NO2ID

[Gareth]

Galleries (Mall) in Broadmead ~11:30am, Friday 23rd September.

Awaiting report, though i've just received a text message:

"Success! Filmed interviewing Minister".

[Rob*]

dammit

wanted to go down.
they really have been sneaky about this.

1) Don't announce the dates they are turning up until the day itself.

2) Hold the roadshows in shopping malls. As shopping malls are private property the owner of the mall gets to say who comes in.

I really really really loathe this government.

PS good work.

[davegould]

Oh boy. For a while it looked as if nothing would happen. The BBC said they had to leave and so the troops came on rather inconspicuously.

The BBC suddenly notice the banner and start pointing the camera at it. I use the distraction to shimmy past all the people who are supposed to stop me and start talking to Burnham.

He said he wouldn't talk to me on camera. "What do you have to hide?" I asked. I repeated it when I noticed this big camera lens behind me.

When I asked the question a third time, he agreed. We sat down, surrounded by cameras and microphones.

First question: "Why are you using public money--our own money--to sell the public a scheme that hasn't been passed by parliament? Don't you believe in democracy?" (thanks to Guy for that one).

Slight pause then he started talking about supposed benefits of biometric passports. I asked him how much it was going to cost. He evaded the question. I repeated the question, must have been at least 6 times.
Then I said "You're obviously not going to tell us the cost so I'll ask you an easier question. <dramatic pause> How would ID Cards have stopped the London bombings?"

Another pause. Burnham replies "I've never said ID Cards would be a silver bullet". Thinking about it now, I should have replied "You just did." Oh well, hindsight.

"So what you're saying is that after we lose our privacy, after we spend 6 billion, Al Qaeda can simply do the exact thing again. Terrorists always attack the weakest link."

Burnham then started his 'people like you' speech. "If you're worried about privacy, your details are already on the DVLA blah blah".

I replied "I'm glad you brought this up" <conspiratorial smile>. This when the Home Office goons started saying "that's enough". Apparently, Burnham's handlers were talking about getting him out of there as quickly as possible.

I think it was at this point I asked him if he'd read his own bill. Unbelievably, he refused to answer that question. So I kept asking it, maybe 10x, before eventually answering "yes" in a small voice. Think he lied? I did. Shame I didn't know it well enough to test him on it.

Then I said "As you know, all these databases are separate, and what you're doing is assigning everyone in the country a unique identity number so that you can amalgamate all these databases into a massively intrusive personal dossier. This numbering is actually illegal according to the German constitution because of what happened in the 40s there."

I repeated the same point about 3x because I didn't make my point particularly cleanly.

His reply was "We do things differently blah blah."

I stood up, was amazed that their stand was swamped by No2ID protestors and nobody was stopping us!

I started handing out leaflets to everyone, including Burnham himself: "Just so you know what we're talking about..."

I just spoke to the BBC, they said because of Hurricane Rita and the terrorist alert at Manchester, it probably won't get on the national news, but apparently it's been on the local news already and it will be on the evening news as well (6:30-7pm). They also said it should make BBC News 24.

Addendum: time adjusted

[jack]

Good work! Congratulations.

[Stephen]

Brilliant, Dave!

Well done - hopefully, at the very least, we'll be able to watch the BBC's coverage on the BBC News Bristol website.

It looks like by timing your confrontation correctly the Home Office/Burnham's staff were unable to use the police to remove NO2ID supporters - it wouldn't work well in front of the cameras!

Well done again.

Stephen

[Rob]

Nice one

[Guest (Paul B)]

Just about to watch Points West now. Good work.

[davegould]

Nice, really nice considering they dumbed it down to Homer Simpson levels. The Beeb spun the whole thing as the Home Office having something to hide. They also showed how we set it up - the banner, me asking Burnham "What have you got to hide?" with anonymous HO hand trying to cover the camera shot!
'Paxman' has now become a verb. They showed me asking 4x how much it was going to cost and said Burnham never answered.

They then said that the idea of whether ID Cards and biometric passports are separate was disputed. This was followed up by member of the public (?) saying that biometric passports were the first step to ID Cards and they too intruded on our privacy.

Last line of voiceover: "Big Brother is watching, but they won't say where or when."

It's one of the more anti-Government pieces I've seen on the BBC.

Anyone manage to capture it digitally?

[Baron von Lotsov.]

Top one.

Hmm, bet they weren’t expecting that amount of hassle. Actually I have been looking on the web at the Gateshead scene and there are quite a few respectable publications covering it including computer magazines and the like. So by the sounds of things that confrontation is going to get around. Good work!

[davegould]

It's a good point. How much more can we make of this?

How would we get The Register to cover it, for example?

So far the story is only going locally, and the way they covered it you can see why (a bit cutesy). Assuming the rest of the interview (the 95% that wasn't shown) is OK, we should push the BBC to use it.

All the political programmes are starting up again. It would probably fit "This Week" with Portillo/Abbott quite well, especially given Abbott's views. There's the "Politics Show" (Sunday midday) and "Newsnight" of course, all on BBC1.

Question Time is going to Brighton next week (you can signup online).

On ITV Dimbleby is interviewing Blunkett on Sunday. There's a slot after that which is the Sunday Roast here in HTV West (which I've been on before).

They'll soon be bored talking about Iraq, hurricanes and the two leadership battles. We need to start courting them before Parliament returns.

[Carpe Noctum]

Genius.

Let's show the scam up, for what it really is.

[davegould]

Now you too can watch the Points West footage!

One of our local member's friends encoded this for us:
http://www.deep-trance.com/No2ID-Bristol-small.mp4

I think you need either the 3iv codec or Videolan to watch it, although you can try Quicktime 6.5+.

Mirror:
http://homepage.mac.com/pldms/.Movies/No2ID-Bristol-small.mp4

[Stephen]

I'd hoped someone would make a copy available. Good job, Dave!

Stephen

[Geraint]

Absolutely superb. Well done, Dave and everyone else there in Bristol!
_________________
Geraint.
3085 D1DD B2A8 15ED 492F E75D 7175 7737 9D10 98D3 - Fingerprint

[Rob]

<massive round of applause>

possibly the best 3 minutes of tv I've ever seen. Congratulations to all involved.

[Haydn]

Outstanding Dave, simply outstanding! There must me some spin-meisters in Whitehall blowing gaskets. I think this really pushes thing up a notch. Whats to bet they become even more secretive after this?

It also shows how just a few people can really make a difference, encouraging to our fledgling new group in Notts.

Once again, well done to you and everyone else in Bristol. If you're ever in Nottingham let me know - you won't be buying any beer.

Best Regards

H

[nick]

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/09/28/no2id_catches_home_office/

[DoctorMO]

Well done, giving those jonnys what for!

[evilwill]

got sent a link to the clip last night from Rob, and thought this would be the normal hippies-with-dreads-shouting kind of protest. nothing wrong with that of course, but that was well done. paxmanesque indeed

i think more importantly though, was the way it was reported. an anti-government bit of news indeed, and if protests like these help to get organisations like the bbc against id cards etc then they are doing very well! they need to meet this sort of resistance at everyone of their roadshows...

[dave]

They mention that the location of future roadshows is a secret. Anyone fancy applying for them under the Freedom of Information Act?!

Dave

[Geraint]

[Gareth]

Yes, FOI doesn't appear to be very useful for 'urgent' requests.

Could be worth doing nonetheless?

[Geraint]

I have sent the following request to the UKPS FOI contact. Unfortunately I am fairly sure that we will not get a response before the Third Reading of the Bill.

[Guest]

Ive just emailed my MP , Adam Holloway, Gravesham , with a list of these questions, Lets hope......

[Guest]

Response From my MP already, fast moving ..

dear david (if i may),
many thanks for this - we will ask the PRU (parliamentary resource
unit) to look at this.
best wishes,
adam

Will it stop there ????