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Civil Contingencies Bill

11:17 / 07.01.04

Well, the Civil Contingencies Bill has been published today.

According to the rather scarily titled UK Resilience department it will "deliver a single framework for civil protection in the United Kingdom."

Then, of course, there's the clause in it which allows police to ban public gatherings, impose curfews, and seize property...

21:24 / 07.01.04

Blimey. They don't do much to make it look less fascistic do they?

21:45 / 07.01.04

I hope there will be intense debate on this bill in the commons and the lords, but have a nasty feeling that the opposition will give these measures a ringing endorsement.

solid~liquid onwards

12:30 / 31.01.04

ah, nice to find someone interested in this bill. It seems to have been largely ignored by the media despite being the most powerful piece of legislation ever proposed.

myself and a mate spent 4 hours reading the bill and its 34 pages can be quite neatly summed up to:

when activated in a state of emergency (which is anything the PM says is an emergency) it gives the PM complete legal power over everything

the bill covers every contingency, at one point it says that a state of emergency has to be decided upon by both houses of parliamnet but it also says that this doesnt have to happen if there isnt enough time or its impratical (such as people disagreeing)

The group liberty recognised 5 seperate human rights that the bill compromises. After liberty got a bit pissed off, tony and co removed the bit that said they could break up peaceful protests but thats pointless when the bill gives the PM the ability to make new laws up on the spot by saying something and stating it is law for as long as there is an emergency.

A state of emergency lasts for a maximum of 30 days (unless they say its going to last longer when the emergency is staed) but the state of emergency can be made longer with a review at 30 days, or, the PM can create a new law saying an the state of emergency lasts as long as he says it does.

This all really really scares me. Didnt hitler use a similar type of emergency power to destroy democracy in Germany and seize ultimate power after a commie supposedly burt the reichstag?

I will personally be ranting like a mad man on the streets of dundee informing people of one of the biggest threats to society and democracy in britain today

sttab out

solid~liquid onwards

13:04 / 31.01.04

extracts from the guardian website http://www.guardian.co.uk/theissues/article/0,6512,1118026,00.html

What concerns are there about the proposed legislation?
The bill will confer sweeping authority on ministers to do almost anything that once an emergency has been declared. According to the Guardian, its poses "potentially the greatest threat to civil liberty that any parliament is ever likely to consider".

"The powers available to the government and state agencies would be truly draconian. Cities could be sealed off, travel bans introduced, all phones cut off, and websites shut down. Demonstrations could be banned and the news media be made subject to censorship. New offences against the state could be "created" by government decree.

"This is Britain's Patriot Act. At a stroke democracy could be replaced by totalitarianism."

When i read the bill i was laughing with tears in my eyes... when i was reaching the last few pages i lay on the floor in a state of semi depression.

solid~liquid onwards

13:11 / 31.01.04

ccbill@cabinet-office.x.gsi.gov.uk

Thats the e-mail address of the civil contingencies team, the people who draw it up, modify it and all that. Give em an e-mail expressing your fear and contempt for the bill.

solid~liquid onwards

13:32 / 31.01.04

Monday January 12, 2004
The Guardian

Peter Hitchens, Mail on Sunday, January 11
"This week the government laid the foundations of a new tyranny, handing itself frightening powers ... The excuse for this pile of offensive legal offal is the bogeyman threat of 'terrorism'. It might as well be 'things that go bump in the night'. Such laws, as it happens, do nothing to stop or end terrorism, which can only be defeated by resolve and courage. The same pretext was given for the almost equally sinister Terrorism Act 2000 ... Taken together these laws are just about all anyone would need to snuff out out liberties in a matter of days."

heres a bit of a summary of the bill ^_^

The Civil Contingencies Bill creates the powers to:

* Send the armed forces into anywhere in Britain;

* Ban movement of people and vehicles in an area;

* Order evacuation of an area;

* Seize, confiscate or destroy property, with or without compensation;

* Destroy animal or plant life, with or without compensation;

* Ban "assemblies of specified kinds, at specified places or at specified times";

* Arrest people who fail to co-operate with the emergency powers;

* Set up special tribunals.

* Make new laws witout parliaments consent

The legislation covers war, terrorism, contamination of land with "harmful biological, chemical or radioactive matter or oil", flooding and "disruption or destruction of plant life or animal life" and homelessness.

Which means if the bill was an act right now, it could be brought into place right now, cos there are homeless people on the streets.

13:34 / 31.01.04

fuck.
ing.
hell.

solid~liquid onwards

13:48 / 31.01.04

a nice wee article
http://beatniksalad.typepad.com/weblog/2004/01/civil_contingen.html

check out www.statewatch.org
Tony Bunyan, Statewatch editor, comments:

"The draft Bill would have allowed the imposition of an authoritarian state. The new Bill is only better in that it paves the road to an authoritarian state. The government is really naive if it thinks people will not read the fine print of the new Bill and realise that it has preserved nearly all the powers it originally proposed - albeit in a different form - and added new contentious provisions which were not in the first draft"

21:53 / 31.01.04

Give em an e-mail expressing your fear and contempt for the bill.

Have done so. Well done for drawing this to people's attention, sttab. Keep up the good work.

22:07 / 31.01.04

And lets not forget getting in contact with your own MPs through the ever-popular faxyourmp.com/.

23:09 / 31.01.04

This all really really scares me. Didnt hitler use a similar type of emergency power to destroy democracy in Germany and seize ultimate power after a commie supposedly burt the reichstag?

The 'Enabling Acts', passed after the Reichstag fire, I seem to remember from GCSE.

Yeah I know, Godwins(?) Law blah blah blah, but the terms of this act are astonishingly similar.. especially the bit sttab has so thoughtfully picked out in bold in hir above post, to which I also draw your attention.

I honestly can't think of a 'sensible' reason why the current government would want to prospose such an astonishingly fascistic bit of legislation.. at least not without veering off into realms normally reserved for conspiracy and paranoia and the like..

Remind me WHY do we have a media that hasn't made this a focus of big attention??

Frustrated, puzzled, concerned and not a little frightened at this end.

solid~liquid onwards

00:00 / 01.02.04

pah. my local mp is charles kennedy, who is opposed to the bill... but i sent him a nice e-mail thanking him for fighting evil, but if he could try and get more media coverage on the issue

but no-one really listens to him

Scrambled Password Bogus Email

16:10 / 01.02.04

Fucking hell.

I'm reminded of the furore a couple of years back over tax hikes on petrol...The barricades preventing supply of gas to the stations in protest.

According to this Bill, that constitutes an 'Emergency'.

Send in the SAS!

I think I'll move to the Caribbean.

18:52 / 01.02.04

Sttab, can you not use your dundee MP too, now?
Do you think nobody listens to Kennedy? I think he just doesnt say things with enough oomph. I sent him a fax too, with kisses attached.

I'm Rick Jones, bitch

20:17 / 01.02.04

My MP is, no shit, Tony Blair himself (If you count my non-term adress, which I do).

will email the father details of this tomorrow, he'll go mental over this.

Tony Blair is such. a. fucking. wanker.

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

21:18 / 01.02.04

Remind me WHY do we have a media that hasn't made this a focus of big attention??

Recent events at the BBC would seem to indicate that Mr Tony's been taking care of that too...

solid~liquid onwards

21:29 / 01.02.04

miss bop,
sent my local dude in dundee a fax too but hes scottish labour scum (tuition fees thing, labour won by 5 votes...all 46 scottish labour mp's voted with Tony on the subject despite it didnt directly concern their constituants)

New Labour are a very scarey and sinister outfit

James Dudley
...Could you post me a postcode that resembles your own (such as a neighbours) so i can send a fax to the esteemed mr Blair

solid~liquid onwards

10:46 / 02.02.04

Heard on the radio this morning that David Blunkett wants to change the law so less evidence is neede to convict suspected terrorists... read camp delta thread (we have our own version of guantanamo bay... in milton-keynes (sweet jesus)

Whale... Whale... Fish!

18:16 / 11.02.04

Si, finnally read your posts and the bill after weeks of your rants

I am scared, very scared. Especially if it's used in conjunction with the terrorist act.

I'm concerned about this passage?
"6) The event or situation mentioned in subsection (1) may occur or be inside or outside the United Kingdom."

As war is deemed an emergancy situation and if emergency situations can occur outside the UK, would another pre-emptive strike mean that the bill could be implemented? And would it also mean that if anyone was to oppose any pre-emptive strike, the could be labled as a terrorist and imprisoned indefinetly?

Hmmm... I feel more and more like trying to start a revolution everyday...

Scrambled Password Bogus Email

15:17 / 24.02.04

I've read through this thoroughly and thought a bit about it, and can honestly say I wouldn't worry too much about the jackboot connotations....Far more likely that it will be used to instigate and justify a brand new 'Civil Contingencies Tax', required of all of us to counter the growing threat of asylum seekers at loose in these fair Isles. Watch it grow and grow...

12:17 / 25.02.04

Ahhh... emergency powers acts... takes me back to the days of the Reich... heady days...