The report of the Constitution Committee on Surveillance: Citizens and the State has now been published. A HTML version can be read here. It has attracted considerable media attention: it is the lead story in The Guardian and has been widely covered by the broadcast media, including the BBC. Given that the committee deals with…
The Lords Constitution Committee has spent over a year undertaking an inquiry into the impact of government surveillance and data collection and the effect it has on the privacy of individuals and their relationship with the state. The report, Surveillance: Citizens and the State, is a substantial one, both quantitatively and qualitatively. It draws on extensive…
The Lord Chancellor, Jack Straw, gave evidence to the Constitution Committee in the Lords yesterday. It was a wide-ranging session covering a number of constitutional issues. I put a number of questions to him. The Lord Chancellor knows who I am, and has variously quoted me, but he seems to have problems with my name. …
The picture shows a Central Lobby with no members of the public present. I use it as a means of raising the question: how concerned should we be that the public take a limited interest in what Parliament does? I have raised this question before in two contexts. One relates to the work of select…
Although Parliament has risen for the recess, reports from select committees continue to be published. Indeed, what has been remarkable so far has been the number published and the publicity they have received. Although we are now in the quiet season (more commonly known as the silly season), the extent of media coverage has been notable. Since…
