London, Saturday, 13th April 2002
For Immediate Use
Contact Details: Dr Chris R. Tame, 07957 644519, chris@libertarian.co.uk
For other contact and link details, see the foot of this
message
"GOVT'S DATA SHARING PLAN IS A DAGGER TO THE HEART
OF LIBERTY", SAYS
FREE MARKET AND CIVIL LIBERTIES THINK TANK
The Labour's government's plans to integrate the
personal data held on British citizens by various
government departments and agencies is a dagger to the
heart of liberty, says the Libertarian Alliance, the
radical free market and civil liberties think tank and
pressure group.
Libertarian Alliance Director, Dr Chris R. Tame,
says:
"In the light of the ever-more blatant attack on civil
liberties in this country - including the proliferation of
camera surveillance systems, the increasing involvement of
intelligence agencies in political surveillance and dirty
tricks operations, the push for a national ID card and DNA
database, the gradual abolition of common law liberties by
the removal of jury trials, of the presumption of
innocence, of the right of silence and of double jeopardy,
and by the adoption of the EU's despotic corpus juris -
this proposal is even more ominous. The government's
claim that data would be processed only 'where
necessary' is laughable - especially when one sees that
their list of 'necessary' reasons covers every
conceivable excuse for nanny statism, paternalism,
censorship, socialism, prudery, puritanism and
prohibitionism.
It is ironic that when the state has demonstrated that it
is incapable of providing any 'public service'
adequately, when it cannot defend its citizens from
predators of every stripe, that is should be attempting to
turn us into supplicants and serfs. The common argument
that 'if you have nothing to hide you have nothing to
fear' is absurd. In an age when health fascists have
declared smoking to be a form of child abuse it is clear
that everyone can be subjected to the prejudices of
demented paternalists - whether of the fundamentalist
religious nutters, the peddlers of PC pieties, the
environmentalists, or the feminist anti-sex cranks. Your
life style, your tastes, your sexuality, your political and
social views, can be subjected to tomorrow's moral
panic, propaganda scare campaign and witch-hunt and
legislated as 'crimes' or as 'politically
incorrect'.
The citizens of Britain need to send a message to our
would-be masters that we are not numbers, that we will not
be pushed, filed, indexed, stamped, briefed, debriefed, or
numbered - that our lives are our own.
It is now clear that the 'social contract' has been
broken by the state. Resistance to the usurpations of the
state is both a right and a moral duty. It is the right,
the duty, of all to resist and disrupt the state's data
gathering and record-keeping ability, by whatever means are
necessary".
ENDS
Note to Editors
(1) Dr Chris R. Tame is the founder and Director of the
Libertarian Alliance. A prolific writer and lecturer on
many topics in sociology, economics, philosophy and the
history of ideas. He is also the author of "Freedom,
Responsibility and Justice: The Criminology of the New
Right" in the book "The Politics of Crime
Control" (Kevin Stenson & David Cowell, eds., Sage
Publications, London, 1991), which can also be found
reprinted at
http://www.libertarian.co.uk
(2) Dr Tame can be contacted for further comment at
07957 644519 or by email at chris@libertarian.co.uk
Extended Contact Details:
The Libertarian Alliance is Britain’s most radical
free market and civil liberties policy institute. It has
published over 700 articles, pamphlets and books in support
of freedom and against statism in all its forms. These are
freely available at
http://www.libertarian.co.uk
Our postal address is
The Libertarian Alliance
Suite 35
2 Lansdowne Row
Mayfair
London
W1J 6HL
Tel: 07956 472 199
Associated Organisations
The Libertarian International - http://www.libertarian.to -
is a sister organisation to the Libertarian Alliance. Its
mission is to coordinate various initiatives in the defence
of individual liberty throughout the world.
Sean Gabb's personal website - http://www.seangabb.co.uk -
contains about 800,000 words of writings on themes
interesting to libertarians and conservatives
Candidlist - http://www.candidlist.com -
owned and maintained by LA Executive member Sean Gabb, it
lists Conservative MPs and candidates according to their
views on European integration. It had a major effect before
the 2001 general election, and remains an important
resource.
Liberalia - http://www.liberalia.com -
maintained by by LA Executive member Christian Michel,
Liberalia publishes in-depth papers in French and English
on libertarianism, anarcho-capitalism and the free market.
It is a prime source of documentation on these issues for
students and scholars.
Libertarian Samizdata - http://www.samizdata.blogspot.com
- works in association with the Libertarian Alliance and
has an ever larger following. Check it out.