Post by earl on Feb 7, 2008 14:26:37 GMT
The bugging of a Labour MP has caused uproar in Britain. But, Jude Collins says, such snooping raises few hackles or waves in Northern Ireland
Thursday, February 07, 2008
Muslim MP Sadiq Khan is very upset. During visits to a constituent in Woodhill prison a couple of years ago, his conversations were secretly recorded by Scotland Yard's anti-terrorist squad. The boys in blue inserted a microphone into a hollowed-out 'talking table' and recorded every word exchanged between Mr Khan and Babar Ahmad, who was facing deportation to the US.
A friend of Mr Khan's has described the bugging as "f---ing outrageous" and demanded: "If he was not a Muslim MP would they be doing this?"
Andrew MacKinlay, a Labour colleague of Khan's, takes a similar line: "It is totally unacceptable that MPs' conversation with constituents are bugged by the security services or the police. It is an affront to democracy and has all the hallmarks of a totalitarian regime".
Even Tom King, former Secretary of State here, was incensed, saying it was the kind of conduct you'd expect in Zimbabwe, not Britain. Latest word is there's to be an inquiry into the incident.
Excuse me - I'm going to have to put the cat out. He's in a laughing fit that could end in asphyxiation.
In December 1999, two MPs - Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness - complained that the car in which they had been travelling to and from Stormont had been bugged, and they produced a large listening device in support of what they said.
The reaction? Some jokes about the size of the device and then ¿ nothing.
The government, the security services, fellow-MPs like Mr MacKinlay - not a peep of protest or apology.
As for inquiry - geddoutahere. Messrs Adams and McGuinness were - are - republicans and might have been plotting something violent with the IRA. You have to bug people like that. Don't you?
Mmm. Except that's exactly the kind of argument behind the bugging of Mr Khan.
He is a Muslim, he was visiting a fellow-Muslim the US authorities wanted for questioning about running a pro-Taliban website, so the anti-terrorist people thought they'd better run their slide-rule over him. In other words, it's " f***ing outrageous" to bug MPs in Britain, but in Ireland, hey, anything goes.
And, of course, you don't have to be an MP to get bugged this side of the Irish Sea.
In 1999, it was revealed that for several years the British government used a listening station at Capenhurst, Cheshire, to monitor thousands of communications every hour - fax messages, emails, telexes and data communications - including communications by the Irish government and Irish businessmen.
But that was the Troubles time and things have changed, right? They have indeed.
Now, surveillance is far more widespread and we seem proud we're being monitored. Take Belfast traffic. At every major traffic light intersection little camera eyes watch the cars. When TV evening news is slow, the TV stations send somebody to a surveillance centre, where an attendant cop in front of a massive bank of monitor screens explains that these let him check just about every motorist in every car in the city.
Does the interviewer respond by tearing his hair and shouting about a police state? Not a bit. Instead he turns to the camera and congratulates us on having alert authorities who keep such a watchful eye on all our movements.
And there's more. Try having a bouncy weekend with your mistress and you'll leave a trail of electronic spoor as you buy petrol, get money from the bank, pay for a meal. The US authorities have my thumb and finger prints and iris recognition whatsits not once but twice, because I had the nerve to visit that country on two consecutive summers. Use Google mail and watch as the ads down the side of your screen respond to what you're writing and receiving. Every time I send a message mentioning Sammy Wilson's naturist tendencies, I get peppered with offers of cheap weekends at Hotel Gettemoff. Big Google Brother is watching me.
And then there's Google Earth. Thanks to it I now know how many daisies grow in the top-left-hand corner of my neighbour's garden. Try it - it's a free internet download and its camera-in-the-sky will take you within feet of most addresses in the world. And if we can check things out with the Google Earth satellite camera for nothing, just think what the big boys with the professional gear can do.
You're going to close your bedroom curtains from now on? Too late.
They've got lenses that can look through them and record if you've clipped your toenails.
Sadiq Khan is said to be not just annoyed but seriously smart too, a rising star in the Labour Party. If he was genuinely upset about a microphone in a hollowed-out table leg, then God help the Labour Party.
Thursday, February 07, 2008
Muslim MP Sadiq Khan is very upset. During visits to a constituent in Woodhill prison a couple of years ago, his conversations were secretly recorded by Scotland Yard's anti-terrorist squad. The boys in blue inserted a microphone into a hollowed-out 'talking table' and recorded every word exchanged between Mr Khan and Babar Ahmad, who was facing deportation to the US.
A friend of Mr Khan's has described the bugging as "f---ing outrageous" and demanded: "If he was not a Muslim MP would they be doing this?"
Andrew MacKinlay, a Labour colleague of Khan's, takes a similar line: "It is totally unacceptable that MPs' conversation with constituents are bugged by the security services or the police. It is an affront to democracy and has all the hallmarks of a totalitarian regime".
Even Tom King, former Secretary of State here, was incensed, saying it was the kind of conduct you'd expect in Zimbabwe, not Britain. Latest word is there's to be an inquiry into the incident.
Excuse me - I'm going to have to put the cat out. He's in a laughing fit that could end in asphyxiation.
In December 1999, two MPs - Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness - complained that the car in which they had been travelling to and from Stormont had been bugged, and they produced a large listening device in support of what they said.
The reaction? Some jokes about the size of the device and then ¿ nothing.
The government, the security services, fellow-MPs like Mr MacKinlay - not a peep of protest or apology.
As for inquiry - geddoutahere. Messrs Adams and McGuinness were - are - republicans and might have been plotting something violent with the IRA. You have to bug people like that. Don't you?
Mmm. Except that's exactly the kind of argument behind the bugging of Mr Khan.
He is a Muslim, he was visiting a fellow-Muslim the US authorities wanted for questioning about running a pro-Taliban website, so the anti-terrorist people thought they'd better run their slide-rule over him. In other words, it's " f***ing outrageous" to bug MPs in Britain, but in Ireland, hey, anything goes.
And, of course, you don't have to be an MP to get bugged this side of the Irish Sea.
In 1999, it was revealed that for several years the British government used a listening station at Capenhurst, Cheshire, to monitor thousands of communications every hour - fax messages, emails, telexes and data communications - including communications by the Irish government and Irish businessmen.
But that was the Troubles time and things have changed, right? They have indeed.
Now, surveillance is far more widespread and we seem proud we're being monitored. Take Belfast traffic. At every major traffic light intersection little camera eyes watch the cars. When TV evening news is slow, the TV stations send somebody to a surveillance centre, where an attendant cop in front of a massive bank of monitor screens explains that these let him check just about every motorist in every car in the city.
Does the interviewer respond by tearing his hair and shouting about a police state? Not a bit. Instead he turns to the camera and congratulates us on having alert authorities who keep such a watchful eye on all our movements.
And there's more. Try having a bouncy weekend with your mistress and you'll leave a trail of electronic spoor as you buy petrol, get money from the bank, pay for a meal. The US authorities have my thumb and finger prints and iris recognition whatsits not once but twice, because I had the nerve to visit that country on two consecutive summers. Use Google mail and watch as the ads down the side of your screen respond to what you're writing and receiving. Every time I send a message mentioning Sammy Wilson's naturist tendencies, I get peppered with offers of cheap weekends at Hotel Gettemoff. Big Google Brother is watching me.
And then there's Google Earth. Thanks to it I now know how many daisies grow in the top-left-hand corner of my neighbour's garden. Try it - it's a free internet download and its camera-in-the-sky will take you within feet of most addresses in the world. And if we can check things out with the Google Earth satellite camera for nothing, just think what the big boys with the professional gear can do.
You're going to close your bedroom curtains from now on? Too late.
They've got lenses that can look through them and record if you've clipped your toenails.
Sadiq Khan is said to be not just annoyed but seriously smart too, a rising star in the Labour Party. If he was genuinely upset about a microphone in a hollowed-out table leg, then God help the Labour Party.