There was a dramatic claim on the front of yesterday's Independent that reading the paper might get you arrested. The potentially offending article was penned by Henry Porter and reprinted from Vanity Fair. A management accountant, Stephen Jago, was arrested on the 18th of June in and around Whitehall, a designated no-protest area, when found to be carrying several copies of Porter's original article.
"In the guise of fighting terrorism and maintaining public order, Tony Blair's Government has quietly and systematically taken power from Parliament and the British people. The author charts a nine-year assault on civil liberties that reveals the danger of trading freedom for security - and must have Churchill spinning in his grave
I might add that this column also comes with the more serious warning that, if rights have been eroded in the land once called "the Mother of Parliaments", it can happen in any country where a government actively promotes the fear of terrorism and crime and uses it to persuade people that they must exchange their freedom for security."
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