𝓤𝓷𝓲𝓽𝓮𝓭 𝓝𝓮𝔀𝓼

This Labour government seems hellbent on rewiring our country in such a way that it will soon be unrecognisable. Recent announcements regarding the introduction of compulsory digital ID, an increased use of facial recognition technology, cancelled mayoral elections and the slashing of trials by jury, will leave people in the UK poorer when it comes to privacy, democracy and justice.

The sum of all these changes is a country where a government, should it wish, will have the tools at its disposal to govern in the most authoritarian of ways. As with all politicians who end up in power and are desperate to hold onto it for as long as they can, such changes are sugar-coated in a way that it is suggested any new measures are being introduced for the good of the country and to benefit us all. But if you stitch them together, we end up with a bleak and frightening picture where the rights and liberties of the individual are seriously eroded.

Sir Keir Starmer’s announcement of digital ID was initially outlined as a way of tackling illegal migration and to ensure that those who should not be in this country would be unable to work. However, various Labour ministers and MPs soon went off script to suggest that it could also be used to access public and financial services.

You do not have to take too many more steps before you can see how digital ID could be used as a tool of suppression by any government who wished to control vast chunks of the population for any given reason.

If you think I am dangerously close to becoming a nutjob conspiracy theorist sitting under a table and wearing a tinfoil hat; just remember it was only five years ago that our rights and freedoms were seriously curtailed during the Covid pandemic. In a world of digital ID, it would be perfectly feasible to stop people going somewhere if their online records revealed that they had refused to have a jab or they had defied the government’s instructions.

Aside from the concerns of the possible abuses of power, there is also the ever-present threat of personal data being hacked which further puts the individual at risk. The last 12 months have been littered with headlines involving countries, companies and organisations that have been hacked and their data accessed or held to ransom.

Police in various parts of the country are increasing their use of facial recognition technology which effectively turns everyone into a suspect. This menacing form of technology creates a ‘faceprint’ of everyone that walks past a camera and scans it accordingly.

Police have received new facial recognition vans in Greater Manchester, West Yorkshire, Bedfordshire, Surrey, Sussex, Thames Valley and Hampshire with more to follow. Supporters say it is a useful tool in catching those wanted by the authorities who may have avoided apprehension or detection to date.

Regardless of this argument, the fact remains that a digital record is created by anyone caught in the scope of a facial recognition camera with no guarantees that this sensitive data will not be abused in the future.

The announcement that new mayoral elections in 2026 are to be cancelled and not held for a further TWO years shows utter contempt for democracy. Millions of voters across the areas of Greater Essex, Norfolk and Suffolk, Sussex and Brighton, and Hampshire and the Solent, have now been disenfranchised. Elections are only ever cancelled during times of national emergency, such as a country at war, for example.

The government says the cancellation is due to it needing more time for local government reorganisation as part of its devolution agenda, though cynics rightly point out that Labour looked set to lose all the elections it has just cancelled and has acted within its own political self-interest.

Cancelling elections in Great Britain – home of the ‘Mother of Parliaments’ and a form of democratic governance followed by countries around the world – is a bitter blow to democracy and sets an unsavoury precedent.

Justice Secretary David Lammy’s announcement that those facing jail terms under three years including theft, fraud, burglary and some sex crimes will lose the 800-year-old right to be tried by twelve peers strips away a fundamental right when it comes to British justice.

Lammy says that the new proposals would help reduce a courts backlog, but removing juries and giving greater powers to judges is fraught with danger – especially when there are judges who behave more like activists than impartial arbitrators of the law.

Put together, these changes feel both seismic and sinister. We must take a stand and oppose them at every level.