Quote of the day
“There are insufficient checks and balances to prevent people’s sex lives being habitually monitored by state bureaucrats”
- Eric Pickles, Shadow Secretary for Communities and Local Government, on learning that council officials camp outside people’s homes and watch their cars to check on those who claim a council tax discount for living alone
But what is Eric doing to stop Tory controlled Councils from misusing this legislation? Walsall Council, in the West Midlands, has used the RIPA powers nearly 1,000 times in the 7 years it has been law, to spy on staff off sick, including filming them through the windows of their own homes, and God knows how many other non-criminal activities. And now Dominic Grieve wants to do away with all the ‘unnecessary bureaucracy’ that allows people to find out who has been monitoring them by using the FoI Act.
Whether Walsall Council is right or wrong, there’s a bloody big difference between a council spying on the public and spying on its own employees. The latter can always choose to change jobs; the former have no choice in the matter.
Bob,
There would be no need for the bureaucracy of recording who they were spying on if the legislation permitting intrusive observation and recording had not been passed or the government and courts had challenging its use outside the “serious terrorist acts” that were that legislation’s justification.
Bob, I am not absolving Conservative councils of responsibility for some of this appalling intrusion. As Robert D says, the fact that legislation allows them to do this in the first place is the problem and given this sort of power, it is no surprise that many councils are behaving in this way.
The bureaucracy issue is a separate one because Dominic Grieve was arguing that surveillance should not be so laden with excessive paperwork that the police are discouraged from pursuing criminals.
Ah, yes. I needed to be reminded that school’s out.
Barmy Bobby Piper’s ‘But Sir! The other kids are doing it too..!’ was just nicely timed…
If people are so tight fisted they lie about their living arrangements to save a few quid of council tax then they should be filmed at it and the results posted on youtube.
Why do the tories always seem to side with the persistent petty middle class criminals?
But they aren’t bahtat.
My sister in-law was fined for returning home to look after her dad who had caught MRS in Lewisham hospital for the second time after cancer treatment.
Lewisham council said he had not notified them of a change of status in his council house and as her car had been seen outside the house for a few days, and was not registered to the address they said she must be living there.
This is his own daughter, coming from abroad, threatened with court action.
She paid whatever it was they wanted just to keep the old man’s stress down.
Regards the council doing it I guess they have to collect evidence.Impossible to prosecute without.
What’s barmy is the lack of priority in deciding who to tackle. Isn’t Lewisham the council where many council houses are sub-let to someone else?
I think it all comes down to how far we as society are willing to let civil liberties be eroded to help law enforcement.
I would like to think that there are better solutions than camping outside people’s homes and filming them in an attempt to catch them out (as in Bill’s example), but people should certainly not be let off lightly for dodging council tax.
LFaT, I agree with you, and I have said repeatedly, although it hasn’t got through to batty Jules, this legislation is absolutely wrong.
But Grieve and Pickles can’t change the legislation…. they can take steps to stop Tory councils misusing it though. The fact that they haven’t, speaks volumes.
David, Walsall hasn’t just used it to snoop on its sick employees, they just refuse to answer a FoI request about the other uses.
If nobody will check whether I am entitled to claim a single person’s discount, I might as well claim it!
PS Bob, I fail to see why you are complaining. We’ve got to pay for all those hard-working Brothers and Sisters in local councils one way or another.