So, if I’m a tourist, a bit lost, and press the button marked ‘Information’ to ask where to go, my photo is sent to the police??? I wonder what happens next? A posse of armed goons appear and shoot me for having the audacity to hope that the Victoria Line is actually working this weekend? More likely, my mugshot just ends up on some database somewhere, as the government attempts to track every citizen’s every move, swamping itself so utterly in spurious data that the real criminals slip underneath the chaos.

Certainly, this threatening announcement is hardly going to encourage anyone to use the facility.  If there’s an emergency, it may even deter someone from raising the alarm.

There is no indication on the help point itself that this will happen, which is surely not legal.

I wonder what they do with it, and how long they keep it. It will be interesting to see if, and how, Transport for London, answer that question.

Some things really scare me:

• The way draconian legislation justified by the need to combat terrorism invariably gets used to investigate far less dangerous pursuits.
• The thought of the fact that I once googled ‘gay goat’ without thinking too hard getting onto a government database, or of some low-paid outsourced worker having access to a log of my emails.
• The notion of a national id database run by a government who’s only contribution to freedom of information seems to be their ability to release it onto trains and into rubbish bins
• Draconian policing of peaceful demonstrations,  creating a climate of fear.

The last few years have seen a steady erosion of the valuable right of a British person to go about their lawful business in privacy and without interference by the authorities, while at the same time, government activity seems to be more and more hidden.  And somehow, the voices of protest are few and far between.  Noone really seems to be too concerned.

And so, I’ll be attending The Convention on Modern Liberty, being held in Bloomsbury on 28 Feb.  Hopefully, it will be more than a talkshop gathering of the usual suspects, and some action will come out of it.