Friday, January 21, 2005
Rant No 2
Unpaid secret policeman or whatever happened to the rule of law?
I've just come into contact with a change to employment law that took place last year. I now have to ask every candidate for a job to provide proof that they have the right to work in the UK. Yes, that's right, people born here have to bring along a passport (or failing that an official document with their National Insurance number plus their full birth certificate - the one that names both parents). It sems that this is so very important to stop people working illicitly here, and that it's so important to stop illegal workers that all 60 million Britons are assumed to be lying cheats unless they prove otherwise. Nice.
You may think this is not much of a problem. After all, most people have a passport or a P60 plus their birth certificate. But think for a moment - do you want to be living in the kind of society where your papers are demanded just so you can go for a job interview? Doesn't that sound familiar? Like South Africa in the days of Apartheid or one of the states of Eastern Europe before the collapse of the Soviet Union. An ongoing requirement to prove your identity to agents of the state.
And brilliantly it co-opts employers as police informers. It's the employer who is liable to prosecution for failing to make these checks, so effectively we have been conscripted as unpaid secret policemen spying on the working population for the government.
What's more, it completely inverts a basic principle of British justice: that one is innocent until proven guilty. Here one is assumed to be guilty until once can prove one's innocence, a concept which strikes at the core of . It's hard to believe that the government that passed such (another) illiberal measure is filled with lawyers, many of whom made their reputations (when in Opposition) mouthing off about human rights. And all you need to do to get away with despicable legislation like this is to dress it up as a measure to control migrant workers - and the Tories just roll over to have their tummies tickled. You call that an Opposition? Cos I don't. The question of to what extent they need to be controlled (rather than protected from exploitation) will be addressed later.
It is perhaps not surprising that 'New Labour' are capable of such stupidities. They seem not just to have no respect for tradition (their own or anybody else's), but to actively despise anything that isn't new. Yet it is shared tradition (or culture if you like) that holds society together, that indeed creates a society. Here once again we see though we can see a view of Britain where it is the state, not the citizens, that is all important; the state which doles out bits of freedom to the citizens, rather than citizens giving up bits of their own freedom to the state for collective reasons; and the state which decides what is best for everyone.
Sometimes I don't know where to turn. We've drifted into an authoritarian nanny state, and seem to lack the will to do anything about it. Let Down by Labour, can't Trust the Tories - what's a boy to do?
Up next: Say No to ID Cards - the spy in your wallet.
I've just come into contact with a change to employment law that took place last year. I now have to ask every candidate for a job to provide proof that they have the right to work in the UK. Yes, that's right, people born here have to bring along a passport (or failing that an official document with their National Insurance number plus their full birth certificate - the one that names both parents). It sems that this is so very important to stop people working illicitly here, and that it's so important to stop illegal workers that all 60 million Britons are assumed to be lying cheats unless they prove otherwise. Nice.
You may think this is not much of a problem. After all, most people have a passport or a P60 plus their birth certificate. But think for a moment - do you want to be living in the kind of society where your papers are demanded just so you can go for a job interview? Doesn't that sound familiar? Like South Africa in the days of Apartheid or one of the states of Eastern Europe before the collapse of the Soviet Union. An ongoing requirement to prove your identity to agents of the state.
And brilliantly it co-opts employers as police informers. It's the employer who is liable to prosecution for failing to make these checks, so effectively we have been conscripted as unpaid secret policemen spying on the working population for the government.
What's more, it completely inverts a basic principle of British justice: that one is innocent until proven guilty. Here one is assumed to be guilty until once can prove one's innocence, a concept which strikes at the core of . It's hard to believe that the government that passed such (another) illiberal measure is filled with lawyers, many of whom made their reputations (when in Opposition) mouthing off about human rights. And all you need to do to get away with despicable legislation like this is to dress it up as a measure to control migrant workers - and the Tories just roll over to have their tummies tickled. You call that an Opposition? Cos I don't. The question of to what extent they need to be controlled (rather than protected from exploitation) will be addressed later.
It is perhaps not surprising that 'New Labour' are capable of such stupidities. They seem not just to have no respect for tradition (their own or anybody else's), but to actively despise anything that isn't new. Yet it is shared tradition (or culture if you like) that holds society together, that indeed creates a society. Here once again we see though we can see a view of Britain where it is the state, not the citizens, that is all important; the state which doles out bits of freedom to the citizens, rather than citizens giving up bits of their own freedom to the state for collective reasons; and the state which decides what is best for everyone.
Sometimes I don't know where to turn. We've drifted into an authoritarian nanny state, and seem to lack the will to do anything about it. Let Down by Labour, can't Trust the Tories - what's a boy to do?
Up next: Say No to ID Cards - the spy in your wallet.
# posted by MaxG @ 1:42 PM 
