Pilots make unhappy guinea pigs

The Independent reports that airline pilots may strike rather than be forced to accept a voluntary ID Card.

The article also highlights airline resistance to the scheme; the British Air Transport Association, which represents British Airways, Virgin Atlantic and others, summed up the scheme as a ‘dubious PR initiative by the Government and one that fails to offer any real benefits’.

The Identity and Passport Service were quick to provide this retort, lacking explanation and potentially contradictory:

Identity cards will directly benefit airside workers – not just by improving personnel security, but also by speeding up pre-employment checks and increasing the efficiency of pass-issuing arrangements.

So forcing the card on airside workers will apparently:

1. Improve Personnel Security - As I noted previously these guinea pigs already go through a more stringent security check before they are cleared for working airside. If you’ve got any sort of criminal record you’re a no-go as far as getting a pass is concerned. This does not apply of course if you are a foreign terrorist. You might think tightening that up would be more of a priority.
2. Speed up pre-employment checks - the only way I could see this speeding up pre-employment checks is if you ignore the time it takes to get an ID Card when applying to work airside. But these workers will have to go through the process in addition to current checks, making this a nonsense. The only way this statement can be true is if the ID Card replaces part of the current checks, which (given it requires a less stringent character assessment) would surely reduce security (see point 1)?
3. Make it easier to have a pass reissued - I thought we were improving security (point 1), not making it easier to get a pass airside?

At best, the quote is just nonsense, not argument.

This is becoming increasingly frustrating. Setting the arguments about personal liberty aside, money is being spent every day on putting this scheme in place. Given the likelihood of a Conservative victory at the next general election the scheme seems doomed. This begs the question: who would bid to work on a doomed scheme? I can’t help but worry that any company with any sense would want considerable security in their contract, burdening the country with some of the costs of the scheme even if the Tories bring it to an end. Labour need to drop it now, to do otherwise is the height of irresponsibility.

In related news, the Identity & Passport Service says there will be an additional cost of £29 to the individual on top of the £30 they’d already admitted to. Why has the price doubled? A shocking revelation: the cards will have biometric details on them. I thought that was the whole point, but it apparently hadn’t been costed. The Home Office are keen to stress the cost is an estimate - in such circumstances one suspects that means it’s a conservative one.

In an increasingly tight economic climate, why is Labour still pushing a fixed tax that will hit the poor hard for no real benefit? Is the Party really so far removed from the electorate and its founding principles? How has it got here?

Answers on a postcard (or in the comments box).

Cold War Modern

I recently managed to go to a fantastic exhibition at the Victoria & Albert Museum called Cold War Modern. I’m interested in both the Cold War and design so it was interesting to see how each affected the other. The competition between East and West drove a period of significant progress and promises of a utopian future, best encapsulated by the race into space. There was a Sputnik replica at the entrance to the exhibition (which I managed to miss and had to go back to see!) as well as lots of other interesting design icons.

It was interesting to see the way the climate had affected design and vice versa: how design had been used to push Western and Eastern ideals. My favourite example from the exhibition was the comparison of Stalinallee in Eastern Berlin with Interbau in the West.

Architecture in Stalinallee, now Karl-Marx-Allee. Photo by Mishkabear.

The architecture of Interbau is different, but with similar objectives. Photo by seier+seier+seier.

The V&A is a fantastic museum in itself and I only saw a small fraction of it whilst there. There’s no charge for admission to the museum, although you need to buy a ticket to get in to the exhibition. Cold War Modern is open until the 11th of January.

The strange world of Jacqui Smith

We’ve been provided with a new insight into the strange world that Jacqui Smith inhabits today.  The National ID Card Scheme will be available to most punters in 2012, but Smith says Joe the Plumber is even keener than that:

I regularly have people coming up to me and saying they don’t want to wait that long.

What strange world does Jacqui inhabit where she meets anybody who wants to pay an extra flat-rate tax for the privilege of being deprived of their liberty? Certainly not one inhabited by airport staff, the poor lot who’ve been selected to volunteer as the scheme’s ‘guinea pigs’ - they found the idea insulting. The logic is a bit confusing: they’re already some of the most stringently vetted people in the country, why should they have to go through a lower-level security check and carry another form of identification?

In other related news, someone has nabbed Jacqui’s biometrics, without resorting to Jack Bauer tactics and taking her arm at the same time. Jacqui could take solace in the fact that her ID Card is ‘fakeproof’, making the biometric data useless. She’d be wrong of course, with the ID Card bearing a striking technological resemblance to the biometric passport, but that hasn’t stopped her yet.

iPie

I made an apple pie today with an Apple logo on top. I’m not a nerd, honest!

42 days detention thrown out by Lords

Good to be rid of this, although it leaves me wondering whether the political maneuvering (whatever it was) used to get it through the Commons in the first place was really worth it. Also, I’m happy that I was wrong last week when I said I thought the Parliament Act would be used to get the Bill through.

It has been suggested that the idea will become a ‘dividing line‘ at the next general election. With potentially fifty current Labour MPs not too keen on the idea it could be a controversial manifesto promise.

42 Days Detention Petition

Plenty of people have already made clear that they’re not a fan of detaining people for six weeks without sufficient evidence to charge them, some examples:

• Sir Ken Macdonald, the director of public prosecutions
• Lord Lyell and The Lords constitution committee
• Lord Goldsmith, former Attorney General
• The joint select committee on human rights (whose chairman said the extension ‘would almost certainly not be lawful’)
• Lady Manningham-Buller, former head of MI5
• Davis Davis MP, who resigned from the Commons, triggering a by-election from which the government fled
• The Conservative Party, the Liberal Democrat Party and thirty-six Labour Rebels

I think that the majority of people, if they thought about it, would agree with what those people have to say. I do not think that the arguments raised in favour of the proposal, which remain extremely vague, limited perhaps to ‘doing the right thing’ and ‘getting the baddies’, can justify the erosion in liberty the move represents. On the contrary, I think the move risks making it more difficult to convict genuine terrorists.

Sir Ken McDonald suggests there is no need for the measure at all: ‘For our part as prosecutors, we don’t perceive any need for the period of 28 days to be increased. Our experience has been that we have managed comfortably within 28 days.’ I was asked yesterday what the problem was if it wasn’t going to be used. The problem is that the government of today may not make much use of an extended period of detention, but that liberty will have already been given away. Given the never-ending nature of fighting a war against a tactic (terrorism), there is little reason to think of this as a temporary measure. If you take the argument further, and believe the move will incite extremism, then it can be seen as completely counter-productive.

I do not think the Bill will survive the House of Lords. When the Lords reject it, Labour will paint the picture once again of the unelected aristocracy getting in the way of what the public wants. They will try to use the Parliament Act to force the Bill on to the statute book.

I do not think it is what the public wants. It is not what I want, which is why I have signed this Amnesty International Petition. I have also spoken to my MP. If you feel the same way, why not write to yours?

Wandering clouds

This is now a touch belated, but still relevant, particularly for all my fellow graduates. When I was vacation scheming down in London I kept seeing this poem (or rather, this excerpt) on the Underground. I liked it, particularly the sentiment of the last line.

Now free,
Free as a bird to settle where I will.
What dwelling shall receive me? in what vale
Shall be my harbour? underneath what grove
Shall I take up my home? and what clear stream
Shall with its murmur lull me into rest?

The earth is all before me. With a heart
Joyous, nor scared at its own liberty,
I look about; and should the chosen guide
Be nothing better than a wandering cloud,
I cannot miss my way.

from The Prelude, William Wordsworth

Elbow win Mercury Music Prize

I was pleased when I saw that Elbow was nominated for the Mercury Prize.  Despite the band’s consistent critical acclaim, they have never been able to break into the mainstream.  I went to see them at the Leeds Met Union earlier this year, and although it is a nice enough venue it seemed wholly inappropriate to the scale of the music.  I felt privileged to have seen them at such an intimate venue, and suspect that will no longer be the norm for them.

Anyway - I didn’t really expect them to win the Mercury Prize, but, through their latest album, The Seldom Seen Kid, they have.  If you’re just discovering the band, now is a great time to start listening.  Below are my recommendations on where to start.  I’ve also made a last.fm playlist, from where you should be able to play all of these for free.

Without a doubt, my favourite track on that album is Grounds for Divorce; it’s gritty, noisy: fantastic fun.  Also excellent is The Bones Of You.  If you want a more ‘tender’ song, both Mirrorball and The Loneliness Of A Tower Crane Driver are achingly beautiful.

From earlier albums highlights include Great Expectations and The Leaders Of The Free World (from the album of the same name).  Going back to 2001, Newborn manages to be a real treat for the ears, and touchingly warm, despite having the opening line “I’ll be the corpse in your bathtub”.

The band has a rich and varied back-catalogue; this is only a flavour of what’s available.  Go check them out!

42-days detention: the Lords’ mauling begins

It was inevitable that Parliament’s scrutiny body would rip the 42-days legislation to shreds.  I wish I could say that it is not really a fair fight - that the arguments against the proposals have always been so strong that it’s a bit like watching a cat play with its food.  Sadly, as identified by Lord Lyell speaking on the Today programme this morning, the debate in the Commons was largely a party-political one; the merits of the legislation not really what was discussed.

The all-party Lords constitution committee has dealt the first blow not to the proposal itself but to the ’safeguards’ that Home Secretary Jacqui Smith offered.  The committee complains of the ‘muddling’ involved in giving Parliament a Judicial role for which they are ‘institutionally ill-equipped’.

The problem is essentially that, where the prolonged detention of an individual is sought, Parliament will be presented with an incomplete picture of why the individual should be detained.  They will not, for example, know that individual’s name.  Of course, another reason why they cannot be presented with much evidence is that by definition it will be lacking: if there was evidence that the person was involved in terrorism, they could be charged.

On the basis of that incomplete picture, the Commons will have to vote to decide whether or not the individual might be so dangerous as to warrant further detention.  Were you an MP, would you want to vote against the advice of the security services and be accused of risking the lives of your constituents?  Following that vote, days or even hours afterwards, a Judge will have to make the same decision, which will by then have the weight of not only the security services’ opinion but a vote by Parliament declaring the individual to be dangerous.

How can a Judge operate independently when asked to make a decision in such circumstances, with little evidence on which to base their opinion?  If the individual is later charged, how can they expect a fair trial when they have already been declared dangerous by the security services, Parliament and a Judge?

The answer to both questions is that they cannot.  The decision as to whether to detain someone should not be open to any sort of political pressure.  It must be made by an independent court, who must ask whether there is sufficient evidence to determine that the individual has broken the law.  There is no way to fit detention without charge into that mold.

Radiohead Videos

I’ve just stumbled across a couple of excellent Radiohead music videos produced by Gastón Viñas.

The first is potentially not safe for work, but brilliant: 2+2=5.

The 2+2=5 video has obvious Animal Farm references; particularly interesting since lyrically there are clear links with Orwell’s 1984. Also, some of the artwork in A Wolf At The Door is simply fantastic. I particularly like the image included at the top of this post, a print of which is available from DeviantArt.