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Yawn more attempts to control everything

solid~liquid onwards

18:44 / 22.12.05

Story Britain is to become the first country in the world where the movements of all vehicles on the roads are recorded. A new national surveillance system will hold the records for at least two years.

Using a network of cameras that can automatically read every passing number plate, the plan is to build a huge database of vehicle movements so that the police and security services can analyse any journey a driver has made over several years.

The network will incorporate thousands of existing CCTV cameras which are being converted to read number plates automatically night and day to provide 24/7 coverage of all motorways and main roads, as well as towns, cities, ports and petrol-station forecourts.

Same old same old. I remember that the government wanted a system that would be capable of tracking the movements of all cars by having gps in every car. the guise. a new way of taxing you based on how much you drive and what roads you use.

Do you like this? Do you care? What can you do? What should you do?

00:47 / 23.12.05

It's disgusting, an insult to all decent people and more proof that government always grows more and more abusive with time.

What should you do? Exactly that.

07:36 / 23.12.05

Whilst there are obvious and serious concerns about the increased level of surveilence I don't really think that smashing up a few speed cameras is the way to go to log your protest.

Although I own and use a car myself, I do feel that they are pollution-belching, fuel-guzzling bastards. Cars do cause a large number of fatalities every year, and surely added monitoring of them could, conceivably, aid in tracking down hit-and-run drivers, stolen vehicles, etc.

I suppose it's that horrible "If you have nothing to hide, why should you care?" argument that Big Brother supporters come out with isn't it though? The government really shouldn't be monitoring it's citizens on a daily basis.

However, I'm not sure the capacity exists to monitor "every" car similtaneously.

Still, the anti-globalisation types should be okay. Those hippys don't have the money to spend on cars (I jape! I jape!).

08:32 / 23.12.05

I'm sure the capacity does exist to monitor and record all traffic - I mean that it will be made available as the system is rolled out - and I'm sure most people want this following the London bombings. I can't imagine what the point in smashing speedcams should be.

This does place a very great deal of additional power in the hands potentially very bad people, of course. It can be used to do very bad things, but catching hit-and-run drivers, enforcing motor tax or tracking terrorists are not among them. I think this system will mostly effect everyday criminals as anyone of any significance is worth monitoring the expensive way, and there will always be loopholes. The idea that this information might be fed to businesses, or be used to trigger violent action is very upsetting.

Our Lady Has Left the Building

12:24 / 23.12.05

How on earth are they going to store the data from one day, let alone for five years? And how on earth would they search such a database? What concerns me is less doing this than the money that's going to need to be spent on even the most basic database to store such information.

13:23 / 23.12.05

They say they want to make 100 million reads a day. I don't think that's nearly enough, as it's only about a thousand reads a second. I think they'll manage that without great effort, but I imagine this is only for some part of North London and there will be similarly sized databases in all major population centres replicating relevant data with one another. That size must be in the region of 2GB to hold a day's readings, or 4TB to hold five year's worth, and there must be hundreds of such databases, perhaps as many as a thousand, to do what is claimed will be done.

Yes, it'll cost a lot. Not as much as the new nuclear weapons though. Not nearly as much, and it actually has a use.

solid~liquid onwards

18:47 / 23.12.05

I concur that such the system has its plus points, but similar to what elene said, its the potential for abuse that im worried about. I suppose it depends on whether you trust your government and/or your political system to be uncoruptable. hmmmm.

There isnt a single speed camera north of Inverness in the Scottish Highlands, where i live . I have nothing to do with that fact.

Evil scientist quote "Whilst there are obvious and serious concerns about the increased level of surveilence I don't really think that smashing up a few speed cameras is the way to go to log your protest."

Options;
Write to MP
Start or join protest group
Smash cameras

Athough i do agree with Evil Scientist's sentiments. Smashing a few cameras wont change much. there is little you can do alone to halt this kind of *progress* but then again if lots of people were to smash all the cameras...

Is this getting to borderline incitement of 73rr0r1s/\/\? Mabye id better shut up before i end up in eastern europe with electrodes attached to my balls.

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

18:50 / 23.12.05

its the potential for abuse that im worried about

Me too. I have nothing against the idea in principle, I just don't trust the people using it.

Just to play devil's advocate for a minute, how would everyone feel if the same level of monitoring was applied to another dangerous machine which is often used by criminals, like, ooh, I don't know, guns?

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

18:53 / 23.12.05

Also, smashing cameras is something I have no time for. I don't think speed cameras are a bad thing at all- monitoring people's movements, yes, that's a bit different, but I still think dangerous driving is something that SHOULD be stamped on hard. (If people have a problem with the limits, campaign to get them changed. Nobody seems to be doing much of that).

(For the record, yes, I AM a driver- I got rid of my car because I couldn't afford to park it in London and I didn't really need it).

solid~liquid onwards

19:49 / 23.12.05

Although I dont dissaprove of and would not smash conventianal speed cameras. If they were as described in the independent's article then that might be a differnet matter.

Just to play devil's advocate for a minute, how would everyone feel if the same level of monitoring was applied to another dangerous machine which is often used by criminals, like, ooh, I don't know, guns?

I know a guy whos a gun nut. He would probably tell you about Nazi Germany's gun registration, then confiscation as a way of removing potential gun related resistance to them. He beleives that a similar thing has/is happened/happening in briatain. The gov is using laws to remove problematic resistance to their ultimate evil plans. Whatever they may be.

Then again he may well be a right conspiracy wing loon.

05:27 / 24.12.05

Funny how everybody jumps on speed cameras, but that may be my own fault for not explaining myself.
I don't care about speed cameras, they don't (as far as I know) log their images. What I have a problem with is this assumption that if just the government knows everything about everyone then we'll all be safe.
Historically, governments have killed far more people than any kind of non-government terrorist. I'm worried about terrorism too, but not nearly enough to give away my freedom to a bunch of people, who have made the quest for power into their whole careers.
Also, any system of this sort has a million holes in it. Besides the potential for tracking dissenters in general, there will likely be thousands of people with access to the system, who might use it for their own purposes (tracking their spouse or whatever).

Concerning smashing cameras, of course it won't help to destroy a few here or there, but there must be some kind of critical mass where it simply won't be economical to keep repairing them. They can't very well post police officers at every camera to guard them, can they?
Maybe I'm being too negative, but I really have very little faith in the official process of objection. Write your MP. That'll help.

Finally, guns. I never cared much for them, but i do have a problem with the idea that only the police and military have any. Maybe it wouldn't make much difference, but still, I consider it a symptom. The state is saying, 'You can't be trusted with weapons.' As if they can.

Also, I feel I should mention that I'm not British. The reason I'm so concerned about this is that my own government are thinking about something similar and it would be a nasty precedent.

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

07:36 / 24.12.05

sttab- I've heard that argument a lot. The thing is, I'm not sure where I stand on it, as in the UK we don't have a culture of gun ownership (or, indeed, the right to bear arms) so I'm not really in a position to say.
However, the gun example in the UK is, for this reason, not really analogous to that in the States, as further controls on gun ownership would not really be taking away any rights from the vast majority of people.

I'm trying to get an argument straight in my head about car ownership being separate from individual freedom, and why I'm more opposed to CCTV on pedestrians, but it's taking a while. I'll try to get it together and come back.

solid~liquid onwards

21:10 / 24.12.05

Stoatie-less pretty than usua, im looking forward to your theory

As for cctv, it is/will soon be possible to recognise faces in a crowd and log that info to track ppls movements. I beleive that some sort of system is being/has been worked that analyse's movements and would flag up movements that didnt fit the norm. A scary big central cctv supercomputer would be rather scary... shite, phone call, mates at pub. And there was even gonna be a point to this. finish later

15:19 / 25.12.05

Plug: You can always finger the CCTV while out and about.

15:41 / 26.12.05

It won't work, took them a few years to even get close to getting errors down to acceptable levels with the congestion charge cctv network, and they use humans to double check any pictures the computers have trouble with.

It's a large scale govt. IT project and will therefore cost at least twice it's estimate, come in 5 years late and not do what it was designed to do.

It's just like the no-fly list for US airports, full of human inputted errors and buggy as anything. Only two things have made US air travel more secure, armoured doors on cockpits and the realisation that passengers and crew will fight highjackers now rather than sit tight and hope to get out alive. Everything else is a waste of money.

I wish they'd spend all this money on stuff that works rather than 'feel good' white elephants. But I suppose foreign aid and getting in touch with local communities aren't 'sexy'.

lord henry strikes back

14:07 / 28.12.05

Stoatie, I think you could base your theory on the following premise: Driving, unlike walking etc. is not a victimless exercise. Foregoing running people over and the like, which are already punishable, every time you start your engine you are adding to the destruction of the environment. Now, given that the driver is gaining an individual benefit (a convenient mode of transportation) at the expense of the greater good it seems only fair that society should expect something in return and the forfieting of ones privacy could be that payment.

My problem with the above is that the simple loss of privacy does not help solve the problem of polution. If this system were to be linked to some form of road charging then I might feel a bit different but at the moment this does look like another chipping away at our rights in return for nothing more than a nebulas notion of security.

19:31 / 28.12.05

I don't see how taxing peoples driving will get them to drive any less. It's just going to make people a lot angrier when they do drive. Its just another one of the governments ten million ways to juice money out of you.

22:44 / 28.12.05

...and then then spend it on improving roads, or improving public transport as a viable and preferable alternative to private car travel.

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

23:57 / 28.12.05

People's driving IS taxed. It's called, erm "road tax". If the amount paid were linked to the amount actually driven, then I think it WOULD have an effect on people's use of cars for piffling little things like going 300 yards to the supermarket. The congestion charge certainly worked pretty well, without the predicted social unrest.

pointless & uncalled for

11:31 / 29.12.05

People's driving IS taxed. It's called, erm "road tax".

Sorry stoatie but there is no such thing as "road tax", at least not in the UK.

The taxation that is paid for by motorised vehicles is actually vehicle excise duty (VED). The sole usage of the revenue derived from VED is on maintenance and development of motorways. Funding used to pay for non M-class roads comes from local authorities by way of council tax.

Subsidy of both forms of road maintenance and development comes from a portion of your Income Tax.

Not that this actually counters your post but it's a point of order on which I am very particular. It's something to do with being a cyclist and being accused of not paying my way on the roads because I don't purchase a tax disc.

As a further aside I'm all for roads as a subscriber service. However, for cyclists this would mean introduction of RFID technology, which I am not all for at all.

pointless & uncalled for

11:41 / 29.12.05

I don't see how taxing peoples driving will get them to drive any less. It's just going to make people a lot angrier when they do drive. Its just another one of the governments ten million ways to juice money out of you.

Whilst comprehensive and definitive studies are still being formed, it is regularly noted that the introduction of the congestion charge (CC) in Central London has significantly reduced the number of people driving in this CC zone. Ad hoc footfall figures collected by a number of bodies and agencies have also observed an increase in cycling, walking and use of public transport.

Furthermore, a part of the justification of the rise in the CC from £5 to £8 was that the drop in traffic in the CC Zone was so great that there was a shortfall in anticipated revenue. Also there have been amendments to the disaster response plan to take into account the altered road usuage.

The forthcoming studies are expected to deliver confirmation of these assumptions.

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

13:10 / 29.12.05

Fair enough, you've put me straight on that one, though I believe (as you said) my point still stands. I guess it comes back to the "taxation is a good thing, as long as it's administered correctly" thing, which is a whole 'nother argument.

11:21 / 30.12.05

I do think is a very major change to how things are done. Isn't there going to be a vote to determine whether people actually want it or not? Indeed how does one request a referendum in Britain? Sorry, but not having lived there for longer than a few weeks since I was eight, I've no idea.

Tryphena Absent

14:09 / 30.12.05

To be honest far more people in this country have cars than should and if this were focused on taxation (I suspect it might be and they're just not telling anyone) I would be 100% behind it. Car usage in the UK is at an unacceptably high level.

18:02 / 30.12.05

How would everyone feel if the same level of monitoring was applied to another dangerous machine which is oftem used by criminals like, ooh, I don't know, guns?

Speaking as someone who owns both a gun and a driving licence, I'm not really too bothered about what they, mine and your employees, the government, want to do about the latter. But they'll have to prise the former from my cold dead hands...

ONLY NICE THINGS

22:03 / 30.12.05

Indeed how does one request a referendum in Britain?

Basically, one doesn't. One votes to elect representatives, who decide, among other things, whether to put things to a popular vote outside that system.

Tryphena Absent

00:50 / 31.12.05

Cars are far more dangerous than guns but I'm not sure a licence really equates to a large metal DEATH machine. And lord of heaven will you please put that gun away?

11:18 / 31.12.05

Thanks, Haus.

It’s the data retention, its analysis and the possibility that this information might pass outside the circle of law enforcement agents with a specific need to know that I find upsetting. Is this in fact legislation at all, or are the police simply doing it off there own bat? That, were it the case, ought not to be permitted.

I think the UK would do well to get a real (a codified) constitution, so that one might easily determine whether this constitutes an invasion of privacy or not. I would hope that would be the case and that introducing this legislation, if that’s what it is, would require no less than a constitutional referendum.

The more I think about this, the more it upsets me. The *Yawn* in this thread’s title is starting to get on my nerves.

20:24 / 02.01.06

It sums up this thread particularly well, really. What are we talking about here? Guns? Tax? Cars? Monitoring?

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

23:36 / 02.01.06

Well, the thread title does say "attempts to control everything". Daily Telegraph here we come!

But, flippancy aside, I think I inadvertently derailed this one with my guns comparison. (Which I still think is valid... I reckon now it should maybe have been for another thread, though). Apologies.

10:40 / 03.01.06

I've only been talking about the new monitoring system described in the article from The Independent quoted in the thread's opening post.

The thread summary is,

"From 2006 Britain will be the first country where *every* journey by *every* car will be monitored" FP independent 22/12/05.