NO2ID: Opponents barred from Home Office 'secret ID roadshow'
Wednesday, 21, Sep 2005 12:00
Four NO2ID supporters have been prevented by police from leafleting and talking to shoppers at a public event in Gateshead’s Metro Centre today. Home Office minister Andy Burnham MP was due to make a presentation of the new biometric technology to the public and local press at the fourth of seven dates in a demonstration tour. The Home Office intends to wow the public and regional media with its travelling technology exhibit, but is not revealing dates or places in advance.
Stephen Hodgson, the organiser of the NO2ID presence in the Metro Centre, said:
“It was extraordinary. We had been there about an hour. The minister had yet to arrive. Then Home Office staff manning the stand had a word with Metro Centre security staff, and the security staff had a word with police. The police ejected us from the Metro Centre, saying that our leaflets were ‘inappropriate’. It beats me how.”
Guy Herbert, General Secretary of NO2ID, said:
“What are they afraid of? This is a secret tour, aimed at an unprepared public who are to being given only one side of the story, accompanied by computerised smoke and mirrors. Opposing views are being rigorously excluded. In due course we will no doubt be told that reactions were ‘overwhelmingly favourable’ and this will be proffered as further justification of the scheme.
“It is worrying that the police are being used to aid the promotion of a Government policy by suppressing the mildest dissentmore so, coming on top of the arrests of ID protestors in the same area only a couple of weeks ago (1) in circumstances that looked like saving the Home Secretary embarrassment in front of his EU colleagues. This roadshow is more reminiscent of the absurd propaganda exercises favoured by Third World dictatorships, than a contribution to a mature democratic discussion.”