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The Snoopers Charter returned last night

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Last night 4 backbenchers in the House of Lords in an extraordinary abuse of parliamentary procedure casually went and added 18 pages of extra clauses to the Counter Terror bill due to be debated on Monday.

 

These concerned citizens just happen to be

 

Lord King the former Conservative defence secretary

Lord Carlile the Liberal Democrat former reviewer of counter-terror laws

Lord West the former Labour defence minister

Lord Blair the former Metropolitan police commissioner

 

A closer examination of these clauses reveal that they are substantially the snoopers charter or Communications Data Bill which was scrutinised by a joint committee of Lords & commons for a year and rejected

 

None of the concerns of the committee have been addressed in any way.

 

There is one significant change however, in this revision there is no judicial oversight, everything is done with the permission of a senior officer rather than by going to get a warrant.

 

Now Inserting these clauses at this stage means the Lords, who have already scheduled the couple of hours they thought they needed don't have time to scrutinise the changes before having to vote on it, most of the lords will have already decided which way to vote based on the last reading before this insertion and won't even turn up for the debate unless they are alerted, as they think it's a formality.

 

If the bill is passed it then goes for royal assent, it doesn't go back to the commons, and the snoopers charter will become law.

 

So the entire process of democracy just got flushed down the toilet, these measures had already been rejected by the democratic process and these four casually picked it up dusted it off, took out any protections the people might have had and casually tacked it on to the back of another bill which they knew was going to be passed.

 

A former defence secretary, Metropolitan police commissioner, first sea lord and an "independent" reviewer of terrorism legislation just decided to throw your rights out of the window because they think it's better.

 

You can kiss goodbye to any privacy you thought you ever had if they get away with this.

 

Oh yes and we'll be paying for it, nearly forgot that, the Home office estimates £1.8Billion the joint committee says this will be exceeded by a considerable margin.

 

The only chance of stopping this is to write to the Lords and urge them to attend the debate and throw out the amendments.

 

Links

 

Open Rights Group: Abuse of Parliamentary procedure: introducing the Comms Data Bill into the Counter Terrorism and Security Bill

GIGAOM: UK terror law amendments would bring back "Snoopers Charter"

The Guardian: ‘Snooper’s charter’: four Lords in bid to pass changed version before election

Parliament website - Progress of Bill: Counter-Terrorism and Security Bill 2014-15

Parliament website: Amendments to Counter-terrorism and Security Bill (PDF)

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So, what exactly are you afraid of?

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Last night 4 backbenchers in the House of Lords in an extraordinary abuse of parliamentary procedure casually went and added 18 pages of extra clauses to the Counter Terror bill due to be debated on Monday.

 

These concerned citizens just happen to be

 

Lord King the former Conservative defence secretary

Lord Carlile the Liberal Democrat former reviewer of counter-terror laws

Lord West the former Labour defence minister

Lord Blair the former Metropolitan police commissioner

 

A closer examination of these clauses reveal that they are substantially the snoopers charter or Communications Data Bill which was scrutinised by a joint committee of Lords & commons for a year and rejected

 

None of the concerns of the committee have been addressed in any way.

 

There is one significant change however, in this revision there is no judicial oversight, everything is done with the permission of a senior officer rather than by going to get a warrant.

 

Now Inserting these clauses at this stage means the Lords, who have already scheduled the couple of hours they thought they needed don't have time to scrutinise the changes before having to vote on it, most of the lords will have already decided which way to vote based on the last reading before this insertion and won't even turn up for the debate unless they are alerted, as they think it's a formality.

 

If the bill is passed it then goes for royal assent, it doesn't go back to the commons, and the snoopers charter will become law.

 

So the entire process of democracy just got flushed down the toilet, these measures had already been rejected by the democratic process and these four casually picked it up dusted it off, took out any protections the people might have had and casually tacked it on to the back of another bill which they knew was going to be passed.

 

A former defence secretary, Metropolitan police commissioner, first sea lord and an "independent" reviewer of terrorism legislation just decided to throw your rights out of the window because they think it's better.

 

You can kiss goodbye to any privacy you thought you ever had if they get away with this.

 

Oh yes and we'll be paying for it, nearly forgot that, the Home office estimates £1.8Billion the joint committee says this will be exceeded by a considerable margin.

 

The only chance of stopping this is to write to the Lords and urge them to attend the debate and throw out the amendments.

 

Links

 

Open Rights Group: Abuse of Parliamentary procedure: introducing the Comms Data Bill into the Counter Terrorism and Security Bill

GIGAOM: UK terror law amendments would bring back "Snoopers Charter"

The Guardian: ‘Snooper’s charter’: four Lords in bid to pass changed version before election

Parliament website - Progress of Bill: Counter-Terrorism and Security Bill 2014-15

Parliament website: Amendments to Counter-terrorism and Security Bill (PDF)

 

 

seems reasonable in todays world, if you are not up to anything ? nothing to be afraid of:roll:

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This practice is nothing new. Your bill fails so tack it in the back of one that gets approved.

 

I suspect there will be a swathe of "If you're not doing owt wrong then why worry" posts.

 

Well if this goes through, you know that cheeky little text you sent to your other half detailing upcoming sexual activity between youselves. After this bill it won't be just you and your other half that reads it.

Edited by Resident

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As I said to another user, PM me your bank details so I can rummage through and check for anything suspicious also give me your email & passwords so I can look through those too.

 

Hand on heart I won't disclose any of this to anyone else unless I find something I consider to be in the public interest or the authorities ask me for it backed of course by a warrant.

 

The point is this bill has already been rejected by both the Commons and the Lords and these four have decided that the rule of democracy isn't good enough, the decision of 600 odd MP's & 600 odd Lords is being overruled by 4 lords.

 

It's bad enough when the government supports something like this, at least that's democratic, but when it's rejected you don't expect to find parliamentary procedure ignored and the bill stapled on to the back of something else

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This practice is nothing new. Your bill fails so tack it in the back of one that gets approved.

 

I suspect there will be a swathe of "If you're not doing owt wrong then why worry" posts.

 

Well if this goes through, you know that cheeky little text you sent to your other half detailing upcoming sexual activity between youselves. After this bill it won't be just you and your other half that reads it.

 

in reality all your searches on the web are monitored by google and your preferences are relayed to bring you ads and to be honest if your worried about your up coming sexual activity being discovered you probably shouldnt be doing it anyway:hihi:

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This practice is nothing new. Your bill fails so tack it in the back of one that gets approved...
First time I've ever heard of it in the UK, quite common in the US

 

So we can expect the lords to sneak in a few other amendments just before royal assent in future can we ?

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As I said to another user, PM me your bank details so I can rummage through and check for anything suspicious also give me your email & passwords so I can look through those too.

 

Hand on heart I won't disclose any of this to anyone else unless I find something I consider to be in the public interest or the authorities ask me for it backed of course by a warrant.

 

The point is this bill has already been rejected by both the Commons and the Lords and these four have decided that the rule of democracy isn't good enough, the decision of 600 odd MP's & 600 odd Lords is being overruled by 4 lords.

 

It's bad enough when the government supports something like this, at least that's democratic, but when it's rejected you don't expect to find parliamentary procedure ignored and the bill stapled on to the back of something else

 

 

you can have my bank details, you can do nothing with them except pay into my account without a password which is never written down or recorded. passwords when entered are encrpyted anyway.

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oh I'll need the password too :)

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So we can expect the lords to sneak in a few other amendments just before royal assent in future can we ?

 

Yes, without a doubt.

BRING ON THE REVOLUTION!

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Why would I want to stop it? If it makes it a quicker and easier process to catch terrorists before they get chance to cause havoc and hurt innocent people, then surely that's a good thing. After all, it's not as if private information about yourself or anyone could not be found without these amendments in place if counter terrorism and security officials really wanted too, it just speeds up the process, possibly saving many lives in the process.

They can snoop all they like on me, I'm a good girl.

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