The Guardian has breaking news on police holding details on thousands of legal protesters. When I was the webmaster of Red Pepper for 2 years, I took it as read that I had gained a MI5 file, but this level of surveillance, and holding details for seven years, is far beyond what people thought was going on.
It is legal to attend political demonstrations. It is legal to attend political meetings. It is legal to attend climate camps, like Kingsnorth. It is legal to be a journalist and cover demonstrations (members of the press are believed to have been monitored during at least eight protests over the last year). The police should not be treating legal activity as though we are criminals.
Corinna Ferguson, Liberty's legal officer, told the Guardian: "A searchable database containing photographs of people who are not even suspected of criminal activity may well violate privacy rights under article 8 of the Human Rights Act. It is particularly worrying if peaceful protesters are being singled out for surveillance."
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The police are not the enemy. It is not legal to smash coffee shop windows or to cut airport perimeter fences or clobber police officers. If MI5 surveillance prevents hooligans from turning peaceful protests into violent conflicts then I’m all for it!
I think you should read the article again, Roger. The surveillance is of thousands of people who aren't smashing windows and who aren't "clobbering" police officers. The police shouldn't be allowed to do whatever they want to, i.e. conduct surveillance for years on democratic and peaceful direct action protesters. The police are under civilian control. As such, they need to be instructed by someone (Jacqui Smith) to stop this at once.
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