innerhippy

The new acronym in town (Serious Organised Crime and Police Act, 2005), was given a stern test last night by a bunch of fearsome, aggressive, militant…carol singers. This savage mob of Jinglebellers was attempting to test this ludicrous law to its limits by arranging a gathering of people to sing some carols. The test was whether the Police would interpret this gathering as some kind of "protest" and so chuck everyone in jail. Unfortunately for the blood-thirsty media, the police were far too busy mugging motorists to pay much attention, or just maybe they were told what idiots they'd look had they try to intervene.

Just in case you were not aware, those free spirited parliamentarians that you voted for, decided to create a law that makes any form of protest an offence, within 1/2 mile of the houses of parliament. Oh, unless you obtain prior permission from, erm…the police. Yes, yes, this really is Britain in 2005. I was having a good whinge about it to a hairdresser yesterday during my annual pre-xmas chop, and found he was genuinely quite astonished to hear that this law even existed. I then wondered how many other people live in this world of apathetic, blissful ignorance? Probably far too many. This still doesn't excuse him for giving me possibly the worst haircut I've ever had (and I've had some bad ones, believe me).

So, I thought I'd go and check it out. I managed to infiltrate these almost-protesters by cunningly disguising myself as a bloke who'd just left the office. Clever eh. I obtained a "carol service sheet" (no doubt a coded Al Qaeda training manual) and proceeded to sing deck-the-halls and other assorted gems for the next 60 minutes. My apologies to the lady in the red hat in front of me who's ears were at the same level as my gob. I suspect it was obvious that I hadn't sung a carol for years and her trauma was apparent by her constant necking of whiskey.

Brain Haw was ranting about not being able to rant, the diminutive and gutsy Maya Evans was there looking a bit startled with her recent accent to cause celebre status, there was also a lone hoodie, some young kids (tomorrows hoodies), me (an older hoodie) and the remainder of the 100 or so singers were just…..people, utterly normal people who happen to share a belief that what is happening is wrong. 100 people doesn't sound very much, but perhaps everyone else was too busy doing important stuff, like Christmas shopping or getting hammered at the annual office toe-curling party. But we all have an MP who represents us and a 10 minute letter with a 30p stamp can be surprisingly effective. But apathy's a very debilitating condition and I've found that it does go away if ignored for long enough.

Incidentally, every Sunday there is going to be a picnic outside the houses or parliament. Obviously this won't be a protest or demonstration of any kind. Just a nice little picnic…

So, Charles Clarke's decided not to hold a public enquiry into the 7/7 bombings. One of the most serious terrorist incidents, certainly one of the most significant, ever to take place within these shores and apparently there's nothing to learn from it, no questions need to be answered, no forum considered for grieving relatives or the crippled victims, no racial issues to be addressed, nothing, nothing, nothing. Instead, it will be brushed under the carpet and we're just supposed to accept the government's account of events and circumstances.

Well I'm sorry you big eared control (order) freak, but that's simply not good enough. The track record of accountability, openness and fairness isn't too great under this government. We trusted you with Iraq's WMD and that turned out to be a great big pile of steaming horse manure – you blew all your Trust Credit on that one pal.

So victims groups have called for a public enquiry, so has Iqbal Sacranie from the Muslim Council of Britain, so have both opposition parties, the media, in fact everyone has! So what are you hiding from? What are you determined to keep under wraps? To try and fob us off with some insipid, limp-wristed, wishy-washy "narrative of events" chaired by some government civil servant (can you see the strings?) is staggeringly stupid. This one really will not go away.

The cover-up culture seems to have spread to Jack S-S-S-S-Straw, who recently refused a public enquiry into the UK's involvement in the US's "extraordinary rendition" policy (erm, torture). One of these days the lid will come off this government and we'll all watch in horror as the sleaze slowly oozes out and only then will we really find out how much damage President Blair has done. It feels increasingly like they've already given up the election in 3 years time – so what do they care?

There is a law in this wonderful country that was passed earlier this year that makes demonstrating outside the houses of parliament an arrestable offence. This can be found under section132 of the Serious Organised and Police Act and was brought in specifically against one man, Brain Haw, who has been peacefully protesting against the Iraq invasion outside parliament for the past 4 years. Unfortunately, the government screwed up a bit, and when the act became law, they still couldn't remove him because he'd started his protest beforehand. So Brain is still there protesting legally outside the houses of Parliament – the place which is, ironically, the embodiment of democracy to many.

Today, Maya Evans was found guilty of breaching this odd little law because of her own anti-war protest. This was held at a well known London monument, called the Cenotaph, and involved reciting the names of the British soldiers killed in Iraq, accompanied by the sound of a small bell being struck between each name. You may have noticed that the Cenotaph is indeed a war memorial itself (built in 1919, and is used at a certain time of the year to remember British soldiers who died in a different war), but because she now needs permission to protest within 1/2 mile of Parliament, she was arrested, banged up in a cell for 5 hours and now has to pay court fines. Oh, and she's also now the proud owner of her very own criminal record. I'm not totally convinced that this constitutes Serious Organised crime, but I'm no lawyer so I could be wrong. I also didn't consider Walter Wolfgang too much of a terrorist threat either, but I'm no policeman so what do I know.

And all because Tony Blair can't handle criticism.

In 1933, Chancellor Hitler invoked Article 48 of the Weimar Constitution that permitted the suspension of civil liberties which included the expression of opinion. He didn't particularly like criticism either.

And now we have the Lord Chancellor, Lord Falconer stating that it is ridiculously overdone to claim that free speech is being undermined. I wonder what is his definition of free speech? The fact that this law was made in the first place because of a single person's protest is jaw-dropping. The fact the it has now been used against someone else is stomach-churning. The half mile democracy-free zone is sure to go the same way as Ken Livingston's congestion charge….get bigger…and bigger….and….bigger…

The PMOS (Prime Minister's Official Spokesman) was asked yesterday why the PM's influence over the US was so weak, especially over the sticky issue of Guantanamo Bay. Blair has secured the release of the handful of UK citizens, but the PMOS said that the US was a sovereign country and they would have to take the decisions on this, not us. He also added, "The Prime Minister's position was clear and, as a result of that, certain provisions concerning UK citizens had been made and the rest of it was not a matter for us".

Hang on a minute, what did he say, "not a matter for us". Really? So detaining people without access to basic human rights is ok as long as they're not a UK citizens? What a ridiculous thing to say! Since when did events in foreign countries affecting foreign people prevent us from getting involved (for good or bad reasons)?

It sounds like the poodle has done some token yapping but doesn't have any true conviction on moral issues. Like we didn't know.