You don’t need a cat-stroking authoritarian to damage democracy and erode liberties. You just need to sit back and talk as if the system is a law unto itself. I believe Gordon Brown is being honest when he denies knowledge of the Damian Green arrest. No10 knows there will be an inquiry, and it will come out who knew what. But ignorance is no defence. System overreach is one of the gravest possible threats to democracy, and it is precisely by tolerating it that we lose the open society which a couple of generations ago so many died to defend.
In my News of the World column today, I say the Green arrest is an allegory for what has happened to Britain. It’s not just the police, but the local authorities which use anti-terror power to spy on the people they’re supposed to serve – always seeking ways to justify their salary and staff levels. The environmental agenda helped the power flip, as the paying public became the polluting public.
Brown’s attitude – that Green’s arrest is an operational matter for the police, and it’s outrageous for anyone to criticise them – mistakes the nature of the democracy he’s supposed to be defending. Bureaucracies seek more power, it’s in their nature. Not because they are run by bad people with malign intent, but because that’s what the system does. It absorbs more cash, hires more staff, extends its empire. A good Prime Minister is aware of this mission-creep and fights it. A good parliament exposes this mission-creep, and demands action.
System overreach doesn’t just mean tanks at Heathrow but the contortion of the nature of local democracies. The system can’t be left alone. The law of unintended consequences is one Westminster always unwittingly passes. Parliament is supposed to be always on the lookout for these consequences, especially with new legislation like counter terror laws. But the Commons can’t be bothered; having voted half of its powers away to Brussels, whilst MPs voted themselves ever more pay and holiday (the year that starts on Wednesday will have the most holidays since the War). The Sergeant at Arms waving in the police to Green’s office symbolises parliament’s abrogation of its supposed role. Even the Commons authorities didn’t seem to think there was a principle to protect anymore.
So it’s no excuse for Brown to say that the system went crazy during Green’s arrest. It should make him wonder what kind of monster has been created. It’s no use for Michael Martin to let it be known he’s hopping mad. He can still act. To signal the seriousness of what happened last week, he can resign – not out of guilt, but out of protest. Green’s arrest is a wake-up call for all of us, but no one more so than politicians. The last ten years have been about giving the system more power and money. It’s gone way, way too far. Now’s the time to fight back.
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