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This morning David Aaronovitch skewers the new leader of “Our Ancient Liberties Are Being Destroyed” movement, David Davis, arguing that if you examine his record closely and you will find a strong streak of authoritarianism. According to Aaronovitch, Davis has not, by his record, been a standard bearer for civil liberties.

His first line of attack on Davis is to point out that by his opposition to the DNA database Davis is showing he is soft on crime, and by implication his opposition to the 42 days detention is showing he is soft on terrorism.

With a little bit of NewLabour double think, Aaronovitch argues that Davis is soft on crime because he is against the universal DNA data base, and would only maintain the records of those who have been imprisoned, “what Davis means is that the guilty who haven’t been to prison will also get taken off.”

As much as it may annoy Aaronovitch, it also exposes his own strong streak of authoritarianism,

a book called 1984. It was supposed to be a warning. This government has used it as a text book.”

because he is arguing for the power of the government to retain all of our DNA. He is also taking a leap in legal definitions; the guilty who have not been to prison are in fact legally innocent, until they are proven guilty.

The apparent inconsistency of Davis is next to come under the spotlight, Aaronovitch points to the fact that Davis voted for 28 days detention, but fails to note that he was following his party in the face of the threat of 90 days which the government and police chiefs were vying for and in fact Davis assisted in defeating the governments plans. Also the present Conservative position is to look at the 28 days with a view to reducing it and this was down to Davis.

Aaronovitch, is also missing the vital piece in the jigsaw, in reality it does not matter how long a suspect is held, what matters is how long before the police must offer some proof to a magistrate, how long before they need the approval of another branch of our justice system in order to continue to hold a suspect, that is the basis for the protection of habeas corpus, the division of authority and that is where Blair and his backers were making inroads into our civil liberties. By removing the inbuilt protections for the individual against the state and thus increasing the power of the state over the citizen.

The aim of the article is to suggest that Davis has now found a new cause that previously he had ignored; it is not really possible to sustain that argument. In February 15th, 2006 David Davis made these points about the national register;

“There are many good reasons for not wanting to be on the national identity register, which involves a large number of pieces of data about each individual being put on a single Government database, many of them the access keys for other Government databases. That is the important point: it is a central database with access keys effectively to all the other Government databases.

It is disingenuous of the Home Secretary to say, “We’ve already got all those.” One of the transitions that has taken place over the past several years under the Government, and to a small extent under the previous Government too, is the removal of barriers to the transfer of information around Government. Those barriers were a protection of the liberties of the individual, and now they have gone.”

Later Davis warned that the scheme would

chip away at the basic liberties we would have come to hold dear, and which previous generations fought to protect.

And pledged that an incoming Conservative administration would abandon the legislation and scrap the ID card scheme.

We will not be the party of such a move. The Home Secretary’s proposals represent a fundamental shift in the balance of power between the citizen and the state.

A vision rather like this was originally set out by a man called Blair who later changed his name to Orwell and wrote a book called 1984. It was supposed to be a warning. This government has used it as a text book.”

That is not to say Aaronovitch is totally wrong Davis has in the past been supportive of the NewLabour line, on the Civil Contingencies Bill, for instance Davis wrote:

I believe that this Bill is necessary. Some of the existing emergency powers legislation dates back to the 1920s and requires updating to reflect new threats. This does not mean, however, that the government should go unchecked and my colleagues and I have been doing - and will continue to do - our utmost to ensure that the potential for misuse of these powers is eliminated.

Many of us however thought Civil Contingencies Bill was a step to far and a grab for extra powers by the government.

One commenter at the time said;

These are Bolshevik-style powers, so sweeping and totalitarian that they sound as if they have been lifted out of some 1930’s banana-republic manifesto.
The effect (and almost certainly the intention) of these laws will be to give the Executive complete political control over the country.

Davis Davis, must be supported in his proclaimed battle against the continual erosion of our basic rights, unlike Aaronovitch I do not see that someone who has resigned his post and is prepared to stand for election on a platform of basic rights of the citizen against the state can be described a authoritarian.

Moral: If you don’t want authoritarianism, don’t vote for authoritarians. If you want to voice your concerns about the continual erosions of our basic rights by an increasingly authoritarian government and a supine opposition, who are content to turn a blind eye to this authoritarianism. Then vote for David Davis - he has had enough, and so have we, it is time to roll back the powers of the state and undue the damage Blair has done to our civil liberties.

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David Davis, authoritarianism, 42 days detention
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