal Farm, enviously peering into the House and unable to tell the difference between pig and human. Harriet Harman, champion of equality, has just added the rider “but some are more equal than others.”

We need to take urgent action on issues such as this, but it also highlights why it is high time we started being proactive.

It is with this in mind that Liberal Conspiracy – in association with Our Kingdom and Unlock Democracy – are launching the Carnival on Modern Liberty.

As an online companion to the Convention, it is intended to help promote debate on civil liberties on the blogosphere over the next few weeks. Fundamentally however, it is also intended to spur both bloggers and their readers into action.

I will be producing the first edition this Friday on Liberal Conspiracy. Over the next couple of weeks it will move to OurKingdom and Unlock Democracy and then we’ll be looking for volunteers to host future editions – what about you? (email offers to modernliberty *at* quaequamblog *dot* net).

If you have an article you would like to be included in the first edition you can submit it either by following this link or emailing modernliberty *at* quaequamblog *dot* net. The deadline is 4pm on Thursday 22 January (if you miss this it is no problem as it will simply carry over to the next week’s edition). We are particularly looking for articles on the following sub-topics:

* ACTION: our favourite category! ideas and initiatives for raising awareness of civil liberty-related issues.
* EVENTS: civil-liberty related events that you are either organising or would like to promote (you don’t need to wait until 28 February before holding a meetup, tweetup or even just a social to the pub or cinema – if it’s civil liberty related, publicise it here).
* JEERS: reports of the latest assaults on liberties.
* CHEERS: good news (we do get it occasionally!) and praise for the champions of liberty.
* WHAT LIBERTY MEANS TO ME: think pieces about what liberty in a modern context actually means (once you’ve been all philosophical, do an action post to balance things out ).

Finally, if I have one goal for the next six weeks, it is to get this debate out in the wider blogosphere instead of the usual political bloggers arguing amongst themselves. The UK blogosphere is gratifyingly diverse, yet too often the politicos seem to exist in a bubble.

So your first mission, if you choose to accept it, is to think of five bloggers who are not the “usual suspects” who you would like to encourage to take part in the Carnival – and then encourage them!

My five will be:
* Girl With A One Track Mind
* London Underground
* Neil Gaiman
* Bad Science
* New Humanist

To help get the Carnival off the ground, please blog these five (so they get pinged!) and submit your post to the Carnival – thanks!

… there is “a rights culture” which is “out of control”, not just in Ulster, but throughout the UK. It did not help that “the undeserving in society” can often use rights legislation for personal gain, he added.

The Conservatives, he suggested, intend to create a UK Bill of Rights which would have in-built safeguards to prevent those “whose own behaviour is lacking” from abusing the powers.

I’m used to people from across the political spectrum differentiating between the “deserving” and “undeserving” poor when it comes to welfare but not when it comes to fundamental rights. This rhetoric even goes beyond the talk about Wrights and duties.”

In fairness to Labour, even the Jack Straws of this world have fallen short of using language as stark as this. Michael Wills was arguing last month that by “responsibilities” all they are talking about is the vague rhetoric about responsibilities that you can find in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and I have heard Straw on more than one occasion insist that by “duties” he means nothing more than the riders which can be found in the European Convention. Of course, that doesn’t stop them from using loaded rhetoric whenever they want to court favour with the Daily Mail.

I suspect that tailoring your rhetoric to suit your (in this case the dinosaurs in the DUP and UUP) audience is something that Grieve himself is guilty of here but even at their best, the Tories don’t offer the same reassurances that Labour do.

It is rank cowardice on their part not to call for its outright rejection, rooted in a knowledge that it would make us the pariahs of Europe (we would have to leave the Council of Europe and subsequently the EU). More to the point, he is talking tosh: when challenged, the anti-HRA brigade consistently fail to come up with concrete examples of how eeeeevil people are using it for “personal gain.”

I don’t actually think the Tories mean all this nonsense. I do fear however that if they regain control the constant undermining of the HRA that Labour are guilty of will be turned up several notches.

And let’s not forget that Grieve is a supposed “wet” – just imagine how much further his own backbenchers will want to push him? And before you carp “never mind this human rights nonsense, at least the Tories will be better on civil liberties”. Nu-uh