It has always been a mystery to me as to why each Labour administration since 1997 has felt the need to restrict our freedoms to such an excessive degree in order to counter the threat of terrorism. Between 1939 and 1945 Germany and her allies tried at first to bomb and when that failed, starve these islands into submission. The Government of that time faced the real threat of our liberties being ground underfoot for ever by the second vilest tyranny spawned during the twentieth century. Yet the Labour Government seeks measures equal to and in some respects in excess of those implemented by the Governments of either Neville Chamberlain or Winston Churchill. A few hundred homicidal miscreants conspiring to blow up a bus station here, a club there or the odd shopping centre anywhere, cannot pose the same threat as did genocidal Nazi Germany.
As says Henry Porter,
“Is it simply that the fear of terrorism has stunned us? The threat is genuine and the government is right to step up some security measures, but let us put it into perspective by reminding ourselves that in the period since 7/7, about 6,000 people have been killed on our roads. And let's not forget the bombings, assassinations, sieges, machine-gunning of restaurants and slaughter that occurred on mainland Britain during the IRA campaign. We survived these without giving up our freedoms.”
The sub-heading of Mr Porter’s article protests,
“A few journalists and MPs are prepared to fight the government's sinister anti-libertarianism. More people should join them.”
Excessive security measures have little if any significant, beneficial effect. They are afflicted by the law of diminishing returns. No matter how much the Government restricts our freedoms in the name of security, somehow, somewhere, an outrage will be committed. Even before New Labour’s tinkering with our liberties, our security services possessed sufficient powers to protect us against reasonably foreseeable threats from our enemies. Occasionally, in the name of their cause, homicidal criminal elements are going to manage to kill some of us. The public understands that, but the Government it seems, does not. At the end of the day, it comes down to our willingness to take casualties, come what may. For the sake of our liberties, I for one, think we’re up for it.