david davies ..forces by-election over 42 days detention..

[DeeRiguer]

omg
he came over all habeus corpus and onto id cards and cctv lost records the lot
does he mn??

i was almost proud to be british when i heard bits of his speech
i cant beleive someone is doing something about this...

Oh and if you are interested in civil liberties in general, Corey Doctorow has recently released an excellent book called Little Brother. It's supposedly teen fiction, but I really enjoyed it - it's futuristic, but not set that far in the future and is all about the aftermath of a terrorist attack in San Fransisco where surveillance of the ordinary citizen gets to Orwellian proportions overnight (and given current news stories, eminently believable).

You can download the pdf of the entire book free before deciding whether to buy or borrow the dead tree version on the author's website

I am completely against the 42 day detention thing. So much so that I am seriously asking myself whether I can ever vote Labour again, having voted Labour all my adult life.

But I can't stand Davis. He is my parents' local MP. And such a defender of free speech that he threatened to sue my brother, who was then still at school, for libel over a mildly critical letter that my brother had written to the local paper.

What I am going to do is join Liberty.

Howden and Haltemprice is a very conservative (and not in a defending liberty kind of way) place. I think he will be re-elected because he is popular, but not because local people are anti the 42 days, iyswim.

Bloody hell, sixspot.

He may be a bastard, but he's right about 42 days so I shall support him on that.

As it happens, my local MP is someone with a history of being a bastard, was a minister in the Thatcher government who did some terrible things. Oddly enough he seems to have reformed and is now a v. good constituency MP whose record on civil liberties is impeccable, even when it hasn't been Tory policy. Guess it's easier to be a good guy when your party is out of office and there's no chance of being a minister. Either that or he has had the sort of Damascene conversion that his mate Portillo had.

Am very happy to support him on the limited issue of 42 days.

I should not let my personal feelings about the man get in the way.

I wonder to what extent his personal feelings about having been beaten by Cameron for the leadership affect him, though?

Well, that's very good of you, sixspot, and I'm not being sarcastic - you have very good reason to despise the man.

I'm finding it very amusing at how party politics has become so confused. This DD matter is really highlighting that fact.

Edam - with all due respect, I think your ancestors would find the current Labour party unrecognisable as anything they battled to be free to support.

edam - my brother is a journalist, so his brush with DD didn't put him off expressing himself!

wrinklytum - are you in Howden?

Yes, I was a determinedly loyal Labour Party supporter until a few years into the Blair regime. My loyalty tapered off gradually and then came to a total and irreversable end with the invasion of Iraq.

I still couldn't bring myself to vote Tory because of the memory of the Thatcher years but, realistically, I don't thik that the Conservative Party is really any less deserving of support than the Labour Party any more. They are equally centrist and opportunist.

I heard Kelvin Mckenzie on Radio 4 this morning talking about why he was going to oppose DD.

Came down to "because Rupert Murdoch told me too"

and

"who cares about civil liberties anywhere when there are terrorists around?"

Twat.

What worries me is that people will actually believe him because they are too thick too understand what's truly at stake. The fact that a majority of people currently appear to be in favour of 42 days would sort of underline this point.

Swedes could not agree more - this will be a good thing if it gets anybody tolook at what each party stands for rather than clinging to last century left v. right agenda. Really think that debate is now more about authoritarianism v. pro-liberty. Need to find balance between freedom and justice/social welfare iykwim.

kelvin mckenzie article here

no sense for a member of the opposition to resign over this. what would happen if every opposition mp did this whenever a bill was passed that they didnt approve of? surely, from dd's pov, the most effective way of changing things would be to ensure that the tories won the next election, he becomes home secretary and lo! he can change things. what is resigning now and standing again as a conservative candidate (not an indie) going to acheive?

six spot am so with you that this by-election will have nothing to do with 42-days. it will be about people paying too much for petrol. a matter that alarms people a lot more than the war on iraq ever did .

I still want to know where this "majority of the population in favour of the 42 days" are. I've not met a single person who is - and that includes the reactionaries at work.

800 years of history and cornerstone of the British constitution or short term price of petrol??

Really, it depresses me beyond words. This is what happens when a large section of the population gets its news from Heat magazine or the cover of The Sun.

The Kelvin Mckenzie intervention really is depressing. On R4 this morning he didn't really seem to want to use the opportunity to debate the 42 days detention. He made a couple of thoughtless comments about civil liberties not mattering when there are bombs around and more or less admitted that he was doing this as a form of publicity for The Sun.

He could at least pretend to care seriously about the issues. It's not as if there isn't any case to be made in favour of 42 days (even if the case is a poor one).

My opinion of the current government sank even lower when I heard they had to bribe the Irish Mps etc. to force the 42 day vote through.. If the House of Lords votes against this bill the government should not be able to plough on regardless.

I have never been a fan of David Davis but his speech yesterday came across as entirely reasonable. It is brave of him to make a stand on the issue of 42 days, and I agree with his stance on this issue.

prettybird, lol at the reactionaries at work. i too know noone who not up in arms, but then i divide my time between mumsnet and the leftwing press and have yet to meet anyone who either supported hanging or were truly upset about diana's death (the latter obvs not a political point, just it always freaked me how insular my world must be to be so far from what was going on at the time...)

personally, i thinks polls are on the whole a load of tosh, but just to source here and here

I am against 42 days but not impressed by this move. What is the point of triggering a by-election in a safe Tory seat? He would win regardless of 42 days and it proves nothing. It is an expensive ego trip for a man who can't stand that he is not Tory Leader. Also David Davis history hardly shows unswerving support for civil liberties in general.

They key to blocking 42 days is the House of Lords. If the Lords are brave and vote against the Commons again and again then they can delay this Bill for nearly another year and force the Government to use a very rare and controversial procedure if they wish to go ahead without the Lords next year (very close to the next election).

So let me get this right - he has resigned his seat and will stand as a Tory candidate at a By-election? What? Why?

I assumed he had also resigned the whip and would stand as an Independant although I couldn't really see the point of that either...

I am utterly confused as to why he thought it would be a good idea - although I don't like 42 days either.

Small White Cat - I am not sure they would be prepared to use the Parliament Act on this. It is very different to the Hunting Bill. It is an issue of constitutional significance which the Lords is recognised as being expert in. To change something so fundamental without agreement of both Houses would be a huge step. Also if the Lords are brave enough to stand-up against his again and again is Brown really going to want to repeat the fight again and again until next spring? Its not great for his image and if the Bill cannot be passed quickly then will he carry on this fight and let it be the issue that defines his premiership?

I was just listening to Radio 4 and agree with a point another Tory MP made. The 42 day fight is still very live, the Lords will defeat it and the Commons will have to think again. The time for David Davis to make this stand would have been after the Parliamentary battle was over, if the Government insisted on using the Parliament Acts to bypass the Lords. Then this gesture might have made a difference.

By timing it as he has Davis has simply ensured there will be less press and public attention on the real fight (in Parliament) and this may make it easier for the Gov to get this through.

You are right about my relatives finding today's so-called 'New' Labour party unrecognisable. No longer stands for fairness for ordinary people, for a start.

Btw, my mother thinks she bumped into David Davies when she was a student (he was high up in the Tory student lot - she was a member briefly because she was going out with Tory, the hussy!). I don't think she was impressed then but she is now.

That was to Swedes, btw!