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Theresa May Becomes UK's 'Spy Queen' and New Prime Minister (arstechnica.co.uk)
An anonymous reader writes from a report via Ars Technica: Theresa May has become the new British Prime Minister. As she sat down with the Queen on Wednesday, a controversial surveillance draft legislation that looks to significantly increase surveillance of Brits' online activity will be debated during its second committee stage day in the House of Lords. Ars Technica reports: "The Investigatory Powers Act could be in place within months of May arriving at Number 10 -- if peers and legal spats fail to scupper its passage through parliament -- after MPs recently waved it through having secured only minor amendments to the bill. As home secretary, May fought for six years to get her so-called Snoopers' Charter onto the statute books." According to Ars Technica, Theresa May's key political moments on the Investigatory Powers Bill start in 1997 when she became the Member of Parliament for Maidenhead. During her opposition years, her home affairs record shows that she generally votes against the Labour government's more draconian measures on topics such as anti-terrorism and ID cards. Mid-2009: May votes against requiring ISPs to retain certain categories of communications data, which they generate or process, for a minimum period of 12 months. 2010: She was appointed home secretary in coalition government between the Conservatives and junior partner the Liberal Democrats. 2011: The previous government's shelved Interception Modernization Program is rebranded as the Communications Capabilities Development Program (CCDP) by home office under May. Mid-2012: The CCDP morphs into Communications Data Bill, which is brought before parliament. Late-2012: May's Snoopers' Charter bid fails as deputy PM Nick Clegg orders the home office to go back to the drawing board. Mid-2014: May rushes what she characterizes as an "emergency" Data Retention and Investigatory Powers Bill through parliament, after the European Court of Justice invalidates the Data Retention Directive for failing to have adequate privacy safeguards in place. Late-2015: British security services have intercepted bulk communications data of UK citizens for years, May reveals to MPs for the first time as she brings her revamped Snoopers' Charter bid -- this time dubbed the Investigatory Powers Bill (IPB) -- before parliament. Mid-2016: MPs support thrust of IPB as it passes through the House of Commons. July 13, 2016: Theresa May becomes the UK's new prime minister as peers in the House of Lords undertake a second day of committee stage scrutiny of the Investigatory Powers Bill. UPDATE 7/13/16: Boris Johnson, the former London mayor who led the Brexit campaign, has been made foreign secretary by the new Prime Minister Theresa May.
I keep reading these headlines that Theresa "may" become prime minister. I wish they would make up their minds.
Seems you're a week or two behind the news.
The UK needs a new prime minister because the previous prime minister has voluntarily stepped down. David Cameron was against the exit from the EU. He decided that since the country's majority ran contrary to his stance, it was a good idea to vacate his position and let someone else lead.
Love sees no species.
This looks a lot like punishment for the unwashed masses for their vote of no confidence in the Politicians (both sides) that the BRExit vote looked like.
I see a large number of the voters in that were voting against the politicians in one of their few chances (elections are not, as you have to vote for
politicians on one side or the other..) due to the complete lack of representation that seems to be in fashion these days, where bills are either pushed through
to support loud minorities 'See! The Government does care!' or corporate sponsors 'We need to protect trade, the economy, jobs!'
It is interesting to watch the developing class wars between those in power and those not, however I am a little surprised that the UK is that close to the leading edge of it - racing to catch up to the US?
This is not spying, which implies some form of balance or power and care, this is just collecting the ability to go hunt for historical dirt on anyone who dares challenge the powerbase.
Left or Right? Socialist or Capitalist? That is long gone, what we have now is the building of totalitarian states with the illusion of democracy, and that is
unfortunately a world wide (mostly) problem. It will not be controlled unless the masses can put aside the petty arguments bout side issues, and address
this elephant in the room.
Unfortunately reality television, cooking competitions, and social justice for [insert this weeks cause] trumps that it seems. Sad times.
You're forgetting a lot of downsides of the U.S. system, and the fact that individual states do have referendums, and you're oversimplifying the UK system.
David Cameron wasn't ousted, he pushed hard for a specific outcome in the referendum, and he lost. The voters rejected a deal he had negotiated, and a policy he willingly bet his premiership on. All that said, he could have stayed as long as the Conservative party wanted him, but it's reasonable for him to step down after losing.
The vote itself also wasn't binding, it's up to Parliament to execute it. This wasn't a law that was passed by referendum. Unlike in the U.S., Parliament (technically the "Queen in Parliament") is supreme in the UK, and can change any law it wants. There's no written constitution, and thus not really the concept of an "unconstitutional" law. The PM is elected by a majority of parliament. This system means that a government usually can get its manifesto legislation passed, and it's easier to hold a government responsible for keeping its promises. The U.S. system can allow for years of deadlock, and whereas an independent commission is responsible for defining constituency boundaries in the UK, they're set by politicians in the U.S. If a party can gain control of the legislature of a state (quick - name any member of your state legislature), it can effectively control that state's seats in Congress for a decade. All of this lends a lot more legitimacy to the UK government.
So yes, getting things done in the U.S. system is harder, and it's easier for a few states to block legislation. That doesn't mean the U.S. system has greater legitimacy, quite the opposite. The state governments are barely accountable for their actions, and even a party with strong popular support can fail to get its legislation passed thanks to the byzantine electoral system.
The right to protest the State is more sacred than the State.
Come on dude, what you said was naive. If you were watching British news and reading articles at BBC, Sun.uk, The Times, etc. you would understand even if you are American.
But you are clueless and don't have any interest in UK politics. Then you talk as is you are speaking knowledgeably --- when in fact your opinion is a demonstrates a lack of knowledge and understanding of UK politics.
Pay attention is fine. Not paying attention is fine. Not paying attention and then trying to speak from a position of knowledge is just lame dude.
In this case, the PM didn't like the way the vote went and instead of doing what the people wanted, he stepped down.
That is how parliamentary systems work. Dave was elected by his party, not by the people.
Could happen in the US
It DID happen in the US, last year. John Boehner resigned, and was replaced by Paul Ryan. David Cameron is the head of the lower house of parliament, just like John Boehner was. The equivalent of Barrack Obama, as head of state, is Queen Elizabeth. She is not resigning.
Dear editors,
I'm genuinely interested in understanding this summary but, it's effectively a gigantic wall of text that's almost impossible to understand or follow. Could you please, I dunno, edit...
Boris Johnson as Foreign Secretary isn't the only Cabinet Minister she's appointed which will have international implications, she has also created two new cabinet posts;
Secretary of State for Exiting the EU - David Davis
Secretary of State for International Trade - Liam Fox
The first is getting us out of the EU, the second is for getting new trade agreements for when we are out of the EU.
All these three are Brexiters, and will be responsible for the aftermath. Very clever - as May was a Remainer, she has effectively delegated responsibility for the success or failure of exiting the EU on to those who campaigned to get us into this situation in the first place!
You never know what is enough unless you know what is more than enough. - Blake
Dave's not here man.
The UK has a tradition going back decades of deciding major constitutional issues via referendum. Political parties are traditionally nervous about making major constitutional change part of their manifesto, because of the potential for this to overshadow a General Election. Moreover, there would be doubts about whether a party that was elected on such a manifesto really had a mandate to take through the changes, as elections are fought across a wide policy spectrum and some of their voters may not have supported the specific change in question.
So basically, when there is an issue that fundamentally changes "the rules of the game" as it were, we usually have a referendum. We had one on remaining in the European Common Market in 1975 (having entered it two years earlier). More recently, we have had votes within the last five years on whether to change our voting system and, for Scotland only, on whether Scotland should leave the UK. Both of those came down in favour of the status quo.
Arguably, the Governments of the day should have held votes on the Maastricht and Lisbon treaties, as both had significant consequences for how the UK is governed. As somebody who voted "Remain" in the most recent referendum but who held his nose while he did so, I like to think that this would have given the UK population the chance to put the brakes on European integration without actually leaving the whole circus. But both treaties needed to be passed under weak Prime Ministers (Major and Brown respectively), who were too afraid of any challenge to their position to allow for something that could have undermined them.
He decided that since the country's majority ran contrary to his stance, it was a good idea to vacate his position and let someone else lead.
Not exactly. He decided to hand the metaphorical flaming bag of excrement (the literal flaming bag is an old Eton tradition, so I hear) to Boris Johnson so he could watch him squirm take the blame in the aftermath.
If you think this is anything to do with representing the will of the people or ethics, then I have a bridge to sell you.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
All that said, he could have stayed as long as the Conservative party wanted him, but it's reasonable for him to step down after losing.
Cameron was cutting his losses. Being PM is now a poison chalice. He knew that whoever was in the job would have to oversee an economic disaster and the break up of the UK as Scotland and perhaps even Gibraltar and Northern Ireland become independent. It's bad enough that he set up the referendum causing it; he didn't want his legacy to be overseeing it too.
The referendum itself gives May very little mandate. Okay, there was a narrow majority to come out of the EU, but it said nothing about the single market or freedom of movement or any number of other issues.
British democracy is now well and truly broken. May can rule, totally unelected and with no mandate, for another four years. That's long enough to leave the EU and set up deals with no say from the electorate, and by the time the next election comes around it will be too late to undo it. It's not like we can just re-join the EU or the single market. She seems to be planning to implement the wishes of a hard core minority of voters, against popular opinion and without a mandate.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
Bloody hell! (in a posh accent)
Well, perhaps not so posh; apparently she is from a working class background, which isn't quite as unusual as one might think - a lot of working class Britons tend to be conservative, in that they just want things to work more or less like they use to. But she also seems like a very decent, down-to-earth person with some views that seem to be not at all common in the Tory party - and I suspect that there may be quite a lot of turbulence ahead for the government, despite their glossy show of unity just now. To me, it looks like we will have a very interesting time over the next few years, and I am in the strange situation of not being quite sure whether to vote one way or the other next time. If Mrs May turns out to be what I think she is, then perhaps I will vote for the Tories, unless Mr Corbyn manages to stay on as leader of Labour and unites the party, in which case I'll probably vote that way. And if you have followed British politics at all, you'll know just how strange that is.
To me it is all about the persons - the problems and their solutions dictate the policy at the moment, so both parties will have to do more or less the same; so it is down to whether you feel the actual persons are decent and trustworthy, and both Mrs May and Mr Corby appear to be that to a high degree. I think we have had enough of overly smart sounding politicians - Blair who sounded like an evangelist, Cameron who sounded like the Cillit Bang man and George "Lightyear" Osborne: "To the bone and beyond". There has been too much spin and too much schoolyard jeering, too much Tory Eton Bully and too much middle class Labour affrontedness. We just want sincere, pragmatic leadership, that works through the problems and takes care of the whole of the nation as best they can.
Actually, from all the people I know who didn't vote they didn't vote because they said they just couldn't tell who was lying and who wasn't, so didn't feel informed enough to vote. It's not that they didn't care, it's that they'd rather make no choice than a bad choice. Their feelings on the matter weren't "Don't care" but typically something like "I want the best for my country, and kids", they just had no idea which option that was.
Of course, many people who did vote also had no idea who was lying to them, either they just decided the opposite, that it's better to risk making a bad choice than no choice.
The referendum result was clear, but it's certainly not the case that the British public made an informed choice. The result of the referendum was by and large an uninformed choice. Not that it matters, but I suspect if the debate was much more clearly informative that many of those that didn't vote would have and I suspect in a fully informed debate many people wouldn't have taken the risk. Ultimately leave won the referendum, but lost the argument, because much of what remain predicted would happen has happened - Farage admitted he lied about the NHS, other leavers like Daniel Hannan admitted they lied that they'd be able to bring immigration down now, Cameron has in fact left and we do in fact now have 4 years of dictatorship ahead of us, the pound has in fact tanked, and the FTSE 250 is down whilst the 100 is being proped up only by a commital of £250bn stimulus reserve (12 years equivalent of EU fees) by the BOE. Project fear turned out to be project fact, and team leave fled for the hills when their bluff was called leaving everyone else to suffer the consequences and clean up the mess.
After all is said and done it looks most likely that we'll end up in the EEA, paying the same amount we do currently, without a seat at the table, and having suffered a few years of reduced economic capability. The whole things looks like it will have become a completely unnecessary needlessly damaging exercise with nothing clear to show for it.
From that I don't think hardly anyone really had their say as such, I just think millions of people had a completely random stab in the dark. The number of us who had done our own fact checking to verify the claims from both sides (by actually looking up and understanding statistics on the economy, migration and so forth) and who were able to vote on the actual facts were an absolutely tiny minority.
Why is my post at -1? When I talk about moderation abuse, this is it. Seriously, can anyone explain why this system makes sense?
1) Scotland and Northern Ireland get a bad deal here since they wanted to remain in the EU. This is against their will. This would be harder in the US system.
2) Why should the Prime minister be ousted? This makes no sense.
3) When votes are done by elected officials, there aren't debates about whether the vote should count or of a revote is needed. No matter how things turn out, people will have a case if they say the outcome isn't valid.
Why is this system a good thing? Seriously, I think the US system makes more sense and I asked my questions in good faith.
1)It wasn't a separate vote, it was a UK vote. The result was the result like it or not for the UK. If you lose a vote you can't just pick up you ball and go do whatever anyway. It doesn't work like that.
2)The PM wasn't ousted he quit because he didn't want to deal with this mess he got us into.
3) When such a big decision comes out so close to a 50/50 split and pretty much all of the experts agree the 'wrong' side won, not least because of massive lies told during the campaign that were admitted to be lies on result day and the protest vote factor it's not quite as definitive as some people might like to imply.
The system sucks and is rotten to the core but is it seriously worse that what america is facing with trump v clinton. tsa, patriot act and all that? I'm not so sure that either are worth shouting about.
Wanna buy a shirt?
https://www.redbubble.com/people/stealthfinger/shop?asc=u
"So yes, getting things done in the U.S. system is harder, and it's easier for a few states to block legislation. That doesn't mean the U.S. system has greater legitimacy, quite the opposite. The state governments are barely accountable for their actions, and even a party with strong popular support can fail to get its legislation passed thanks to the byzantine electoral system."
I think you have a rose tinted view of the UK's electoral system if you genuinely believe it leads to greater accountability. Let's be clear here, the ruling party has 100% of the power in the UK despite only representing 37% of the voting electorate in this parliament, worse though, party leaders determine the direction of the country and are typically the figurehead that people vote for, and as such when there is a handover in this case, the country can be pushed in a direction that is completely against the will of the people. Theresa May now has the option to take the country in whatever direction she wants for 4 years despite having no democratic mandate to do so, beyond on one simple point, that we should leave the EU but with no definition of when or how.
The UK would be better if it had proportional representation, but it doesn't, due to first past the post, the UK's electoral system nearly always turns out what can be best described as minority backed dictatorship as the British system almost never turns out a party backed by a majority, or a coalition backed by a combined majority. The last government was the first exception in a hundred years where we had a coalition that actually represented a compromise goverment covering over 50% of the population's votes.
The idea of our system is that it leaves us with local representatives, but even this is broken and is in itself the source of the problem - at local level the representatives can be even less representative, in some constituencies a represented is elected with less than 25% of local support, this absurd situation means that someone who is meant to represent his local region is actually opposed by over 75% of the people that live there. If those 75% are liberal and support gay married, whereas the other 25% are an organised church loving, gay hating minority, then that representative may vote in a manner that the vast majority of his constituents are firmly opposed to.
Germany is one of the better examples of governance in the world. Picking between the UK and US electoral systems is like narrowing yourself to a choice between Stalin and Hitler as your leader when you could instead go with a 3rd option and just have Churchill.
Yes, gerrymandering causes some problems...
Some problems? You make it sound like a coffee stain on a brown T-shirt. Gerrymandering is a huge problem in the US.
It's a shit question.
"Remain a member of the European Union" is ok, you know what is being voting for - and, equally importantly - the people who voted for the other option also know what its proponents were voting for.
"Leave the European Union" is utterly stupid. Nobody knows what it means. For some leave voters it means stop immigration at all costs. For other leave voters it meant "continue the free movement of people and goods within Europe".
Compare this question with the 2011 alternative vote question:
At present, the UK uses the "first past the post" system to elect MPs to the House of Commons. Should the "alternative vote" system be used instead?
"alternative vote" was defined https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
Imagine instead if this question had been:
At present, the UK uses the "first past the post" system to elect MPs to the House of Commons. Should a proportional voting system be used instead?'
I would expect that this would have carried. Much like the EU question, the alternative to the status quo is a shifting target that can be defined to whatever the proponent wants. Of course, had that question been asked then we'd then have had a mess to sort out when everybody wanted a different PR system.
What should have happened is that DC should have negotiated with Europe on, say, Britain adopting the Norwegian model and leaving the EU. Once he'd got approval then gone to the country with
"Remain a member of the European Union"
"Adopt the Norwegian model of membership in the EEA"
(Or he could have gone for a no-free movement of people or goods WTO rules model alternative)
Now the question is clearer - and even if it had gone against DC, at least everybody would have known what was going to happen.
Britain is utterly crap at negotiating. We have an adversarial system, both in parliament and in the judiciary. Most European nations have had much more experience with having to establish coalitions. It's going to be interesting to see how the next two years go and whether the press is reporting how those "evil Europeans are ganging up on us" when almost certainly none of them are arguing for what they really want but instead for what they understand they can really get.
At least for some things in Europe we used to have a veto. That gave us a lot of clout - however awkward we were we couldn't be completely ignored (and the 10-12% control of the vote helped too). We also tended to hold the balance of power in Franco-German differences - so neither country to afford to upset us too much. We're giving all that up. That might mean Europe now tears itself to pieces or it might mean that Europe can now rebuild itself stronger in a more cooperative model.
We've now got idiots saying that any deal with Europe should now go to another referendum. I predict that there is NO deal that can be made that will attract a majority of the votes. The single largest minority is probably "remain in the EU" which has already been rejected. I suppose we could put two deals on the referendum and force people to chose one or the other - just make sure that the other option is so bad that it cannot win.
God said, "div D = rho, div B = 0, curl E = -@B/@t, curl H = J + @D/@t," and there was light.
I agree, both Corbyn and May appear to be honest. Cameron, being a PR man by trade, could never master honesty (he had a bit of trouble with competence too).
Theresa May looks like the best of a bad bunch. On the debit side, her authoritarian tendencies have only increased during her time as Home Secretary (it seems to afflict nearly all who hold that post). To her credit, she has taken more notice of actual evidence than some politicians when making decisions and seems to want to be fair.
She'll need all the stubbornness she's noted for to hold to the words of her initial speech, against all the rich and powerful influences gathering at No. 10's door.
I'm unsure what her appointment of Boris Johnson as Foreign Secretary means; maybe she had to have him inside the tent and has given him a last chance or enough rope. Seems a bit reckless though.
It wasn't that hard:
£350 - nope, that was a lie.
71 failed no votes - true, but that amounted to 3%, we actually got our way about 90% of the time.
EEA without free movement - we were constantly told this wouldn't happen, and still are being told this.
Fisherman won't have to deal with quotas - even if that were to happen, how long would it take for them to be reintroduced after they return to over-fishing indiscriminately?
109 laws on pillows - John Oliver covered that nicely.
The EU need us more than we need them (trade deficit) - only if you ignore the fact the EU's GDP is five times greater than the UK's.
All you had to do is check if there was a modicum of truth in what you heard.
Yes, the Boris appointment was very interesting.
Personally, I find it all a little too convenient. It may very well have just been chance, but I wonder if Boris and Gove set up their 'stabbing in the back' thing as a way for Boris to exit from a situation he could not win from. Before his good friend Gove did this, Boris was basically trapped and would have had to follow through with brexit and all the ridiculous promises he made. He would basically have had to upset both the brexiters (by not being able to deliver on all the promises he made) and remainers (who see him as an unprincipled opportunist). He could have ended as the most hated prime minister in history, without anyone else to blame since he was the face of the brexit campaign.
If you consider his position, then what Gove did was actually an incredibly effective way for Boris to escape the trap. Gove spent his public image (which is off little value to him), and Boris got to preserve his by crawling off with hurt feelings, gaining some sympathy from the public instead of its scorn, and not having to deal with being labelled a quitter.
This would also explain a plot hole that didn't make sense to me before, around why Boris didn't just remain in the leadership race despite Gove joining. In the end all Gove had was claims that Boris wouldn't be a good leader. A seasoned politician like Boris could have easily run a PR campaign back that he would be a good leader, and discredit Gove (after all Gove had just stabbed him in the back). So why did he decide he suddenly had no chance of winning?
I suspect from this appointment that May was involved as well, and was promised the premiership at least until the next election. My prediction is Gove will do his 'penance' and then come back to the cabinet in a few months time, and Boris will start figuring out how to engineer a comeback as the 'hero of brexit' once May has done all the dirty work for him.
You have to understand; to an American, the concept of a leader voluntarily submitting to the will of the people is completely alien.
"-1, Overrated" works, too.
I always find it funny to get a "-1, Overrated" applied to a post that has no other moderation.
Love sees no species.
109 laws on pillows - John Oliver covered that nicely
I didn't hear that one, but I remember when the right wing press through a massive shit fit over the EU regulating domestic (i.e. not certified for use in commercial kitchens) oven gloves.
Oh woe those evil Europeans forcing regulation on us hard working British manufacturers of deeply shitty oven gloves.
The EU law was to insist that they would work at a mere 200C which is of course inane because most domestic ovens reach 250. But that wasn't the cause of complaint. No, the complaint was that British manufactuers would have to stop selling oven gloves that wouldn't be safe even as low as 200C.
It came as a bit of a shock that it was actually legal to sell oven gloves that can't be safely used to take stuff out of a normal oven. Apparently the EU are evil for wanting to stop manufacturers salling blatently substsandard goods.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
I'm unsure what her appointment of Boris Johnson as Foreign Secretary means; maybe she had to have him inside the tent and has given him a last chance or enough rope. Seems a bit reckless though.
I think it is a brilliant piece of strategic nastiness, that one can only admire, as an engineer. She wanted to remain in EU, he was the highest profile brexiteer; now he can sort out the mess. If he fails miserably - and it seems not unlikely - he'll get all the blame; if he succeeds, it shines a positive light on her as a good leader. Well played, I think.
We are seriously going to run out of simile soon. This is quite the most bizarre and unlikely position to be in, truth being stranger than fiction and all that.
She's put Bam-bam in as foreign secretary, and she's left a homeopathy supporter in charge of the NHS. However she HAS had the good sense to get rid of Michael Gove (snake in the grass has been returned to the green pastures of the Back Benches).
Where is Spitting Image when you need it?