A Gareth Epps Sized Lib Dem Conference Security Farce

I've been following with some incredulity this evening an astonishing exchange of messages on Facebook between Gareth Epps and the Chair of the Liberal Democrat Federal Conference Committee (FCC), Andrew Wiseman.

A few days ago, I received an e-mail that said:

"Dear Mark, just to confirm, we have received information from Greater Manchester Police that you have been successfully accredited for the upcoming Liberal Democrat Autumn Conference 2011. Your conference pass will be posted to you in September".

My e-mail response to the Lib Dem conference office was this:

"It's good to know. I was worried my past in the Colombian rainforests would come back to bite me. Maybe next year?"

The additional security measures at this year's conference has been met with hostility by a great number of long-standing liberals who deem the illiberal measures enacted for this September's Birmingham conference as a front against our civil liberties.

I sympathise with the sentiment and feel that having been a regular voting conference attendee, as designated by my local party for nearly a decade now, the concept of being 'checked out' by the police to ensure that I am suitable to attend is pretty demeaning.

But then I suppose I should count my blessings because at least I've been given permission to attend.

Gareth Epps
The same can not be said for many long-standing members who have had difficulties with their accreditation. Despite having paid for accommodation and planned for travel months in advance, delegates are now facing the uncertainty of whether they can attend or not.

Gareth Epps

More so, hundreds of already paid-up delegates are still awaiting news from Greater Manchester Police and are therefore in a state of limbo with only 2 weeks to go.

Gareth Epps is one of those in the former category and anyone who knows him realises what a ludicrous situation this is. Andrew Wiseman the FCC Chair has reacted on Gareth's Facebook wall tonight in a very matter of fact way which has not helped matters. Complaints that Gareth hasn't been sending the right passport style photo through to the conference office is missing the point entirely. Gareth Epps is a long-standing and well known Liberal Democrat activist, Federal Committee member and PPC (and nearly an MP in Reading for his efforts). He's opinionated, passionate in his views and is also very importantly, a keen member of the conference Glee Club.

Gareth Epps you could almost say is your stereotypical Liberal Democrat conference delegate for crying out loud and he's being refused entry now not only apparently by the police but by our own conference committee! If this can happen to someone like Gareth Epps who has the stomach to raise his voice and fight back against the authorities and these draconian measures, what about the quieter members who may not be so confident to challenge these dubious decisions? How many delegates may end up missing the conference because of these ill-conceived measures?

It is a complete and utter bloody farce.

Andrew Wiseman and his committee need to sort this out with a cold, sharp dose of common sense. If the likes of Gareth aren't able to enter conference, there'll be a blood-bath on the conference floor in the debate on this very issue on Sunday morning and it will be the members of the FCC that will be scrapped off the walls.

Liberty Vs Security - Lib Dems get Detention without Charge Progress

An issue of much discussion within the Coalition government seems to have found a reasonable compromise as the BBC News website reports here.

Detention without Charge
Home Office Minister Damian Green announced in the House of Commons this morning that the Government is not intending to maintain the 28-day limit to detain terror suspects without charge when its 6 month extension lapses next Tuesday. Instead, it will revert back to 14 days. Home Secretary Theresa May is to report fully on anti-terror measures in Parliament next Wednesday.



The Liberal Democrats campaigned to reduce the limit after Labour in Government continued to increase it and in doing so, erode fundamental liberties in the name of security. Indeed, in November 2005, Tony Blair suffered his first ever Commons defeat as Prime Minister after 8 years, when he tried to increase the limit to a mind-boggling 90 days. How would you like to be detained for 3 months without charge? Well thankfully, 49 Labour MPs rebelled against their leader and the amendment was lost by 322-291 votes. The 28 days amendment won the day by the similarly narrow margin of 323-290 votes.

Control Orders
In the wider debate, there is a power struggle going on within the coalition between the securocrats and those who deem a re-balancing between liberty and security as essential.

This decision is most certainly a step in the right direction. Personally, I think 14 days detention without trial is too much. What about the terrorists the securocrats will bellow. Well, what about the fundamental tenet that underpins (or is supposed to underpin) our legal system - that of innocent until proven guilty?

Before jumping onto the security bandwagon, people should ask that question of themselves. How would we like it if a member of our family was detained without charge? Not very nice is it.

It was Benjamin  Franklin who framed it in a way that those who value liberty have failed to better in the 200 years since.

"Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety."

Getting the balance right is of vital importance and the Government's first responsibility is to protect its citizens. But it must also ensure that it protects us from an overwhelmingly powerful state.

We should not wish to be an authoritarian state. Labour got the balance wrong and even their senior members now admit so.

This is not George Orwell's 1984 and I hope it never will be, because what kind of living is that?

Wikileaks - A Right to Know?

Open government. The right to know.

It sounds like an episode of 'Yes Minister' but the revelations made by wikileaks in recent days is much more significant than could ever have been imagined by a Jim Hacker or a Sir Humphrey.

These diplomatic and security revelations that are being made known by this whistle-blowing website are unprecedented and if their word it to be believed, are only the tip of the iceberg.

Here in the UK, top security documents are usually embargoed under the '30 year' rule if not longer. But now, cables from across the world have been leaked to wikileaks and are opening up the murky world of international diplomacy. Suddenly, we now know the intimate opinions of senior world leaders of their counterparts.

They include reports of some Arab leaders - including Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah - urging the US to attack Iran and end its nuclear weapons programme. Other concerns include the security of Pakistani nuclear material that could be used to make an atomic weapon.

In a statement, the White House said: "Such disclosures put at risk our diplomats, intelligence professionals, and people around the world who come to the United States for assistance in promoting democracy and open government."President Obama supports responsible, accountable, and open government at home and around the world, but this reckless and dangerous action runs counter to that goal."

This is the point. Much diplomatic dialogue that occurs, must be behind closed-doors. Individuals and nations, if in possession of the whole truth of a situation at any given time, may make dangerous decisions.

The Northern Ireland Example
An example from recent years comes from Northern Ireland. We now know, years after the time in question, that John Major in his early years as Prime Minister in the early 1990s, opened up channels of communication with Sinn Fein. This was a highly provocative and high-stakes gamble on his part. Sinn Fein after all were the political arm of the IRA which blew up the Conservative Party conference in Brighton in 1984.

If we knew then what we know now, there's no doubt in my mind that pressures would've been put onto him to stop what were tentative attempts to bring the Republicans to the diplomatic table. Had that have been the case, the 1998 Good Friday Agreement may not have been accomplished all those years later. We may now not have had the peaceful political settlement that has come about since 2007.

A Necessary Evil?
Security and diplomacy and future peace are threatened by these revelations. How can such news as we have read of in recent days help us with our dealings with Iran? They can't. It only adds to the tension that already exists.

We are not talking paperclips and clothes hangers as they may have done in the time of Hacker and Humphrey. We're talking of a post-cold war world where it isn't nations, but people within nations who are the threat to society. Nuclear arms have proliferated and great care must be taken when dealing with the leaders of nations and of peoples who have the access to these earth-changing weapons of destruction.

Diplomacy has a rightful place in modern society - indeed even more so than ever. Security also. It therefore imperils us all when such dimplomatic leaks are made public as we have seen this week. The ends do not justify the means in this case.

Wikileaks may mean well but in this case, they've gone way to far or as Sir Humphrey may have put it, "This is the thin end of the wedge".

My Qatar Airlines Seal of Approval

I've seen today on the news that this bomb from Yemen that was contained within a printer, had previously travelled on passenger planes with Qatar Airlines.

That's quite a scary thought. Clearly there's great issues of security continuing to emanate from the Middle East with terror levels being increased back here in the UK as a result.

It's also a sobering thought for me because I've flown on Qatar Airlines in the past. Back in early 2008, I had the great fortune to fly by Qatar Airlines to and from Manchester to Thailand via Doha, in Qatar.

They were very long 7 or so hour flights either side of Doha for a combined flight time of some 14 hours. Combined with the return flight, that's around 28 hours of travel that I've experienced with Qatar Airlines.

I was fortunate to have received a good deal for my return flight as I was under 26 at the time and got a discount. As it was, it was in my experience (and I've flown around a fair bit in all fairness), the best in-flight experience that I've ever encountered.

The service was excellent and the facilities really were first class. The choice of TV channels and music channels that I had on my own individual TV were wide and I had no problem at all in keeping myself occupied for the long travel to and from Thailand.

So it saddens me to hear that one of these bombs from the last week, had travelled on Qatar Airlines. But credit must go to the authorities for intercepting the package when they did.

I for one would love to travel again on Qatar Airlines. Today's honest announcement wouldn't change that. They have my seal of approval.