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David Davis - A man of principle & honour.

He stands alone as an MP worthy or respect.

My faith in the office of our MP's is restored somewhat.

You have done yourself and the cause of freedom proud.

Cynical MP's will attempt to smear his resigning as MP so as to fight on the issue of 42 day detention. They just show themselves for the small minded, authoritarian asshats that they are.

Davids speech:

"The name of my constituency is Haltemprice and Howden. The word Haltemprice is derived from the motto of a medieval priory, and in Old French it means "Noble Endeavour".

I had always viewed membership of this House as a noble endeavour, not least because we and our forebears have for centuries fiercely defended the fundamental freedoms of our citizens. Or we did, up until yesterday.Up until yesterday, I took the view that what we did in the House of Commons representing our constituents was a noble endeavour because with centuries or forebears we defended the freedoms of the British people. Well we did up until yesterday.

This Sunday is the anniversary of Magna Carta—the document that guarantees that most fundamental of British freedoms—Habeus Corpus.

The right not to be imprisoned by the state without charge or reason. Yesterday this house decided to allow the state to lock up potentially innocent British citizens for up to six weeks without charge.

Now the counter terrorism bill will in all probability be rejected by the House of Lords very firmly. After all, what should they be there for if not to defend Magna Carta.

But because the impetus behind this is essentially political - not security - the government will be tempted to use the Parliament Act to over-rule the Lords. It has no democratic mandate to do this since 42 days was not in its manifesto.

Its legal basis is uncertain to say the least. But purely for political reasons, this government's going to do that. And because the generic security arguments relied on will never go away—technology, development and complexity and so on, we'll next see 56 days, 70 days, 90 days.

But in truth, 42 days is just one—perhaps the most salient example—of the insidious, surreptitious and relentless erosion of fundamental British freedoms.

And we will have shortly, the most intrusive identity card system in the world.

A CCTV camera for every 14 citiziens, a DNA database bigger than any dictatorship has, with 1000s of innocent children and a million innocent citizens on it.

We have witnessed an assault on jury trials—that balwark against bad law and its arbitrary use by the state. Short cuts with our justice system that make our system neither firm not fair.

And the creation of a database state opening up our private lives to the prying eyes of official snoopers and exposing our personal data to careless civil servants and criminal hackers.

The state has security powers to clamp down on peaceful protest and so-called hate laws that stifle legitimate debate - while those who incite violence get off Scot free.

This cannot go on, it must be stopped. And for that reason, I feel that today it's incumbent on me to take a stand.

I will be resigning my membership of the House and I intend to force a by-election in Haltemprice and Howden.

Now I'll not fight it on the government's general record—there's no point repeating Crewe and Nantwich. I won't fight it on my personal record. I am just a piece in this great chess game.

I will fight it, I will argue this by-election, against the slow strangulation of fundamental British freedoms by this government.

Now, that may mean I've made my last speech to the House—it's possible. And of course that would be a matter of deep regret to me. But at least my electorate, and the nation as a whole, would have had the opportunity to debate and consider one of the most fundamental issues of our day—the ever-intrusive power of the state into our lives, the loss of privacy, the loss of freedom and the steady attrition undermining the rule of law.And if they do send me back here it will be with a single, simple message: that the monstrosity of a law that we passed yesterday will not stand."

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4 people have spoken:

Anonymous said...

Did Davis support the 28 day extension?



Yes he did, and worse, he argued for it on the same grounds that Labour now argue for 42 days. This makes his whole position ludicrous in my view. I have no idea why 42 days destroys the Magna Carta, but 28 didn’t. It’s a stunt. The idea that David Davis wil protect your civil liberties is a fantasy. One might argue that’s he changed his mind, but to me the issue is this - we can talk about and once every 4/5 years have a 1/40m say about it, but he had a 1/600 odd say and chose an extension - worse he argued in favour of it.

Anonymous said...

I'm sure he acted with honour and best intentions. However, the fact is, most people, rightly or wrongly,see this as a means of locking up pakis & saudis etc who want to blow the place up. Throw away the key, many people would think. (they probably need to be better informed)
Couldn't David picked another issue? There are loads to choose from.
Urban11

Fidothedog said...

Anon 28/48 the whole thing is a fiasco. Brown is playing hard man with the UK as his testing board.

Fidothedog said...

Urban, as for the Paki's/Saudi's etc who want to kill us infidels well I am first to suggest taking a blowtorch to their nads to get information.(A lot quicker than 42 days)

However the moslems get it today, what is to stop Brown using this law against us? Nothing, just the word of the Home Sec. dire kebab muncher with a fat arse Jacqui Spliff.

Trials should be in front of a jury with the evidence shown, we managed with that old system against nazi spys/Russians/IRA etc etc..

The issue would have died away, David is keeping in the news, which is what we as a nation need.