I could never be a politician. The Queen’s Speech today included a Lords Reform Bill, Draft Communications Data Bill, Banking Reform Bill, Energy Bill, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Bill, Children and Families Bill, Pensions and Public Service Pensions Bill, Crime and Courts Bill, Croatia Accession Bill, Electoral Registration and Administration Bill, Defamation Bill, European Union (Approval of Treaty Amendment Decision) Bill, Groceries Code Adjudicator Bill, Justice and Security Bill, Small Donations Bill together with Draft Draft Care and Support, Local Audit and Water Bills and Carry Over Bills on Civil Aviation, Financial Services, Finance (No. 4), Local Government Finance and Trusts (Capital and Income).
I’ve listed them in one long string for effect. I guess I must be interested in the outcomes of some of them as they affect me – comms data for one. It has to take a very particular sort of person to want to become a politician. We pay politicians to sort this stuff out but do have to keep an eye on them because as we all know they can get a bit out of control.
The Communications Data Bill which caused such a lot of fuss a few weeks ago when it was leaked to the Sunday Times that it would include surveillance seems to not be getting any attention in the media today with things like Lords Reform hitting the headlines.
This must be remedied. We must rally the troops, man the battlements. In fact I think Shakespeare foresaw all this as you will see from this early version of another monarch’s speech:
Scene 1. France. Before Harfleur (Life of King Henry 5th)
Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more;
Or close the web up with our English censorship.
In peace there’s nothing so becomes a man
As modest browsing in the privacy of his own home: