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Tag: UK government

  • Governments and fossil fuel companies accelerate fecking the planet

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    The Guardian has a very disturbing article reporting it’s research that it’s full speed ahead for climate destroying governments and fossil fuel companies and that there is no regard for the climate destruction that they are causing. It’s also bad news that there was no mention of the climate in the UK’s Queen’s Speech (the UK government giving notice of it’s intentions) other than harsher laws against climate protestors. Kwasi Kwarteng has already said as much – that the UK is aggressively pursuing exploitation of fossil fuels disregarding climate concerns “… we took steps to remove obstacles to accelerate production …”.

    I find it difficult to understand how these people are so determined to feck the planet tbh. I know that they are Capitalists and mad Tories but is logic and reason totally alien to them? Don’t they care for their own children and grandchildren? I suppose that they can get into the habit of just following orders but just following orders has been dismissed as a defence.

    We have to defeat these cnuts but have very little time to do it …

  • 2020 was worst year on record for UK government secrecy

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    https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/freedom-of-information/2020-was-worst-year-on-record-for-uk-government-secrecy

    openDemocracy has an exclusive report exposing the depth of the government’s attack on the Freedom of Information Act

    Last year was the worst on record for government secrecy, new research by openDemocracy has revealed.

    Just 41% of Freedom of Information (FOI) requests sent to government departments and agencies were granted in full in 2020, down from 43% the previous year.

    This is the lowest figure since records began in 2005.

    The findings are published in openDemocracy’s new report, ‘Access Denied’, which exposes the extent of the government’s attack on FOI.

    It follows a major investigation by openDemocracy last year, which revealed how a secretive Cabinet Office unit called the ‘Clearing House’ vetted sensitive requests for information.

    A judge subsequently criticised the government for a “profound lack of transparency” that might “extend to ministers”.

    A parliamentary inquiry into the Clearing House – launched by the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee in the wake of openDemocracy’s revelations – opens this week.

    The Access Denied report also finds that some government departments have far lower FOI disclosure rates than others, with the Cabinet Office among the worst offenders, along with the Foreign Office and the Department for International Trade.

    Transparency campaigners say “urgent action is required” and that there needs to be a “sea change in attitudes towards FOI within Whitehall to avoid it spiralling it into an accountability black hole”.

    ...

  • Cameron, Clegg and Ed sneak in a snoopers’ charter by the back door

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    A snoopers’ charter by the backdoor: One day until Drip is forced through

    by Ian Dunt

    Privacy campaigners are frantically trying to brief MPs about the implications of the data retention and investigatory powers bill (Drip), before it is forced through all of its Commons stages tomorrow.

    The more experts look at the bill, the more convinced they’ve become that it provides authorities with the spine of the snoopers’ charter, but without any of the public debate or parliamentary scrutiny which were supposed to accompany it.

    The charter – known as the draft communications bill before it was killed off – would have forced internet service providers and mobile operators to keep details of their customers’ behaviour for 12 months.

    Analysis of Drip, which was supposed to only extend the government’s current powers for another two years, suggests it forces through many of those requirements on internet firms without any of the political outrage which derailed the earlier effort.

    Clause four of the bill appears to extend Ripa – the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (basically Britain’s Patriot Act) – so that the UK government can impose severe penalties on companies overseas that refuse to comply with interception warrants. It also lays out situations in which they may be required to maintain permanent interception capacity.

    Clause five then provides a new definition of “telecommunications service”, which includes companies offering internet-based services. That seems to drag services like Gmail and Hotmail into the law, and very probably social media sites like Facebook too.

    The government insists the extraterritoriality clause merely makes explicit what was previously implicit. It’s tosh. As the explanatory notes for the legislation – released very quietly on Friday night – make clear, overseas telecommunications companies did not believe they were necessarily under Ripa’s jurisdiction.

    “Regarding the amendments to Ripa, in view of the suggestion by overseas telecommunications service providers that the extra-territorial effect of Ripa is unclear, it is considered necessary to amend the legislation to put the issue beyond doubt,” it reads.

    “This includes clarifying the definition of a ‘telecommunications service’ to ensure the full range of telecommunications services available to customers in the United Kingdom are included in the definition.”

    David Cameron, Nick Clegg and Ed Miliband insist Drip merely extends their current powers for two years. That’s nonsense. These two clauses, which have nothing to do with the purported aim of the bill, provide the spine of the snoopers’ charter.

    They also appear to provide a legal basis for programmes like Tempora, the project revealed by Edward Snowden to allow GCHQ to tap into transatlantic fibre-optic cables and stored data.

    Notably, Privacy International, Liberty and others are taking the government to a tribunal this week on whether Tempora is legal, even though the government won’t even admit its existence. Drip could make the tribunal ruling irrelevant.

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