UK sneaks mass spying laws through Brussels

1.00.00pm UTC (GMT +0000) Mon 1st Oct 2007

UK legislation implementing the controversial EU Directive on data retention, which allows details of phone calls to be kept for 12 months, came into force today.

But Liberal Democrat European justice spokeswoman Baroness Sarah Ludford MEP said:

"The Labour government managed to launder through Brussels its own illiberal policy, which Charles Clarke trumpeted during his disastrous spell in the Home Office, and now it uses the resulting EU legislation as a pretext to expand its increasingly authoritarian regime."

"Contrary to the basis on which the Directive was said to be justified 2 years ago in the wake of the London bombings, the Brown government's use of the retained data will not be limited to terrorism or even serious crime. Having clashed at the time with the bullying Mr Clarke, I can honestly say of this con-trick: 'I told you so'."

"UK practice will be to give access to any individual's personal phone data to over 600 public agencies. What has Whitehall or town hall snooping got to do with catching terror suspects?"

"The EU Directive requires serious penalties for unauthorised use of data but the new UK regulations omit such sanctions. I will be asking the European Commission to explain how UK practice complies with EU law."

"Sneaking through these intrusive rules with no serious domestic public or parliamentary debate is alarming in a supposedly democratic society. The measure only got adopted at EU level when the UK Presidency sold a shameful deal to the Labour and Conservative coalition groups in the European Parliament. Now we see the reality of how Brussels-laundering works."