Dame Stella Rimington is in the news today attacking the government’s postition regarding data  retention.  This is in tune with comments previously made on this blog.

I sympathise with the need to guard against terrorism but you do get the feeling that we are moving backwards. When I was growing up we were hit with propaganda about the communist enemy.  A police state where people were frequently spied upon just in case they had views that were contrary to official policy.  Increased levels of surveillance in order to catch terrorists is undoubtedly going to impact on many innocent lives. If we are not careful we will end up mimicking the police states that we were cricisising not so long ago.