If this great reform is to be durable, we need to pin our politicians down
Timothy Garton Ash writes in the Guardian about the checklist of reforms he plans to press for in the aftermath of the MPs expenses scandal. Here’s item 8:
Roll back the database state: I’m glad to see Cameron point to the megalomaniac national identity register scheme as evidence of “an increasingly Orwellian surveillance state”. But we need a set of specific commitments on issues ranging from ID cards through email snooping to the elephantine DNA database, with deadlines for action. To reverse the now legally entrenched intrusive practices of the Home Office, the police and the secret services is a Herculean task.
