Mayoral debate focuses on crime
The BBC carries a report on Tuesday evening’s London Mayoral hustings, including the one run by NO2ID:
Mr Paddick told the meeting that like his party leader, Nick Clegg, he would rather go to prison than carry an ID card – and he criticised the use of Oyster travel card records to track people’s movements, saying it was “the beginning of a police state”.
“I resent the fact that just because I have auto top-up on my Oyster card, that means Transport for London can monitor exactly where I am whenever I go by bus and whenever I go to an underground station”.
He said he would restrict the use by police of Oyster data and congestion charge cameras, except for suspected terrorist offences and violent crime – a pledge echoed by Mr Johnson.
Mr Johnson attacked ID cards as “morally and economically bankrupt” and pledged to cut his card up and “sprinkle it on my cornflakes”.
He went further than party leader David Cameron by speaking out against the issuing of ID cards to non-EU migrants, which begins this year, saying it was “creepy and wrong”.
