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http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/oct/14/gchq-monitor-communications-mps-peers-tribunal-wilson-doctrine#comment-61385862

Looks like 1984 was a documentary and not a work of fiction

For any non Brits, MPs are our lawmakers.

I sincerely hope that MPs pass a law that will give GCHQ a severe boot up the rear, because this is a direct attack on parliamentary democracy, the likes of which Britain hasn't seen since the days of the English Civil War.

So much for the Wilson doctrine...

I would suggest reading the judgement, and pausing to all who come across this story as it has been misrepresented to a fair degree.

It's not really that bad is it? I don't understand why people think that the Wilson doctrine ever had any legal power, as it was only a statement by a politician. It's also fairly unremarkable that we subject MPs and other parliamentary officials to the same level of protection that private citizens get. Lucas' comments are legally wrong and there is still a fair respect for privacy within the model.

I am also amused that people find it outrageous that an organisation that exists to intercept communication on behalf of the government actually does this and doesn't always inform people.

Out of interest, beyond the hyperbole of the headlines, why do you think that parliamentarians should be better protected than the rest of society in terms of data protection?

 IGtR= wrote:
I would suggest reading the judgement, and pausing to all who come across this story as it has been misrepresented to a fair degree.

It's not really that bad is it? I don't understand why people think that the Wilson doctrine ever had any legal power, as it was only a statement by a politician. It's also fairly unremarkable that we subject MPs and other parliamentary officials to the same level of protection that private citizens get. Lucas' comments are legally wrong and there is still a fair respect for privacy within the model.

I am also amused that people find it outrageous that an organisation that exists to intercept communication on behalf of the government actually does this and doesn't always inform people.

Out of interest, beyond the hyperbole of the headlines, why do you think that parliamentarians should be better protected than the rest of society in terms of data protection?

GCHQ have already been hauled up for lying to MPs about spying on them. You don't think there's a problem when a government agency spies on democratically elected officials, and then fails to mention that fact when asked about it?

MPs are not private citizens, in case you haven't noticed.

Given that we know GCHQ shares information with the NSA, there is a possibility that a foreign nation, the USA, is actively taking an interest in the internal affairs of another nation. No problem whatsoever.....

There is a problem of accountability I understand that, but there must be some sort of balancing of the national interest against full disclosure. There are things that cannot be widely broadcast, and anything that MPs say generally gets recorded in Hansard, and so there are obvious problems in answering questions in a public setting for GCHQ et al,

MPs are private citizens performing a public role and thus should have the protection of private citizens. They should be subject to the same scrutiny as the rest of us. They are not subject to diplomatic immunity, or performing any role that means that they are subject to the Official Secrets Act, thus they should be treated as private citizens. I never said that they were private citizens but it is prima facie problematic from a rule of law perspective to hold MPs or any other members of a legislative body to a seperate standard as the rest of us. That right stems from the Magna Carta and is a pillar of the rule of law. If you think that it is a problem for democracy that they are being snooped on, it seems far more problematic for them to get special powers not to be investigated.

And your last point demonstrates the problem that people have with this, which is sharing with the Americans. If so it seems the simpler question is why do we share everything with the Americans? It clearly makes people upset. Again decisions have been made at a high level that the costs and benefits are in the UK's favour.

 IGtR= wrote:
There is a problem of accountability I understand that, but there must be some sort of balancing of the national interest against full disclosure. There are things that cannot be widely broadcast, and anything that MPs say generally gets recorded in Hansard, and so there are obvious problems in answering questions in a public setting for GCHQ et al,

MPs are private citizens performing a public role and thus should have the protection of private citizens. They should be subject to the same scrutiny as the rest of us. They are not subject to diplomatic immunity, or performing any role that means that they are subject to the Official Secrets Act, thus they should be treated as private citizens. I never said that they were private citizens but it is prima facie problematic from a rule of law perspective to hold MPs or any other members of a legislative body to a seperate standard as the rest of us. That right stems from the Magna Carta and is a pillar of the rule of law. If you think that it is a problem for democracy that they are being snooped on, it seems far more problematic for them to get special powers not to be investigated.

And your last point demonstrates the problem that people have with this, which is sharing with the Americans. If so it seems the simpler question is why do we share everything with the Americans? It clearly makes people upset. Again decisions have been made at a high level that the costs and benefits are in the UK's favour.

I agree with some of this, but MPs, do have oversight. - being accountable to the electorate who can kick them out, and in the case of Carmichael, sometimes the constiuents can bring a case against their MP, so accountability is there.

GCHQ is giving the impression these days that it's above the law. This cannot stand. Parliament needs to remind it who is boss.

Agree with your last post. Why we share bulk data collecting with the Yanks is beyond me.

Given the amount of law breaking MP's seem to do... and get away with somehow... I would have thought they should be watched the closest.

But I would suggest MP's should have to live with the same laws as the rest of us. If MP's don't like being spied on, give everyone protection from being spied on...

One rule for us and the same rule for them? Hold on, Hold on! That's not how it works

I think the old saying "Hoisted by your own petard" fits perfectly for this absurd position we all find ourselves in. I'd laugh if it wasn't so bloody worrying

Actually under Parliamentary Privilege MPs in the House do have legal protections above and beyond private citizens. In other words, it is already accepted that the office of MP should not be treated the same as everyone else. Whether this should extend to their communications is another matter. I would argue that consultations between MPs and constituents should be privileged in the same way as legal, religious and medical consultations.

From the wider view, I think GCHQ should on the whole not be monitoring everyone just because they can, and certainly should not be handing over material to the Americans or acting as their handmaidens.

There has grown up a very dubious culture of intelligence services making use of connections in different countries to get round the legal protections that restrict their activity at home.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
Actually under Parliamentary Privilege MPs in the House do have legal protections above and beyond private citizens. In other words, it is already accepted that the office of MP should not be treated the same as everyone else. Whether this should extend to their communications is another matter. I would argue that consultations between MPs and constituents should be privileged in the same way as legal, religious and medical consultations.

From the wider view, I think GCHQ should on the whole not be monitoring everyone just because they can, and certainly should not be handing over material to the Americans or acting as their handmaidens.

There has grown up a very dubious culture of intelligence services making use of connections in different countries to get round the legal protections that restrict their activity at home.

Your last sentence is something I agree with entirely.

I think the UK is the most spied upon nation on earth. The amount of CCTV cameras we have make the North Koreans look like bungling amateurs.

And even the bloody councils were using spying powers to monitor people putting the wrong stuff in their wheelie bins!

I believe there is one CCTV camera for every six people in the UK, most cameras per person in the world.

 welshhoppo wrote:
I believe there is one CCTV camera for every six people in the UK, most cameras per person in the world.

Perhaps so but nobody is looking at them. The vast majority of cameras(90%+) are not being looked at by anybody, fact. Most cameras are for insurance and deterrent use and the rest are dummy cameras.

The very few that are being watched by a human operator are so poor quality that they could not be used in a court of law.

The only people that need worry are the people that want to do you and me harm

Spy away all you want GCHQ the only think I have to hide is an unmowed lawn

 darkness screamer wrote:

 welshhoppo wrote:
I believe there is one CCTV camera for every six people in the UK, most cameras per person in the world.

Perhaps so but nobody is looking at them. The vast majority of cameras(90%+) are not being looked at by anybody, fact. Most cameras are for insurance and deterrent use and the rest are dummy cameras.

The very few that are being watched by a human operator are so poor quality that they could not be used in a court of law.

The only people that need worry are the people that want to do you and me harm

Spy away all you want GCHQ the only think I have to hide is an unmowed lawn

The grateful you don't live in Kent, the Adeptus Lawnstartes would be after you pretty quick.

I've got no idea how many cameras I appear in front of per day, but it is several dozen since I commute into central London by train.

As said above, the vast majority of cameras are not monitored, and often take such bad quality recordings that they are useless for criminal prosecution purposes.

To look at things another way, in the modern world practically everyone carries a smartphone capable of taking high resolution video and stills and uploading them to the internet in seconds. So it's not like everyone isn't potentially under close surveillance by their fellow citizens everywhere.

The problem with the official cameras will come when they are all linked to a computer network with the capability to recognise faces and follow someone as they move around. (Mobile phones already enable us to be followed as we move between cells. Our cars can be followed using number plate recognition.) Even this is not in itself a problem until it starts to be abused.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
The problem with the official cameras will come when they are all linked to a computer network with the capability to recognise faces and follow someone as they move around. (Mobile phones already enable us to be followed as we move between cells. Our cars can be followed using number plate recognition.) Even this is not in itself a problem until it starts to be abused.

They've already started. Judging from the Police's response, I'd say they were more than a little put out at being rumbled.

Follow up article

 darkness screamer wrote:

 welshhoppo wrote:
I believe there is one CCTV camera for every six people in the UK, most cameras per person in the world.

Perhaps so but nobody is looking at them. The vast majority of cameras(90%+) are not being looked at by anybody, fact. Most cameras are for insurance and deterrent use and the rest are dummy cameras.

The very few that are being watched by a human operator are so poor quality that they could not be used in a court of law.

The only people that need worry are the people that want to do you and me harm

Spy away all you want GCHQ the only think I have to hide is an unmowed lawn

The nothing to hide, nothing to fear argument is a nonsense. Always has been.

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:

 darkness screamer wrote:

 welshhoppo wrote:
I believe there is one CCTV camera for every six people in the UK, most cameras per person in the world.

Perhaps so but nobody is looking at them. The vast majority of cameras(90%+) are not being looked at by anybody, fact. Most cameras are for insurance and deterrent use and the rest are dummy cameras.

The very few that are being watched by a human operator are so poor quality that they could not be used in a court of law.

The only people that need worry are the people that want to do you and me harm

Spy away all you want GCHQ the only think I have to hide is an unmowed lawn

The nothing to hide, nothing to fear argument is a nonsense. Always has been.

Agreed. If you have nothing to hide and nothing to fear, then you won't mind me or anyone else looking at your bank transactions? Web history? Social Arrangements? Job salary and performance? Credit report? Medical history?

What ever happened to innocent until proven guilty

 zedmeister wrote:


Agreed. If you have nothing to hide and nothing to fear, then you won't mind me or anyone else looking at your bank transactions? Web history?

That's a lot of porn.

A lot of porn.

Good times.

The amount of computing power needed to realtime track and store data of the entire population will be very considerable.

It's hard to imagine why most of the data would be of any use, but I have always thought the entire CCTV programme was designed as a method of transferring public funds to private companies rather than for actual safety and security.

 Kilkrazy wrote:

It's hard to imagine why most of the data would be of any use, but I have always thought the entire CCTV programme was designed as a method of transferring public funds to private companies rather than for actual safety and security.

And for kick ass YouTube videos!

I actually agree with this. GCHQ and NSA have a lot better intentions then most politicians. At the end of the day the most a GCHQ or NSA employee could do with that information is report it to higher up, or violate about a dozen laws and attempt to black mail someone, which would result in their immediate arrest, so long as the person people black mailed understands there rights.

In my honest opinion, the biggest criminals in both the US and Britain are our Politicians. It would be nice to see more of these donkey caves getting arrested for taking bribes and kickbacks for government contracts, maybe then our military could afford to buy useful gear instead of a PRC 150 which costs something stupid like $20,000 when a regular civilian Radio works even better for literally 1/20th the cost.

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:

 darkness screamer wrote:

 welshhoppo wrote:
I believe there is one CCTV camera for every six people in the UK, most cameras per person in the world.

Perhaps so but nobody is looking at them. The vast majority of cameras(90%+) are not being looked at by anybody, fact. Most cameras are for insurance and deterrent use and the rest are dummy cameras.

The very few that are being watched by a human operator are so poor quality that they could not be used in a court of law.

The only people that need worry are the people that want to do you and me harm

Spy away all you want GCHQ the only think I have to hide is an unmowed lawn

The nothing to hide, nothing to fear argument is a nonsense. Always has been.

Lol, who said I was arguing. I don't care, I live near Cheltenham and its provides jobs and money for the area. I make money from the people who spy on you.

I`m pounds in and not worried about my lawn. May the spying continue and I shall grow fat off the spies.

I don't even use my mobile phone and if I do it will only be used for calling a gardener.

As he is not called Bin Laden and I wont be using any keywords like "nuke" the lawn I don't think GCHQ will have much interest in me ?

 darkness screamer wrote:

I make money from the people who spy on you.

darkness screamer =

 SilverMK2 wrote:
Given the amount of law breaking MP's seem to do... and get away with somehow... I would have thought they should be watched the closest.

But I would suggest MP's should have to live with the same laws as the rest of us. If MP's don't like being spied on, give everyone protection from being spied on...

That's how I feel actually.

In-between expenses scandals, leading a country to war under false pretences and practically too many other corruption scandals to count it's painfully clear that a proportion of MPs are as trustworthy as shady car salesmen. Which, in a funny sort of way, is what they have started to resemble.

The main problem with politicians is the kind of people who want to be one.
What kind of person thinks a good way to pass the time and earn money is to boss people around in the form of laws, and the rest of their time nodding and grinning?

Was it Ancient Greece that picked people to run the country? They knew that the people who wanted the job weren't the best people to do it.