Bollox Britain

MPs are prevented from surfing the internet for pornographic and other inappropriate material in their Commons offices, it has emerged.

A filter on the Commons IT system blocks access to websites that contain supposedly offensive or illegal content or are sources of malicious software.

The policy emerged after an MP was unable to access colleague Lembit Opik's column on the Daily Sport site.

Opik said he did not believe the site should be blocked: Because of the things they are trying to censor they may have made an assumption about this particular website . But he said he did not believe the site was inappropriate and that although he backed the filters, which prevented MPs from being bombarded with utter rubbish , he did think they were too restrictive and sometimes prevented MPs from accessing sites they needed for their work.

A mother was stopped while buying a 12 certificate DVD at a  Morrisons supermarket because she was with her young children.

Karen Richards said she was amazed and outraged after the incident at her local Morrisons.

She was shopping with her eight-year-old son, Sean, and nine-month-old baby when she was stopped at the checkout trying to buy the film Ladies in Lavender , a drama starring Dame Judi Dench.

The assistant said she could not buy it because she was with her young children.

Miss Richards said: Is Morrisons suggesting I should leave them both outside while I shop in case I want to buy something of a slightly adult nature? Does Morrisons not realise how totally ridiculous this is?

She added: The ironic thing is the staff member was quite happy to sell me a bottle of wine at the same time. It is further proof, if it is needed, that this 'PC' world of ours has gone barking mad. But with regards to films, I'll decide what my son does or does not watch, not Morrisons.

She said after talking to the supermarket's supervisor she was eventually allowed to buy to film.

A Morrisons spokesman said customers suspected of buying an age-restricted product for a minor should be refused sale: The DVD product in this case had an age restriction applied to it and the store followed procedure.

Alex Salmond was dealt another major setback last night after it emerged his plans to crack down on cheap alcohol have been blocked by Opposition parties.

The First Minister's controversial proposals to introduce minimum prices for alcohol and ban drinks promotions are likely to be delayed until next year. He had planned to use only amendments to existing laws to bring his plan into force, but Labour, the Tories and the Liberal Democrats have insisted on brand new legislation. They argued that only by being included in a Bill will the measures get the proper scrutiny they deserve.

Speaking after the meeting, Mike Rumbles, Scottish Liberal Democrat chief whip, said: I made it absolutely clear that the Government's alcohol strategy faced certain defeat unless they brought these proposals forward properly. They need to let MSPs scrutinise fully and vote on controversial measures like minimum pricing, which could have a devastating impact on the whisky industry. It is absolutely clear that if they continue trying to sneak through these measures then the entire package would be dead in the water.

David McLetchie, Scottish Tory chief whip, said: These are highly controversial proposals and they should not be dealt with in a piecemeal fashion or bulldozed through the parliament in this way. There needs to be a proper inquiry into the plans before parliament decides on the specific proposals.

Michael McMahon, his Labour counterpart, said: We will not be opposing them because we disagree but because of the way they are bringing it forward. If they are confident in their arguments they will not be afraid to put them to the full Parliament for debate.

Under the SNP's scheme, alcohol cannot be sold below a minimum price per unit. This has yet to be set, although Scottish ministers suggested a level of about 40p.

This would mean a bottle of wine with 13% alcohol by volume could not be sold for less than £3.90 and a bottle of 40% whisky would cost at least £11.20. Promotions, such as three-for-two offers, are to be banned.

Other parts of Salmond's alcohol blueprint are included in the new Criminal Justice and Licensing Bill and he could add the minimum pricing and promotions ban to this legislation. However, this would see their introduction delayed until next year.

Update: Standalone Legislation

27th March 2009. See article from timesonline.co.uk

The SNP government announced yesterday that they would bow to pressure from Labour, Liberal Democrat and Conservative party managers and allow full parliamentary scrutiny of the measures, which include setting a minimum price per unit for all alcoholic drinks.

Instead of bringing in the changes by amending existing regulations, entailing a much shorter scrutiny process in Parliament, the minority government has now agreed that they should be contained in a standalone health bill that will see full parliamentary scrutiny.

The legislation will also include other controversial initiatives such as allowing local licensing boards to raise to 21 the age limit for buying alcohol in off-sales, a crackdown on cut-price drink promotions and making alcohol retailers pay a “social responsibility fee” to help deal with the social consequences of alcohol abuse.

Britain has become a bureacratic and authoritarian state watched over by a quarter of the world's CCTV cameras, a study of Labour's decade in power claims.

The Rotten State of Britain claims to be the first deeply researched factual account of Tony Blair's and Gordon Brown's time in office.

The author Eamonn Butler, a director of the leading think tank the Adam Smith Institute, claimed that his book had been turned down by two publishers because of the unconventional nature of the content.

Among the claims in the book are that Britain has a quarter of the world's CCTV cameras, the largest of any country and that taxes have risen by 51% since 1997.

Each year the Government has passed 3,500 regulations, along with 100,000 pages of rules and explanation.

Butler also claims national debt is running at £4.6billion, or £175,000 per household, not £729billion (£29,000 per household) as the Government claims.

Dr Butler said he wrote the book because he got so angry about the way that they have no concept of the rule of law.

One in nine hospital patients picks up an infection during their stay on a ward, while the total cost of outstanding claims against the NHS is £9.2billion, Dr Butler claimed.

He said that 30,000 of the 200,000 people who die of cancer and strokes each year would survive if they lived anywhere else in northern Europe.

Dr Butler also claimed in the book that the number of people receiving state benefits has risen from 17million people in 1997 to 21million people by 2007. He found that nearly six million families receive £16billion-worth of child credit. Dr Butler said: It's ridiculously high number of beneficiaries for something aimed to help the poorest.

You are being arrested for possession of dangerous balloons

Kent Police have been accused of crossing a line after it was revealed officers seized balloons and books at a power station protest camp.

MP David Howarth said police confiscated items to intimidate protesters at the Climate Camp in Kingsnorth near Hoo in August 2008.

A Freedom of Information Act request showed items taken included blankets, a walking stick, a clown outfit and soap.

A spokesman for the force said many of the items have now been returned.

Howarth, Liberal Democrat MP for Cambridge, said: If people carry knives it is right to seize a knife, I'm not claiming that everything that was seized was wrongly seized. A mountain bike, cycle helmets, bin bags and party poppers were also taken from protesters entering the camp site.

I think [the police] did cross an important line. You have to have a really creative imagination to think these items might be involved in committing a crime. It seems to me that I think that there is a very clear line between trying to do their job... and trying to disrupt the process itself. That takes [the police] into a political area where they just shouldn't go.

In December, police minister Vernon Coaker apologised for telling Parliament that 70 officers were injured dealing with protests at Kingsnorth power station. There were only 12 reportable injuries, according to a Freedom of Information (FoI) request by Howarth, four of which involved direct contact with another person.

Copper: What time is it please? Protester: It's ten past three. Copper: You're arrested for providing information useful to terrorists.

Hundreds of photographers protested outside Scotland Yard in London as a new law which they claim restricts their freedom came into force.

Under section 76 of the Counter-Terrorism Act 2008, illiciting, publishing or communicating information on members of the armed forces, intelligence services and police officers which is likely to be useful to a person committing or preparing an act of terrorism will carry a maximum prison sentence of 10 years.

Photographers fear police will use the law to prevent lawful pictures of protests being taken.

To mark the law, at least 300 photographers gathered outside Scotland Yard to exercise their democratic right – and take pictures.

The police officers present were repeatedly photographed, but took the protest in good spirit.

Some photographers wore masks and fancy dress, while others wore stickers that said: I am a photographer – not a terrorist.

David Hoffman, a photographer with 32 years' experience, said he now carries shinpads in his bag, claiming he had been kicked by police officers at protests. He said: They have been beautiful today, but it's the individual officer who's on his own at a back-street anti-fur protest. He's less accountable.

When I started, photographers were seen as representatives of the press, an important part of a public event. But over the last 30 years that has deteriorated. They're using the law as an excuse to stop photographers when, politically, they don't want coverage. Animal rights protests, peace marches, of course the poll tax – police are simply saying: We don't want this in the paper.

Marc Vallee, protest co-organiser and a photographer well-known for covering protests, said: This has been amazing. Photographers are fed up with the way they have been treated for the last few years. They are trying to do their job in a professional way and the counter-terrorism laws are being used against them. I have had colleagues that have come out of the tube station to cover a protest, with press card, and officers have come across and said: I'm stopping you under section 44 [stop and search powers].

What is that doing for press freedom?

Lovers hoping to bid each other an intimate farewell will no longer be able to do so in certain areas of Warrington Bank Quay train station after no kissing signs appeared following concerns that embracing couples were supposedly causing congestion.

The signs were installed as part of a refurbishment of the station and have divided the car park and taxi ranks into kissing and no-kissing zones.

The idea of the no-kissing zones at Warrington station in Cheshire, was first mooted in 1998 by Colin Daniels, chief executive of the town's chamber of commerce. He came up with the idea after hearing that a station in Deerfield, Illinois, had used the signs to ease congestion.

Daniels said: It is a fairly congested station and ideally what we want is for people to come here, drop someone off and move on. But that wasn't always happening and people were lingering and causing delays.

With these 'no-kissing' signs we are pointing out that we don't want people doing that right outside the front of the station. If they want to linger and say a longer goodbye they can do that in the 'kissing zone' where there is a limited amount of parking.

Daniels said that the station would not be enforcing the zones too rigidly, adding: It is a bit of fun, but it will be interesting to see if people observe it. They may seem frivolous but there is a serious message underneath.

Organisations with interactive websites likely to be used mainly by children must ensure that staff moderating the sites are not barred from working with children from October.

It will be a criminal offence for an organisation to knowingly employ a barred person for a regulated role, such as moderating children's sites.

The Government is changing the way that it controls who has access to children and vulnerable adults and new laws take effect on 12th October. Those make the moderation of online services such as bulletin boards a regulated activity.

The Safeguarding Vulnerable Groups Act was introduced in 2006 and has been modified by a commencement order which expands it to include some online services as regulated activities, meaning that they cannot be performed by anyone on the list of banned people. The new law includes as a regulated activity "moderating a public interactive communication service which is likely to be used wholly or mainly by children".

The law will be phased in and from 12th October this year will only apply to people filling new jobs in regulated areas. It will extend to all 11 million roles connected with children and vulnerable adults over the following five years on a phased basis, but the Government has not yet published the phasing-in programme.

Police scrambled eight patrol cars filled with armed officers after a man in his 50s pointed a toy ray-gun at a baby and said Pow, Pow.

The man was arrested after he approached the baby and its mother with a silver ray-gun which lights up and makes a buzzing noise when the trigger is pulled.

Onlookers in Hove, East Sussex, were astonished when the police cars sped to the scene to apprehend the man.

Alison Edmonds  said that she saw the man - who is not believed to be related to the baby and mother - approach the pram holding the toy gun, before jokingly saying Pow, pow while pressing the trigger repeatedly.

The mother of the child then called police, who sent an armed response team to find and arrest the man, who was waiting for a bus less than a few hundred yards away.

Miss Edwards said: It was unbelievable. All he did was try to make the child laugh, but the mum decided to call the police and obviously told them a man with a gun had threatened her and her baby.

What happened next was truly astonishing. I've never seen anything like it. These eight cars screamed to a halt and surrounded the poor man at the bus stop. They were fully kitted out with machine guns, rifles and everything. The man didn't know what was happening. All he was trying to do was make the baby crack a smile.

Police seized the man's toy ray-gun and arrested him on suspicion of possessing an imitation firearm in a public place.

The Scottish Labour Party have set out measures aimed at hassling young adults in the name of curbing the supply of alcohol to under-18s which it claims are workable.

Richard Baker, the party's injustice spokesman, called for the Challenge 21 scheme to be made mandatory for all off-sales – as an alternative to daft Scottish Government plans to ban under-21s from buying drink.

The Labour proposals have the backing of retailers, trades unions and campaigners.

The Challenge 21 scheme sees retailers asking for identification if a customer doesn't look 21 – but they will be served if their identification shows they are over 18.

Baker said it would lead to a healthy culture where youngsters expect to be challenged when buying alcohol.

Labour's proposals would make it a legal requirement for alcohol retailers to ask for proof of age for all customers who appear under the age of 21.

Update: Kenny MacKillJoy publishes his proposals

4th March 2009. See article from guardian.co.uk

The Scottish Government have now published their proposals including giving chief constables the right to ask for bans on under-21s using off-licences.

Richard Baker, Labour's shadow Scottish justice secretary, said the crackpot idea of banning all under-21s from buying alcohol ignored Labour's own, more sensible, plans for mandatory age checks to weed out underage drinkers.

He added that the Scottish justice secretary, Kenny MacAskill, has had two years to deliver his alcohol and criminal justice strategy and despite delay after delay, and rethink after rethink, Scotland is left with an unworkable mess.

Beat: Life on the Street
ITV1, Series 1: 29 October - 3 December 2006, 18:00.
Series 2: 27 January - 2 March 2008, 18:00

Beat: Life on the Street is an observational documentary series about the work of Police Community Support Officers (“PCSOs”) in Oxford and Lancashire.

The series was fully funded by the Home Office.

Two complainants, who became aware of the Home Office’s involvement with the series following press reports, objected that the programmes were essentially government “propaganda” and the Home Office’s relationship with the series should have been made clear to viewers.

Ofcom considered:

• Rule 9.4 – a sponsor must not influence the content and/or scheduling of a programme in such a way as to impair the responsibility and editorial independence of the broadcaster.
• Rule 9.5 – there must be no promotional reference to the sponsor, its name, trademark, image, activities, services or products or to any of its other direct or indirect interests. There must be no promotional generic references. Nonpromotional references are permitted only where they are editorially justified and incidental.
• Rule 9.7 - The relationship between the sponsor and the sponsored programme must be transparent.

Channel Television (“Channel TV”), which complied the programmes on behalf of ITV
Network, confirmed that the Home Office fully funded the series. The sponsorship
was arranged through the Central Office of Information (“COI”). The programmes
were made by an independent production company, TwoFour Productions.

Ofcom Decision: Breach of Rules 9.5 and 9.7

A sponsored programme is a programme that has had some or all of its costs met by the sponsor with a view to promoting its own or another’s name, trademark, image, activities, services, products or any other direct or indirect interest.

There is no evidence to suggest that the sponsor influenced the content of the programme so as to undermine the independence of the broadcaster and, as such, we do not find the series in breach of Rule 9.4.

Ofcom judged that overall the series portrayed the PCSOs and the contribution they made to communities in a positive light. There were several elements in the programmes that contributed to this overall positive tone, including interviews with serving officers, who talked in detail about why they enjoyed their role.

Ofcom considered that the overriding tone of the programmes was supportive and likely to leave viewers with a favourable impression of the PCSO service. Taking into account the fact that the Home Office sponsored these series, and that the PCSO service is at least an indirect interest of the Home Office, Ofcom therefore considered that these references within the programmes were promotional, in breach of Rule 9.5.

Ofcom noted that the message displayed on screen during the credits immediately preceding the programme contained the text: Let’s Keep Crime Down, and the strapline Keep It Safe, Keep it Hidden - In Association with Beat: Life on the Street. We considered these credits, broadcast at the start and end of each programme would have notified viewers that the programmes were sponsored. However, the text did not tell viewers who the sponsor was.

Ofcom judged that the Home Office’s role and relationship with the series, as its sponsor, was not made sufficiently clear. While a small, inconspicuous Home Office logo was displayed in the top right hand corner of the screen for a very brief period at the end of the sponsor credits, Ofcom considered that the sponsorship arrangement was not made transparent since the size of its text and the brevity of the logo’s appearance on screen meant it was likely to have been missed by viewers.

In Ofcom’s view, the relationship between the sponsored programme and the Home Office’s role as its sponsor was therefore not made transparent to the audience, in breach of Rule 9.7.

The following petition to No 10 Downing Street has closed with 5792 signatures

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to clarify the laws surrounding photography in public places.

Statement from No 10 Downing Street:

There are no legal restrictions on photography in public places. However, the law applies to photographers as it does to anybody else in a public place. So there may be situations in which the taking of photographs may cause or lead to public order situations, inflame an already tense situation, or raise security considerations. Additionally, the police may require a person to move on in order to prevent a breach of the peace, to avoid a public order situation, or for the person’s own safety or welfare, or for the safety and welfare of others.

Each situation will be different and it would be an operational matter for the police officer concerned as to what action if any should be taken in respect of those taking photographs. Anybody with a concern about a specific incident should raise the matter with the Chief Constable of the relevant force.

Conservative MP Andrew Pelling has said he was stopped and searched by police on suspicion of being a terrorist after taking photographs of a cycle path.

The MP for Central Croydon was stopped by police under trumped up anti-terrorism laws on December 30.

Despite him showing his House of Commons pass to the officers, they insisted on searching him after they found him taking photos of a cycle path in his area.

He told police that he was taking photos to highlight a long-neglected bicycle and pedestrian route, which had been of concern to his constituents and that he was intending on taking the photos to Parliament to illustrate the dangers posed by the protracted maintenance works.

But the two officers insisted on searching him after they told him they thought he was taking photos of East Croydon train station. They searched his bag, but after finding nothing of interest they sent the MP on his way.

A police spokeswoman said: An officer stopped and searched a man's bag in Cherry Orchard Road on December 30, under section 44 of the Terrorism Act. The officer conducted a stop-and-search, taking into account the current terror threat, as he was taking pictures in the vicinity of a major transport hub.

A close pal of Jacqui Smith has been unmasked writing letters in support of her to newspapers — days after the Home Secretary’s husband was exposed for doing the same.

Patricia Lailey, using her maiden name Hill, told how the politician sympathised during a recent bereavement.

But Lailey didn’t mention she had been a Labour councillor for four years, and had worked with the MP on local issues.

She lives in Redditch, Worcester the seat Smith is fighting to keep at the next election. Lailey wrote in a national newspaper: I recently lost my mum and Jacqui wrote a personal letter to me. She cares about us in Redditch.

She insisted: I didn’t mention I used to be a councillor because I did not think it was relevant. I used my maiden name because that is how I was known in my job and when working as a councillor.

Smith’s husband Richard Timney was last month revealed as the author of letters backing her and her policies. But he didn’t mention they were married or that he was her ฃ40,000-a-year Commons adviser.

Reuben Powell is an unlikely terrorist. A white, middle-aged, middle-class artist, he has been photographing and drawing life around the capital's Elephant & Castle for 25 years.

With a studio near the 1960s shopping centre at the heart of this area in south London, he is a familiar figure and is regularly seen snapping and sketching the people and buildings around his home. But to the policemen who arrested him last week his photographing of the old HMSO print works close to the local police station posed an unacceptable security risk.

The car skidded to a halt like something out of Starsky & Hutch and this officer jumped out very dramatically and said 'what are you doing?' I told him I was photographing the building and he said he was going to search me under the Anti-Terrorism Act, he recalled.

For Powell, this brush with the law resulted in five hours in a cell after police seized the lock-blade knife he uses to sharpen his pencils. His release only came after the intervention of the local MP, Simon Hughes, but not before he was handcuffed and his genetic material stored permanently on the DNA database.

But Powell's experience is far from uncommon. Every week photographers wielding their cameras in public find themselves on the receiving end of warnings either by police, who stop them under the trumped up justification of Section 44 of the Terrorism Act 2000, or from over-eager officials who believe that photography in a public area is somehow against the law.

Groups from journalists to trainspotters have found themselves on the receiving end of this unwanted attention, with many photographers now fearing that their job or hobby could be under threat.

Yet, according to the Association of Chief Police Officers, the law is straightforward. Police officers may not prevent someone from taking a photograph in public unless they suspect criminal or terrorist intent. Their powers are strictly regulated by law and once an image has been recorded, the police have no power to delete or confiscate it without a court order. This applies equally to members of the media seeking to record images, who do not need a permit to photograph or film in public places, a spokeswoman said.

But still the harassment goes on. Philip Haigh, the business editor of Rail magazine, said the bullying of enthusiasts on railway platforms has become an unwelcome fact of life in Britain: It is a problem that doesn't ever seem to go away. We get complaints from railway photographers all the time that they are told to stop what they are doing, mainly by railway staff but also by the police. It usually results in an apologetic letter from a rail company .

UK Police are using draconian anti-terrorism powers against trainspotters, it has emerged.

Enthusiasts innocently taking photographs of carriages and noting serial numbers have ludicrously been accused of behaving like a reconnaissance unit for a terror cell.

The Prevention of Terrorism Act 2000 has been used to stop a staggering 62,584 people at railway stations. Another 87,000 were questioned under separate stop and search and stop and account legislation.

The figures were uncovered by Liberal Democrat transport spokesman Norman Baker, who warned that Britain was sliding towards a police state. While it is important to be vigilant about the threat of terrorism to the transport network, the sheer scale of the number of people stopped by police on railway property is ridiculous.

The anti-terror laws allow officers to stop people for taking photographs and I know this has led to innocent trainspotters being stopped. This is an abuse of anti-terrorism powers and a worrying sign that we are sliding towards a police state.