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1984 is in England

I was wondering when this one would happen and now it has. :down:

1984 is here you are a number and your details are up for grabs. :nope:

Quote:

Big Brother row as 400,000 civil servants win right to snoop

Last updated at 21:56pm on 13th September 2006

A vast database containing a file on every man, woman and child is being planned by the Government in a 'sinister' expansion of the 'Big Brother' state.
Personal information containing details of every aspect of an individual's life will be available to 400,000 Whitehall civil servants and council workers.
Lord Falconer has ordered privacy laws to be watered down to allow the plans to be forced through.
The plans would allow anyone working for a public body to monitor everything from an individual's driving licence record to whether they had paid their council tax on time.
Critics warned that allowing sensitive financial information to be viewed by all public bodies would leave it wide open to identity fraud. And pensioners who take stands against soaring council tax bills by refusing to pay could have their rights to pension credit withdrawn.
Data-sharing powers would also allow the electoral roll to be used to police the ID card database - allowing residents to be fined up to £2,500 for not registering their name or address.
Data protection laws - which are supposed to safeguard individuals' rights to information held about them - will be changed to force the moves through.
Ministers want the changes in place by April next year. The plans would see a massive sharing of all state databases including the electoral roll, benefits records and information collected by the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency - but taxpayer, medical and criminal records would be exempt.
MPs and civil liberties campaigners condemned the moves as a further erosion of individual's privacy by the Big Brother state. The plans were published yesterday in a blandly-worded 'vision statement' by Lord Falconer's Department for Constitutional Affairs.
The document says civil servants and council workers must 'fully understand that the Data Protection Act is not a barrier to appropriate information sharing'.
The Government insisted the database would help people moving house avoid contacting local authority, driving licence and the Inland Revenue separately because records would be updated automatically.
Information should be routinely shared 'to expand opportunities for the most disadvantaged, fight crime and provide better services' and in other instances 'where it is in the public interest'.
Constitutional Affairs Minister Baroness Ashton said the Government was 'committed to more information sharing between public sector organisations and service providers'.
But Ministers have already made inroads into individual freedoms, including the creation of a £200 million Children's Index which will create a file containing information on the health and education of every child in England and Wales.
A report last month warned that a database holding the personal details on ten million children will hand a 'dangerous weapon' to paedophiles.
The Valuation Office Agency is building a detailed property database of every home - including information on conservatories, scenic views and gardens - in preparation for the shake-up of council tax.
Microchips are being fitted in household dustbins by councils to pave the way for a new rubbish tax, imposed on householders who do not meet recycling targets.
And the DVLA was criticised this year after it emerged it had sold the driving licence details of more than 100,000 motorists to private firms. But Simon Davies of Privacy International said the plans were 'alarming', adding: 'Who will decide what is in the public interest?'
Gareth Crossman, policy director of Liberty, said: 'The Government seems set on moving from a situation where information is not shared unless there is a reason to do so, towards one where information will be shared unless there is a reason not to. 'This is an information free-for-all which is very worrying.' Shadow Constitutional Affairs Secretary Oliver Heald said: 'Step by step, the Government is logging details of every man, woman and child - and their home - in "Big Brother" computers. For all of Labour's talk of human rights, it's clear their state inspectors have little respect for people's privacy.
'There is a case for Government agencies to share data to tackle crime and prevent fraud. But I fear the wholesale weakening of Data Protection laws will merely be used as a sinister excuse for bureaucrats to snoop in people's homes and Gordon Brown to increase taxes by stealth.'
Phil Booth, of the NO2ID campaign, said: 'From now on, you can assume that anything you tell to an official or public servant will not only go on your record, but be passed on to anyone at all in "the public interest" - which has already been neatly redefined to mean 'official convenience'. 'How many thousands of officials will now have free rein to snoop on your personal, business and children's lives?'

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/liv...n_page_id=1770

A little worrying as an article, but this does come from the daily mail... not the most ballanced paper these days. My mum reads the daily mail and is typical of what I would describe as a dailymailreader :hmm: well intentioned, but prone to overreaction.
But having said that, such a centralised system of information is asking for abuse- given the general level of incompetence of most local governement (ie. council tax) I could see one slip of the mouse by a lazy data monkey turning my life totally upside down. Tbh, I'm more concerned about that kind of thing than shady governement agencys snooping through my 'private data' and plotting my incarceration for a overdue council tax payment.

any public servant, govermental representative or member of parliment/house of lord's should be taken out and flogged every time they have a "vision".. even the idea of a government being guided by "Vision statements" is straight out of 1984

information is power....what's the bet that the department which will emerge to deal with this massive centralisation of information will be called the "ministry for privacy"?
to match the "ministry for deciding who lives and who dies" which is of course called......:lol: N.I.C.E.

This could have been done so much smoother. Try visit Denmark. We've had such a system for beards now. The thing is, no civil servant can gain complete access to the whole picture, baring police investigators with the proper value. There is a strict law of registration that defines what you can register on each citizen, as well as how much you can share registered information between entities.

I except the dailymail glossed it up a bit but when you stop and think what opposition is there to this government from other political party's the answer is none. All the opposition comes from the press! at this rate they may as well form a new party as the others don't seem to do anything, as for this database I said ten years ago human life with be worth nothing and information will be worth everything. I have been proved right and I don't like it one bit we are going in the wrong direction, what will the next ten years have installed for us?

:D.....But in some areas we are still back in the 18th century. Try establishing whch 'societies' any professional acting,
or about to act for you, is a member of ! The Human Rights legislation is cited to defend what after all we are assured
could be no more sinister than the membership of a golf club !

Another loss of liberty is the over scrutiny of town centres by security cameras. Typicaly your innocent shopping spree
will be recorded on several cameras running into two figures from shops, street, shopping centre and car park.

'Big Brother' arrived a long time ago ! Our passivity means he is here to stay.

I agree with jumpy. local council workers worry me. Personally I don't have time for them. I think many of them are lazy bums who are in jobs for life. Honestly ever watched a bunch of council construction guys put up a fence or mend a hole in the road. They string out for a week when it can be done in 3 days.

Might be an overstatement saying all council workers are like that but having a look at teh adverts for jobs in my local council it seems that they have to invent posts with weird names when the job is something that could be done by an existing employee.

What Immacolata said is teh better idea and I thought that was how it was at the current time if not as advanced as the Daily Scare(Mail) has written. I also thought that how it is in Denmark is how it is going to be here, I'm sure I read that and the mail is missing it out. I do agree with STEED that we have a government hooked on more legislation as a solution to everything and obsessed with know what we do with our time.

What I find some what disturbing is the number of people who are now voting BNP, for the benefit of you guys outside England the BNP stands for British National Party they are a fringe very right wing party that blames all the country's problems on immigrates they hold some council seats in areas like Oldham. I know that are main political opposition party's are a joke but why are people voting BNP they have no answers what so ever, it's a sad day that the only opposition comes from the national press in this country.

This government is a control freak forcing it's unwanted 1984 Big Brother and Political Correctness on us and they have done nothing for this country, when Labour came to power in 1997 our economy was £50 billion in the black now it's £80 billion in the red. As for the information they are collecting on us your ID will be up for grabs and abused.

From the government to the councils all I see is money being wasted, my own council resurfaced a large section of road and it went right over budget so what do they do? They hold enquiry which costed millions just to come to the answer yes the road surfacing went over budget.

The worst case scenario I see is that Labour intorduces all these laws and regs making it easier to snoop or know what people are up to then some one like the BNP get in and they have all these powers that they can use to turn is into a totalitarian state.

Can't seeing it happen but who knows.

I'd say vote but for who? Maybe a little revolt would help, the Charles the First solution wot. :x

Was this before or after they took all your guns away?

Tony Blair’s loonies are planning to expel Clair Short out of the Labour party for her remarks a hung Parliament would be a good thing to wake up M.P’s. The funny thing is Clair Short is stepping down at the next general election.

Politics in the U.K. is going down the tubes and why? M.P’s know that most voters just don’t care anymore and they can get away with what ever. The voter is sleep walking and it’s time to wake up and make your MP work for you, that’s what they are paid for.

For the rest of the world
MP = Member of Parliament

http://www.private-eye.co.uk/picture...s/big/1166.jpg

Another one from Private Eye. :lol:

Oh god, love political Funnies. I still have a bunch of Kerry ones.