Big Brother

I have quoted below the first two paragraphs of an item from today's Daily Telegraph, linked here, as it reads exactly like the kind of posting that has appeared on this blog and Ironies over the past few years.

History will record that the most baleful legacy of New Labour is not its alarming incompetence or its mendacity in the conduct of public affairs – shameful though they are – but the way in which it has destroyed our privacy. We are the most spied-upon society in Europe, with more CCTV cameras than the rest of the EU combined. In the international rankings calculated by the human rights organisation Privacy International we are near the bottom of the table, marginally above Russia and China but below the Philippines and Thailand.

How did this country, for centuries a bastion of freedom, slither into this morass? Some answers are found in yesterday's chilling analysis of the "Surveillance Society" published by Richard Thomas, the Information Commissioner. Mr Thomas is to be commended for ringing the alarm bells. While conceding that much official snooping is well-intentioned and can bring benefits, he warns that "unseen, uncontrolled or excessive surveillance can foster a climate of suspicion and undermine trust".

Finally there is some publicity given to the destruction of our society, but why has it taken so long and for how much longer will such coverage be allowed?