Slashdot Mirror

Dear ...,

The "Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill" recently came to my attention, thanks to a piece on The Guardian's website.

http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200506/ cmbills/111/06111.1-4.html

Having looked at the proposed text of the bill, it bears chilling comparison to Hitler's 1933 Enabling Act, which allowed him and his cabinet to enact laws without the participation of the Germany's parliament.

Please can you help clarify what the Bill will allow, as by my reading it is disturbingly broad with very few limitation, and whether you will be supporting or opposing it.

Yours sincerely, ...

Well, I've just writen to my MP using the WriteToThem service. I'm sure that he is already on the case, as he strongly opposes Labour's anti-terrorism laws, the Iraq war, and the introduction of ID cards.

As an aside, I was just looking up oligarchy on Wikipedia, and there is a political theory that all forms of organization, regardless of how democratic or autocratic they may be at the start, will eventually and inevitably develop oligarchic tendencies.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_law_of_oligarchy .

If you're in the UK, you might want to visit some of the weblogs written by our Members of Parliament.

• Tom Watson, Labour MP for West Bromwich East, blogging since March 2003 (even entitling it 'First Post'!).
• Richard Allan, formerly Liberal Democrat MP for Sheffield Hallam.
• Boris Johnson, Conservative MP for Henley-on-Thames. Article on his views on blogging.
• Clive Soley, formerly Labour MP for Hammersmith, Ealing Acton and Shepherds Bush, and now a member of the House of Lords. Why MPs Should Get Blogging.

Other important resources are TheyWorkForYou.com, which is a "Web 2.0" (ugh) way of keeping track of what your MP is doing and what's happening in the Houses of Parliament; and WriteToThem.com, which takes the hassle out of writing to your MP - they print it out and post it for you.

Of course, if that's not enough for you, you can switch on Celebrity Big Brother, where George Galloway, Respect MP for Bethnal Green and Bow has been residing for the past few weeks. As predicted by Tom Watson in 2004.

I disagree with the term police state - although levels of trust in the UK police are falling within the country, it's still regarded as the best police force in the world for good reason, as this article in the Economist illustrates admirably. You won't like this but my attitude is literally "more power to them".

Thanks for introducing me to http://www.writetothem.com/ - if there really is a groundswell of opinion against giving the security services and police greater powers, I think we both agree the voters should be able to decide.

Or, shock horror, they could use their own damn car! Didn't one of the London bombers drive his own car to Luton?

What the authorities don't seem to have grasped is that with suicide bombers, they tend to have no "history", as their first offence tends to be their last!

May I suggest UK people reading this visit Write To Them and fax their MP suggesting that this is perhaps, you know, a trifle off, don't you know, what.

There is currently a petition being driven by my local MP to try and ban 'violent pornographic websites' see BBC http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/4460828.stm[BBC News]. Whilst not directly related to this article it is an example of the general public thinking that something can actually be done about these things!

Whilst I have a lot of sympathy for Liz Longhurst who has lost her daughter I do wish that my MP and other MPs would spend 30mins talking to some IT guys to discover that this is an impossible task. Currently they must be wasting lots of time at the taxpayer's expense.

If anyone else in the UK feels the same as me then please use the http://www.writetothem.com/ Write-to-them website to get a message to your MP!

For some reason neither zdnet nor the submitter give a link to the site and article they are talking about:

an openrights.org blog entry.

The page has a cool link to WriteToThem where UK readers at least can quickly find out who their MEP is and how to contact them.

Dear Mr Palastanga,

Thank you so much for your email of 21 June and for the care that you have taken to lay out in clear terms your concerns about the application of patent law within the European Union to software.

The picture you paint has a parallel. In, for example, the radio telecommunications business there are numerous examples of multinational companies who have attempted to control the development of new standards in the industry to the detriment of small innovative European based companies who, as you rightly observe, are the engine rooms of new concepts and technologies.

I will certainly make representations on your behalf both at a national and European level to alert key decision makers to your concerns and seek their assurances that in future work in this area they will fully reflect upon the very important points you raise in your email. As soon I as I have further news I will, of course, write to you again.

Yours sincerely

The Rt Hon Michael Jack MP

Or you can use www.writetothem.com which will tell you who your MP/MEP/MSPs are and let you email them.

Find your MEPs via http://www.writetothem.com/ Be sure to *only* write to your own representatives as writing to others will merely annoy and set back the cause.

UK Residents can send a fax directly to their MEP by using http://www.writetothem.com/

It takes just a moment to write a short letter and faxing is more likely to have an impact.

Oops, http://www.writetothem.com/

Readers in the UK can FAX their Euro MP for free from the excellent: http://www.writetothem.com/ - all you need is your postcode.

The guy in the UK pushing this is James Purnell. If you live in the UK you should write to him.

If you find this unacceptable, then write to your mp! You don't even have to leave your computer if they don't use email-
writetothem.com will do the hard work for you!

Same, this is absurd, the rich don't need to get richer. UK people can find their MPs here.

Totally worth it. As an earlier post pointed out, the EP is actually highly aggravated by the actions of the Council of Ministers in approving the Directive without their amendments. Groklaw has the EP's press release on the subject and it's clear the EP is mad as hell - the language borders on the undiplomatic, which for Europe is very unusual.

"The quarrel between the Commission and Parliament over the directive on the patentability of computer-implemented inventions goes on. During a plenary debate on Tuesday evening, MEPs attacked the Commission's refusal to submit its draft directive for a new first reading by Parliament. They also criticised the directive's scope."

The reason this upsets the EP is that if the decision is allowed to stand it sets a precedent for binding legislation to be created in Council without any recourse for elected assemblies - if the EP doesn't manage to get all MEPs in the room to vote it down now, the thing will pass unaltered and all EU states will be compelled to implement it as law.

So, for the first time, we can really make a difference by writing to MEPs and ensuring they are aware that this is a big deal for their constituents. The political trap is set, it's up to us to spring it. Personally I have already gone to WriteToThem and written to my MEPs, it was very easy.

First of all, I'm irish and wish to apologise to Europe for Mr McCreevey.

The telling section of the letter to the President of the parliment is this. "You can, of course, reject or substantially amend the proposal. If the Parliament decides to reject it, then the Commission will respect your wishes. I will not propose a new directive." The emphasis is mine.

It is clear now what has to be done. Contact your EU member of Parliment.http://writetothem.com/

Do it. Do it now.

Try http://writetothem.com/.

Your MEP can be found via the new version of FaxYourMP

As for who to talk to relating to Ag & Fish, you probably want The Secretary of State: Rt. Hon. Margaret Beckett MP, who is available via

Fax: +44 20 7270 8125, which they apparently prefer or failing that, email

Try to be polite :-)