Leona Helmsley, the American billionaire tried for tax evasion in 1989, famously observed, as it was claimed at her trial, 'We don't pay taxes. Only the little people pay taxes.' Although Helmsley was convicted and, briefly, imprisoned, the principle of which she availed herself has flourished, internationally, ever since.
Now in the UK we have a new measure, or an 'updated' one, proposed for the little people: communications surveillance. This is touted as simply a necessary measure to keep check on serious crime and terrorism. Some of its supporters claim that it is doubly necessary as we face threats associated with the Olympic Games and the Queen's Jubilee. It is a sign of our times that every occasion for celebration and jubilation turns into a focus of yet more hazards and attack, against which the security services must take new measures to protect us - measures of course that will be permanent not temporary. The government is sensible enough to avoid references to the Olympics and the Jubilee since this new legislative measure cannot possibly be on the statute book before the year after they take place, but the current climate of apprehension will help them get it through.
Yet serious criminals and terrorists, as well as the internet savvy, will be able to avoid the surveillance without difficulty. It is the little people and their imagined conspiracies and threats who will be affected. One has only to note the exhaustive triviality of past physical monitoring of people who were clearly no threat to the state or society, and the ability of the authorities to overlook information they already had access to in advance of major outrages, to see the way it will work out.
