Term 1 Homework- Week 1
Wednesday, 08 October 2014
Outrage over ‘police state’ snooping on press
Intelligence failure:Andrew Mitchell MP, the politician at the centre of the ‘Plebgate’ affair © PA
A law designed to uncover terrorist plots is being used by the police to obtain journalists’ phone records in secret. Is this an appalling infringement of civil liberty or a necessary evil?
It is the beginning of ‘the rise of a police state’, according to one outraged journalist. Another put it more starkly: 'We are back to the Soviet Union, with private conversation confined to public parks.’
These ominous warnings came after the revelation that the police were using the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 (Ripa) to access in secret the phone records of journalists. Ripa was meant to be a weapon against terrorists. However police are also using it to discover the sources used by journalists on UK newspapers.
Protection of journalistic sources is one of the basic conditions for press freedom. Without it people may be deterred from assisting the press in informing the public on matters of public interest.
Two stories, both about MPs, have caused most controversy. TheMail on Sundayrevealed that the police obtained a journalist’s phone records without his consent. They did so to trace a story aboutChris Huhne, the Cabinet minister jailed for conspiring to have his wife take his speeding points on her driving licence.
The Metropolitan Police also obtained the phone data of aSunjournalist to uncover a source in the Andrew Mitchell ‘Plebgate‘ affair, in which the former Cabinet minister lost his job after a row with police at the gates of Downing Street.
Before Ripa, the police would have had to go to court and explain to a judge why they needed the information. The journalist would have been able to argue why his source should remain confidential. Now the only permission required is that of a senior police officer and phone companies are obliged to hand over data about calls (although not their content).
Critics say this power is being used to targetwhistleblowers. And it is being used widely. Official statistics reveal police and security services obtained communications records more than 514,000 times last year – over 1,400 times a day.
Balancing act
This is a serious attack on the freedom of the press to uncover information in the public interest, some say. Neither of the two MP cases was important enough to justify the use of Ripa. Fewer whistleblowers will approach the press if their identity is at risk of being revealed. And the scale of Ripa’s use — and its ease — seems to show that the police are using it habitually to fish for information.
But law enforcers argue that the current broad scope of the law makes its use entirely legal. The police have a duty to obtain all the evidence necessary for a successful prosecution. Society today faces many threats — paedophile networks, organised crime, terrorism at home and abroad — and we must sacrifice some of our civil liberty for better security and protection.
EXTEND:
Read carefully Passage B, ‘Outrage over ‘police state’ snooping on press’, and then answerQuestion 3(a) and (b) on this Question Paper.
Question 3
Answer the questions in the order set.
(a)Notes
How and why are the government ‘snooping’ on the press, according toPassage B?
Write your answer using short notes.
You do not need to use your own words.
Up to 15 marks are available for the content of your answer (Extend)
(b)Summary
Now use your notes to write a summary of what Passage B tells you about how and why the government are ‘snooping’ on the press.
You must use continuous writing (not note form) and use your own words as far aspossible.
Your summary should include all 15 of your points in Question 3(a) and must be 200 to 250words.
Up to 5 marks are available for the quality of your writing.
CORE:
Read carefully Passage B, ‘Outrage over ‘police state’ snooping on press’, and then answerQuestion 3(a) and (b) on this Question Paper.
Question 3
- Notes
How and why are the government ‘snooping’ on the press,, according toPassage B?
Write your answer using short notes.
You do not need to use your own words.
Up to 10 marks are available for the content of your answer.
(b) Summary
Now use your notes to write a summary of what Passage B tells you about how and why the government are ‘snooping’ on the press.
You must use continuous writing (not note form) and use your own words as far aspossible.
Your summary should include all 10 of your points in Question 3(a) and must be 200 to 250words.
Up to 5 marks are available for the quality of your writing.
Stretch and challenge:
B: Should the police have to go to court to obtain this sort of information?
S: Why is it important to protect the anonymity of whistleblowers?
G: Why you think the freedom of the press is important?
P: Comment on the quote: ‘This House believe that when it comes to state surveillance, you have nothing to worry about if you have done nothing wrong.’