MAIL Online: George Orwell's 1984 was supposed to be a warning about the dangers of totalitarianism, not a blueprint for government.
No one seems to have told New Labour. Barely a day goes by without another assault on our civil liberties, another extension of state snooping, another exciting ruse for meting out punishment for the most trivial offence.
This week’s outrage is the news that Home Secretary Jacqui Smith is creating a whole new vigilante class of quasi-policemen, drawn from the ranks of Town Hall jobsworths, security guards and car park attendants.
They’ll be allowed to wear uniforms, patrol the streets with dogs, confiscate property and hand out fixed-penalty notices for everything from littering to under-age drinking.
It’s emerged that there are 1,400 of these Accredited Persons out there already, and their numbers will soon swell into the thousands.
They have the power to stop cars, take photos of people, demand names and addresses and issue fines.
For now, they wear badges sewn onto their tunics by their employers.
But the Home Office wants to see a uniform standardised across the country. How about peaked caps, jodhpurs, jackboots and black shirts with swastikas on the sleeves? Jackboot Jacqui’s a Nazi Piece of Work >>> By Richard Littlejohn | August 29, 2008
The Dawning of a New Dark Age – Dust Jacket Hardcover, direct from the publishers (UK) >>>
The Dawning of a New Dark Age – Paperback, direct from the publishers (UK) >>>
