Aw Cummon...gi'us a swig

The author of a new briefing document reports on how drinking control laws give the police absolute, unchecked power.

Most police powers are kept on a tight leash. If the police want to arrest you, search your house, or confiscate your property, they can only do this in particular defined circumstances – and the whole procedure is closely documented and recorded.

Yet now there is a whole swathe of behaviour-policing laws, where police – or pseudo-police such as community support officers – are given powers to use however they want, against whomever they want, in whatever circumstances they want. They are being signed legal blank cheques. One key example of this is drinking control powers: within 800-plus control areas across the UK, police officers can now ask peaceable citizens to surrender their can of lager or ale, or to tip it down the drain. 

...Read full article

The Australian political party, with the slogan we're serious about sex, launches at Melbourne Sexpo on November 20th and party convenor Fiona Patten is confident it will gain the 500 members required to register and contest state Upper House and Senate seats.

Ms Patten, who is also the chief executive of the Eros Association - representing the adult retail and entertainment industry, said she and others were concerned about the Government's proposed internet filter, which is being tested over summer on about 10,000 sites to block unwanted content.

This really came out of 20 years of lobbying on sex and censorship and then... the latest being the compulsory internet filter, which will ... prohibit and blacklist adult material that is currently legal in magazines, books and film, she said.

Ms Patten said there had already been a lot of interest from potential members: We'll probably have our 500 members by the time we launch on Thursday. But there's four million customers of adult shops in Australia."

She also hoped the 1000 or so adult shops around the country would become Sex Party branches: Hopefully we'll get their attention with the word but then we may be able to help influence some reasonably sensible policies.

An introductory statement on the Australian Sex Party reads:

We're serious about sex.

Sex is a wonderful thing. It's the reason we were born and (mostly) its NOT the reason we die. Sex, as gender, defines who we are and often what roles we undertake in society. It's responsible for a heck of a lot of pleasure and fulfillment in life. Also, the basis of much art, fashion and music. It entertains us, enthralls us and mystifies us. Because its such a fundamental need of human beings, it conditions much of our behaviour. And then politicians go and legislate that behaviour.

The Australian Sex Party is a political response to the sexual needs of Australia in the 21st century. It is an attempt to restore the balance between sexual privacy and sexual publicity that has been severely distorted by morals campaigners and prudish politicians.

A political party based on sex is certainly a single-issue party but to choose a bad metaphor, its a very broad church. Economic, social welfare, environmental and even defense policies have got lots to do with sex and sexuality. All those big guns and huge surpluses...

If you're sick of religious and anti-sex politicians like Steve Fielding, Brian Harradine and Fred Nile threatening to block legislation in the Senate and State Upper Houses unless they get their way on sex and gender issues, vote for someone who understands this rort.

Vote for the Sex Party.

Paying for sex is to become a criminal offence in the UK and lapdancing clubs will face a stringent licensing regime

The Home Secretary has attacked the 'bizarre' practice of City firms entertaining clients in lapdancing clubs, on the eve of a government crackdown on the sex trade which is expected to criminalise most men who use prostitutes.

Jacqui Smith said she expected to see some lapdancing clubs, which have mushroomed in recent years, close and fewer new ones opened under reforms. She will outline plans this week to criminalise paying for sex with a woman controlled for another person's gain. The new offence will carry a hefty fine and criminal record, which could prevent those caught from getting jobs in sensitive occupations.

The legislation will cover women who have pimps or drug addicts who work to pay off their dealers as well as the rarer cases of trafficked women. This is expected to include the majority of Britain's 80,000 sex workers. Ignorance of a woman's circumstances will not be a defence. Kerb crawlers will be named and shamed, while those who pay a prostitute knowing she has been forcibly trafficked could face rape charges.

The measures are highly controversial, with critics arguing that men will seek other outlets if prostitution is driven off the streets. Smith said it was not mine or the government's responsibility to ensure that the demand is satisfied. Is this something about which people have a choice with respect to their demands? Yes, they do. Basically, if it means fewer people are able to go out and pay for sex I think that would be a good thing.

The prostitution review will be published this week, followed later this month by new licensing arrangements that are expected to see lapdancing clubs, currently licensed in the same way as pubs, subjected to the same stringent regime as sex shops, allowing local residents more opportunities to object.

he English Collective of Prostitutes (ECP), which has vigorously opposed the clampdown, says outlawing paid-for sex between consenting adults will punish women who find this more lucrative than menial jobs. Forcing the trade underground would mean that the risks they are forced to take will be greater, said a spokeswoman.

Under the new offence, men would not be able to claim in court that they had not known the prostitute had a pimp or a drug habit. It won't be enough to say, "I didn't know", she said. What I hope people will say is, "I am not actually going to take the risk if there is any concern that this woman hasn't made a free choice." It would be quite difficult for a man paying for sex in the majority of cases not to fall under this particular offence.

What the new powers would provide:

• A new criminal offence of paying for sex with a prostitute 'controlled for another person's gain'.
• Kerb crawlers to be liable for prosecution after their first offence.
• The possible expansion of a scheme in Lambeth, south London, which has impressed ministers, in which offenders are routinely named in local press.
• A stricter licensing regime to make it harder for lap-dancing clubs to open in residential areas.

Sex toys amounting to P10,000 were seized during a series of police raids in several stalls in Manila's Quiapo and Sta. Cruz districts.

The raids were in response to Manila Mayor Alfredo Lim's directive to intensify the campaign against illegal sex toys being sold in the city, said Superintendent Romulo Sapitula, of Manila Police: My men will continue to monitor the area and we will conduct relentless operations to prevent the proliferation of the sex toys.

Among the items seized were sex rings, sex dolls and dildos.

Police had been receiving information that sex toys, along with fake Viagra pills, are being sold openly in the areas.

A man known as the Naked Rambler has been cleared of committing a breach of the peace after leaving Barlinnie Prison on 14 October with no clothes on.

Stephen Gough was acquitted at Glasgow Sheriff Court yesterday, but was rearrested in the foyer.

Police in the Malaysian state of Perak want the state government to either stop issuing entertainment licences to errant operators or tighten the rules in a move to combat prostitution.

The only way for us to keep these activities under control is by getting the state government to intervene. We need them to help us by revoking entertainment licences given to notorious operators or by tightening the rules and monitoring the outlets closely, Perak police chief Deputy Comm Datuk Zulkifli Abdullah told reporters.

He also urged the state government to make it mandatory for karaoke operators to use glass windows in each of their karaoke rooms at their outlets: It would be easier for us to keep watch on what is going on behind the walls in the rooms. There are operators who even have special cubicles to hide their guest relations officers or prostitutes during our raids.

DCP Zulkifli said that the appeal to the state government comes in the wake of the 18% rise in arrests made on foreigners engaged in vice activities across the state this year: We arrested a total of 987 foreigners, mostly from China, some from Indonesia, Vietnam and other countries, in 305 raids conducted from January to October this year.

Black & Decker battleaxe grinder

US power tool maker Black & Decker has received a hammering from a Swedish advertising censor for an advert described as degrading to women.

The Swedish business sector's Ethical Council against Gender Discriminatory Advertising (ERK) slammed an advert that promised beauty treatments for the wives of men who bought its products.

The Black & Decker ad earlier this year promised customers a pleased wife guarantee, offering beauty treatments worth 350 kronor ($43 dollars) to the wives of men who bought spent more than 1,500 kronor on its tools.

Through this text, the council finds that (the company) conveyed an outdated view of gender roles in which women are expected to be placated with beauty treatments while men buy tools, ERK said in its ruling: This is degrading for both women and men. The ad is thereby gender discriminatory.

ERK, which is made up of representatives of Sweden's main advertising companies, has no power to impose sanctions on companies it finds guilty of discrimination.

All alcohol advertisements should be banned in Northern Ireland in an effort to repress the region's drinkers.

The legislative assembly heard that raising the age limit for buying alcoholic drinks in off licences from 18-21 and outlawing two-for-one and happy hour promotions in bars and clubs are also among a series of repressive measures proposed by the SDLP.

The SDLP also called for a social responsibility tariff imposed on all licensed premises to ensure they contribute to the cost of policing the night-time economy.

The initiatives were outlined by Foyle MLA Pat Ramsey during a debate on the problems surrounding alcohol misuse in Northern Ireland.

Ramsey acknowledged that while some of his party's proposals could be legislated for by the Assembly others were devolved matters.

Britain's largest dedicated human trafficking police unit is being shut down just a year after it was set up because of Home Office spending cuts.

The Metropolitan Police's Human Trafficking Team will cease work next year because its budget has been withdrawn following the decision by the Home Office to cut its yearly funding for human trafficking investigations from £4m to £1.7m.

The Met's Human Trafficking Team was set up in March 2007 and was designed to actively target gangs who bring women to the UK as sex slaves and children as forced labourers. It is estimated that more than 4,000 people are currently in the UK as a result of having been trafficked.

The Home Office yesterday insisted that the funding for the unit was always intended to be time-limited. However, when it was launched last year, the Home Office made no mention of this. Instead, the Home Office minister, Vernon Coaker, said: This new team will be a specialist unit dedicated to targeting the global criminal networks that profit from this modern day slave trade. Those involved in the trafficking of men, women and children can expect to feel the full weight of the law.

However there have been a handful of cases of trafficking successfully prosecuted recently:

Based on article from enfieldindependent.co.uk

A man who held a teenage girl in sex slavery at his Enfield home has been jailed. Mentor Brahimi pimped out his 19-year-old victim from a property in Enfield for a month, in March this year.

She had just been brought to the UK by an Eastern European gang, when Brahimi’s wife promised the teenager a room in a safe house, which she saw as an escape route.

But the offer was nothing but a trick and she was forced to sell her body for sex to stay there. She eventually escaped on April 23 and alerted police.

Brahimi was convicted and sentenced to five years for trafficking women and four years for controlling prostitution. He was also handed a three-year jail term for cocaine possession and a year for money laundering.

DC Chris Ansell, of the Met’s clubs and vice unit, said: Brahimi subjected a young and vulnerable woman to repeated sexual abuse to line his own pocket. To exploit a woman who had already been trafficked over from Romania to work as a prostitute shows cruelty in the extreme.

Based on article from news.bbc.co.uk

Thai brothers who led an internet sex gang which made millions by exploiting trafficked women have been jailed. The women were charged up to £30,000 by the gang to repay their travel "debts".

Bordee Pitayatankul was jailed for 15 months. His brother Pongpoj was given 18 months at Southwark Crown Court. Seven other members of the gang were also jailed.

Gang members admitted to various offences including conspiring to launder money and plotting to control prostitution between 1 January 2005 and 21 April 2008.

Up to 70 women worked from at least 20 brothels across London, including Bayswater, Kensington and Paddington, to raise the money they were told they owed the gang.

The Oriental Gems website set up by the gang featured the women accompanied by a photo gallery showing them naked or semi-naked. It also listed their sexual specialities with prices ranging from £150 for one hour to £1,500 for an overnight stay.

Passing sentence, Judge Christopher Hardy said: It cannot be right in this day and age that women coming to this country should be, in effect, sold off like slaves to work in this or any other trade for free until their debt is expunged.

Police estimate that the business was making a conservative £800,000 a year at one stage, with the gang pocketing a minimum of £3.2m. Although officers have seized £179,000 they are yet to trace huge assets thought to be hidden abroad.

The judge said authorities should decide whether those convicted should be deported. Confiscation hearings will be held next year.

There a number of proposals being highlighted in the run-up to next month's Queen's Speech.

Home Secretary Jacqui Smith will shortly announce an overhaul of prostitution law, making it an offence for a man to buy sex from a prostitute if she is 'controlled for the gain' of another person. This is expected to be so widely drafted that it could cover up to nine out of 10 sex workers, not just those trafficked into the sex trade but those controlled by pimps or even by drug habits.

Ministers hope that while it will technically remain legal to pay for sex so long as a woman agrees freely, many men will be frightened off because it will be so difficult to be sure any particular prostitute falls into that category.

Burkha is the new bikini

Bali Police chief Insp. Gen. Teuku Ashikin Husein said his institution had no option but to enforce the new pornography law in the province.

I have no option. The police must enforce every positive law in the country, he said in Denpasar, as quoted by Tempointeraktif.com.

Ashikin said the law would be implemented through a government regulation which had yet to be established.

Last week, Bali's governor and speaker of the provincial legislature announced that the province would not be able to enforce the newly passed law, saying it was not in line with Balinese philosophical and sociological values.

Bali leaders and members of the public have united in an organization named the Bali People's Component to challenge the new law through the Constitutional Court.

The Harriet Hateman Committee

House of Commons debates
Thursday, 6 November 2008
Oral Answers to Questions — Solicitor-General

Fiona Mactaggart (Slough, Labour):

What recent discussions she has had with the Secretary of State for the Home Department on the review of demand for prostitution; and if she will make a statement.

Vera Baird (Solicitor General, Redcar, Labour):

I have discussed with the Home Secretary a number of measures to address the problems of prostitution arising from the demand review. They were mainly announced by the Home Secretary in September, and included improvements to the legislation on kerb crawling, new powers to close brothels, greater restrictions on lap dancing clubs and a new offence of paying for sex with someone who is controlled for another's gain. The full results of the review will be announced this month.

Fiona Mactaggart:

I thank the Solicitor-General for that reply. The last of those offences announced by the Home Secretary—the offence of having sex with someone who is controlled for gain—mirrors an offence in Finland. Is the Solicitor-General aware that there have been no prosecutions since the Finnish offence was introduced?

Vera Baird:

No, I did not know that. However, I do not think that that is an inherent defect of the offence, and I am not sure that the two offences are identical. We prosecute those who control prostitutes for gain, so prosecuting people who pay for sex with a person who has been prostituted for gain goes with the grain of what we do already. We all know that a very high percentage of prostitutes are controlled for another's gain, so one might think that there is a 90 per cent. chance that any man who buys sex will fall foul of this law. We will have to design its finer points later, but we have every hope that it will make a significant difference and be a significant deterrent.

Burkha is the new bikini

Indonesia watched its new anti-pornography law leap into action last weekend, as police raided a Jakarta nightclub and arrested three employees. The officers detained three erotic dancers in the raid. The women now face up to 10 years in prison.

The new law retains a broad definition of pornography that many fear could be abused by law enforcers and radical organizations. The law is wide open to interpretation and could even apply to voice, sound, poetry, works of art or literature, says Kadek Krishna Adidharma, one of many Balinese who see the law as an attempt by the Indonesian Muslim majority to impose their will on the rest of the country: Anything that supposedly raises the libido could be prosecutable.

The law has a long list of possible offenses. Anyone displaying nudity could be fined up to $500,000 and jailed for up to 10 years. Public performances that could incite sexual desire have been banned, and civil society groups will be allowed to help enforce the legislation.

While it is true that pornographic magazines and pirated DVDs are easily available in Indonesia, advocates for the rights of religious and ethnic minorities say the problem will not be righted by the new legislation. They point to existing provisions in the criminal law as sufficient to deal with the problem, and complain that the new law poses a threat to non-Muslim Indonesians. The law imposes the will of the majority that embrace Islam, is a form of religious discrimination and against the spirit of tolerance taught by the country's founders, says Theophilus Bela, chairman of the Christian Communication Forum.

Four provinces with sizeable non-Muslim populations — Bali, Yogyakarta, Papua and North Sulawesi — have already rejected the law and said it will not be enforced in their regions. It remains to be seen how and if that will be tolerated by Jakarta. Major protests are planned for this month in Bali, where the governor has been a vocal opponent of the law and pledged that it will not be implemented. Many Balinese are now calling for greater autonomy and say dire consequences lie ahead if their demands are not met. There is even a possibility that Bali will ask to separate from Indonesia, says Rudolf Dethu, a Balinese who has helped organize protests against the law: It's that serious.

Jack & Jacqui Jack: Have you got your ID card yet? Jacqui: Yes, but I lost it!

Passport fees to jump by a third to more than £100 to pay for fingerprinting. The Home Secretary Jacqui Smith also revealed that the cost to taxpayers of new identity cards will double from £30 to £60.

The huge rises were necessary to pay for taking facial readings and fingerprints for new biometric passports and ID cards.

From 2012 identity and passport service estimates that around seven million UK residents will apply for a card or a passport - with each person having to provide their fingerprints, photograph and signature in person.

This means that the additional cost of a biometric passport or identity card will be £28 each, on top of the £72 charge for a new passport. The cost of paying for an identity card will jump from £30 to £58.

The fee for a new passport has increased fourfold in the past 10 years, from £18 in 1997 to £72 today. If the fee in 1997 had increased by the annual rate of inflation it would be £23.67 today.

In a speech by Smith at the Social Market Foundation in London, Smith also revealed that some ID cards will be handed out next year to members of the public who were keen to have one.

Anyone who wants a card can register their interest on a website. They would be then selected at random to become early adopters of the cards. The cards will enable holders to travel around Europe without a passport.

ID cards will be compulsory for 20,000 airside workers at two airports - City of London and Manchester - from next Autumn, although the cost of registering them will be paid for by the Home Office.

From Nov 25 this year, ID cards are compulsory for foreign nationals who come to Britain for more than a holiday.

Today, according to the Government's own Mori poll, 59% of people agree that prostitution is a perfectly reasonable choice of work; and 37% would not be ashamed if a family member worked as a prostitute. It is surely time to decriminalise it. Yet Jacqui Smith wants to criminalise kerb crawlers ever more severely and to give police and councils the power to close brothels, throwing women on the streets. There is rightly proper concern about the trafficking of young girls, and their exploitation and violent abuse by pimps and drug dealers. The spiral of such depravity is a scar on our cities. But pitching such interests in a war with the police can only aggravate matters.

There is, whether we like it or not, a compelling need for many men to have sex without strings, sex with a stranger that is over and done with once the cash has changed hands. Throughout history they have found ways of doing so, whether with sacred temple maidens or in the garrison brothels set up to serve fighting armies. We can chase it up and down the legal ladders, hound it down dark alleys and squalid bedsits, but its persistence tells us that we won't eradicate it. So let's face up to the fact and make paying for sex legal. That way we can site and inspect brothels where it suits the community, women can have their health and welfare monitored and their drug problems treated.

...Read full article

Nutters are pressing for another change in the law on prostitution, which would see sex for sale in the Capital's saunas outlawed. They want an outright ban on buying sex, which would apply not just to clients of street prostitutes but also those who visit saunas or private flats.

And they hope the change could be achieved through tabling an amendment to a bill already being considered by the Scottish Parliament.

A number of MSPs from different parties have indicated support for making the purchase of sex illegal. But independent Lothians MSP Margo MacDonald branded the move futile and said it could make the situation worse.

Evangelical nutters of CARE have asked the Scottish Parliament's justice committee to add a clause to the Sexual Offences (Scotland) Bill, which it is currently scrutinising, to outlaw the purchase of sex. Lawrie Hutton, executive director of Edinburgh City Mission is another religious nutter to back the call.

And Labour backbencher Paul Martin said he would not rule out tabling an amendment: Public perception is probably that this is something which is already illegal.

Fellow Labour MSP Marlyn Glen and SNP MSP Sandra White voiced their backing and Scottish Tory deputy leader Murdo Fraser said the campaigners had made a good case.

Glasgow City Council is also pressing for a ban on the purchase of sex. Ann Hamilton, the council's lead officer on prostitution, said the new law on kerb-crawling was helping to combat street prostitution, but some women were continuing their trade elsewhere.

But Margo MacDonald said the Swedish example showed outlawing prostitution did not work: If the aim is to eliminate prostitution, it has been proven in Sweden to fail. It simply drives prostitution underground. It makes it infinitely more dangerous for the women because of the way organised crime is moving in and taking over.

Gordon Brown's ministerial team. Left to right: Women's Issues, Patriotism & Jingoism, Religious Observance, Fun & Recreation, Men's Issues

Harriet Harman says firms should not take staff to lap dancing clubs

She urged firms to sign up to a new morality charter that would prevent employees paying for trips to see strippers on expenses.

Harman, a no-sex object and minister for women, was speaking as the Fawcett Society launched a campaign to urge firms to challenge sex-object culture at work.

It includes banning the use of use of lap dancing clubs in corporate entertaining and stopping staff from accessing pornography in the office.

The charter is backed by the likes of BT, Barclays Wealth and Matrix Chambers.

However the suggestions were criticised by the Lap Dancing Association.

Kate Nicholls, the association's secretary, said: This campaign is another aggressive attempt to see our clubs shut down and tens of thousands of professional dancers put out of work.

The Fawcett Charter is another attempt to stigmatise a legitimate industry, constructed by people who oppose it on moral grounds.

Lap dancers have taken part in a protest against government plans to reclassify them as sex workers.

Nutter campaigners against the clubs want them to be relabelled as sex encounter establishments and say councils should be given more control to ban them and to charge higher licence fees.

But the Lap Dancing Association, which represents a third of the industry's clubs, claims this would stigmatise performers. Its members say sexual activity does not take place in regulated clubs and their businesses were already controlled under the Licensing Act 2003.

They said they are subject to numerous policies which regulated their activity and the reclassification was unnecessary.

On Tuesday, Lap dancers Lynsey Catt, Sian Wilshaw, Katherine Martinez, and Sharon Warneford presented a petition with nearly 3,000 signatures to Number 10 Downing Street, on behalf of the association.

Elaine Reed, a spokeswoman for the Spearmint Rhino Gentlemen's Clubs chain, said: The workers within our industry are absolutely horrified that the Government are trying to rebrand us as part of the sex industry. The feeling is that if these changes are made the whole face of the industry will change, and not for the better

A Home Office spokesman said it was looking into the matter and intended to introduce changes to the the law at some point in the future.

Do the incentives this sets up seem weird?

You let a man solicit you for sex, and then you say hey, I'm suing you?

Seems like an incentive for women luring men and then turning on them, no?

See article from newsmill.se (in Swedish):

The Johns shall pay damages to prostituted persons

Politicians to the right and left agree how the payingforsex law should be redefined.

The law against paying for sexual services was adopted to acknowledge that sex buyers exploits and damages the prostituted. To give those victims of sex discrimination the right to seek damages under civil rights law is in line with that acknowledgement, writes 9 Swedish MPs* and American feminist/lawyer Catherine A. Mackinnon**

….

Giving lots of references to Melissa Farley’s research, the article argues that a civil remedy for prostituted persons to claim damages from sex buyers would empower those who need empowerment.

The amendment would define prostitution as a civil rights violation against women, and allow women who claimed harm from prostitution to sue the sexbuyers for damages in civil court .

*including lawyer and former Ombudsman of equality Claes Borgström
**MacKinnon has already tried this in the US together with Andrea Dworkin -see under pornography here.

Wowser Stephen Conroy:  I am not a wowser ...BUT... I will ban hardcore porn

Online pornography will be caught in the Rudd Government’s compulsory blacklist internet filter, the Australian Media and Communications Authority (ACMA) has confirmed.

Any website that is subject to a complaint and classified RC or X18+ will be added to the blacklist, an ACMA spokesman said: This includes real depictions of actual sexual activity

Legal X18+ pornography in the territories will not be immune, the ACMA spokesman added.

Communications Minister Stephen Conroy: This is not an argument about free speech. As I have already said, [...BUT...] we have laws about the sort of material that is acceptable across all mediums and the internet is no different.

Currently, some material is banned and we are simply seeking to use technology to ensure those bans are working. The National Classification Code determines content against the standards of morality, decency and propriety generally accepted by reasonable adults.

ACMA received 1122 complaints about online content in 2007/08 resulting in 15 take-down orders and 781 recommendations to makers of online filters.

A third of those 796 blocked websites were classified X18+ for actual sexual activity between consenting adults, with the remainder refused classification for depiction of a sexual fetish or fantasy, violence, or a child.

A separate filter, dubbed the Clean Feed, will further block a range of material unsuitable for children. Adults will be able to opt out of the Clean Feed, but not the illegal content filter.

• www.myspace.com/nocleanfeed
• www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=32318174194

Proposition K failed to gain voter approval in San Francisco and lost by 16 percentage points. It proposed to van the enforcement of the states anti-prostitution laws.

The result so far is that with 98% of precincts counted. Yes - 42%. No - 58%. (The measure required a simple majority to pass).

Meanwhile, this election's wackiest ballot measure, Proposition R - which would rename a city sewage plant after George W Bush - went down the shitter by 31% in favour to 69% against.

Corrosive cynicism, fuelled by politically nihilistic blogs and a retreat from dispassionate reporting, is endangering British political discourse, Hazel Blears, the communities secretary, will tell a Hansard Society conference today on growing political disengagement in Britain.

She will lambast the growth of a hermetically-sealed professional political class and call for a support network on the lines of the political women's action group Emily's List to help more people from ordinary careers into full-time politics.

In a hard-hitting speech, she will warn that the fall in turnouts among working class voters in some British cities is now so marked that it amounts to a reversal by stealth of 19th century reforms that spread the franchise.

All political parties will have to learn how to use the web as a campaign and fundraising tool, she will say, and how to engage ethnic minority groups and the working class.

We are witnessing a dangerous corrosion in our political culture, she says. In part she will blame a shrinking and increasingly competitive newspaper market which demands more impact from its reporting - the translation of every political discussion into a row, every difficulty a crisis, every rocky patch for the prime minister into the worst week ever.

She will, however, also turn her fire on some political bloggers.

Perhaps because of the nature of the technology, there is a tendency for political blogs to have a 'Samizdat' style. The most popular blogs are rightwing, ranging from the considered Tory views of Iain Dale, to the vicious nihilism of Guido Fawkes. Perhaps this is simply anti-establishment. Blogs have only existed under a Labour government. Perhaps if there was a Tory government, all the leading blogs would be left-of-centre?

But mostly, political blogs are written by people with disdain for the political system and politicians, who see their function as unearthing scandals, conspiracies and perceived hypocrisy.

Until political blogging 'adds value' to our political culture, by allowing new voices, ideas and legitimate protest and challenge, and until the mainstream media reports politics in a calmer, more responsible manner, it will continue to fuel a culture of cynicism and despair.

Jack & Jacqui Jack: Good one Jacqui, can't wait to read the consultation results. Jacqui: No need to wait, we just listen in to what people are saying

Internet black boxes will be used to collect every email and web visit in the UK under the Government's plans for a giant big brother database, The Independent has learnt.

Home Office officials have told senior figures from the internet and telecommunications industries that the black box technology could automatically retain and store raw data from the web before transferring it to a giant central database controlled by the Government.

Plans to create a database holding information about every phone call, email and internet visit made in the UK have provoked a huge public outcry. Richard Thomas, the Information Commissioner, described it as step too far and the Government's own terrorism watchdog said that as a raw idea it was awful.

Nevertheless, ministers have said they are committed to consulting on the new Communications Data Bill early in the new year. News that the Government is already preparing the ground by trying to allay the concerns of the internet industry is bound to raise suspicions about ministers' true intentions. Further details of the database emerged on Monday at a meeting of internet service providers (ISPs) in London where representatives from BT, AOL Europe, O2 and BSkyB were given a PowerPoint presentation of the issues and the technology surrounding the Government's Interception Modernisation Programme (IMP), the name given by the Home Office its database monstrosity proposal.

Whitehall experts working on the IMP unit told the meeting the security and intelligence agencies  said the technology would allow them to create greater capacity to monitor all communication traffic on the internet. The black boxes are an attractive option for the internet industry because they would be secure and not require any direct input from the ISPs.

During the meeting Whitehall officials also tried to reassure the industry by suggesting that many smaller ISPs would be unaffected by the black boxes as these would be installed upstream on the network and hinted that all costs would be met by the Government.

A source close to the meeting said: They said they only wanted to return to a position they were in before the emergence of internet communication, when they were able to monitor all correspondence with a police suspect. The difference here is they will be in a much better position to spy on many more people on the basis of their internet behaviour. Also there's a grey area between what is content and what is traffic. Is what is said in a chat room content or just traffic?

A spokesman for the Home Office said that Monday's meeting provided a chance to engage with small communication service providers ahead of the formal public consultation next year.

The age for securing a marriage visa to enter the UK is to be raised from 18 to 21 in an effort to crack down on people being forced into relationships, the government announced yesterday.

The change to the immigration rules will come into force on 27 November and will mean both the intended husband and wife will have to be 21 before a marriage visa can be issued.

Owners of lap dancing clubs across Britain have joined forces to oppose attempts to make it more difficult for them to obtain licences.

Next week lap dancers are to hand in a petition to Prime Minister Gordon Brown urging him not to reclassify them as sex establishments.

They stress that while lap dancing is a sexy industry, sex is not for sale.

The Government look set to change the law to make it easier for local councils to refuse licences for clubs where customers pay to watch semi-naked women dancing.

But Kate Nicholls, secretary of the Lap Dancing Association (LDA) yesterday said: Britain's lap dancing clubs have been the subject of political and media debate in recent months.

The LDA shares concerns about unregulated or inadequately controlled establishments offering lap dancing. The LDA proposes a mandatory code of operating standards for the industry.

The LDA offers its own code of practice as a blueprint for this. A code of practice which would ensure any licensed premises offering adult entertainment must adhere to principles of professionalism, safety and transparency, would go some lengths to addressing residual issues within the industry.

The LDA insist that local authorities do have the power to reject a licensing application for a lap-dancing club, and quote an example in her own Durham constituency: By way of example, in a recent case in Durham, a council ignored objections from local residents and the Magistrates Court reversed their decision, showing how effective and influential local complaints can be. The reality is that planning and licensing restrictions give local authorities and local communities full powers of consultation, complaint and control.

Utrecht plans to clean up prostitution in the city after strong indications that most women are forced into working the streets.

Camera surveillance will be introduced to show whether women are put under pressure and brothels will have to apply for licences. Police, the courts and health care workers will exchange more information in the future.

Utrecht does not want to go as far as Amsterdam and Alkmaar, where many red light area premises have been closed.

Update:

Based on article from enews20.com

One by one, authorities in cities across the country are stepping up their efforts to regulate, scrutinize and generally clean up the country's sex business.

This week the mayors of the cities of Alkmaar and Utrecht followed moves by Amsterdam in 2007 to toughen regulation and reduce the ability of the sex trade to act as cover for and cause of other illegal activities.

The mayor of Utrecht, Aleid Wolfsen, announced that the entire area of Zandpad in the city would be placed under CCTV surveillance.

Prostitution itself is legal in the Netherlands, with companies operating brothels being required to obtain a licence before they can open for business.

Brothels are required to list individual sex workers as employees. It is a bureaucratic procedure, which doesn't provide the authorities with information on whether or not the women were employed voluntarily.

This is why Wolfsen wants to change the law, requiring individual prostitutes to apply for a licence themselves.

Utrecht will also make it easier for prostitutes to report crimes and criminals to the police and get help, Wolfsen said.

The Mayor of Alkmaar Piet Bruinoge announced that the city would not be renewing the license of the JE Nool company, which operates 95 out of the 125 brothels in Alkmaar's Achterdam Street. Authorities in Alkmaar, north of Amsterdam, said that JE Nool did not fulfill the terms of the 2003 law, known as BIBOB.

The city of Alkmaar says it has no intention of closing down the prostitution zone entirely: If brothels observe Dutch law, they will be given a licence.

Alkmaar police have now been authorized to stop passers-by in the prostitution zone, and perform so-called random preventive searches for weapons or hard drugs.

Utrecht authorities have also said they will use the law in their own red-light districts.

Local authorities are claim that Latin words are elitist and discriminatory, and have ordered employees to use often-wordier alternatives in documents or when speaking to the public.

Bournemouth Council has listed 19 terms it no longer considers acceptable for use. They include ad hoc, bona fide, status quo, vice versa and even via.

Mary Beard, a Cambridge professor of classics, said: 'This is absolutely bonkers and the linguistic equivalent of ethnic cleansing: English is and always has been a language full of foreign words. It has never been an ethnically pure language.

Harry Mount, author of the best-selling book Amo, Amos, Amat and All That, a light-hearted guide to the language, said: Latin words and phrases can often sum up thoughts and ideas more often than the alternatives which are put forward. They are tremendously useful, quicker and nicer sounding. They are also English words. You will find etc or et cetera in an English dictionary.

Of other local authorities to prohibit the use of Latin, Salisbury has asked staff to avoid the phrases ad hoc, ergo and QED, while Fife has banned ad hoc as well as ex officio.

The credit crunch is already starting to bite at the industry, early in October the Wildcats group which had 8 clubs mainly in the north of England went into administration.

It’s understood that former MD Matt Haycox has bought the Leeds and Harrogate clubs off the receivers and that most of the others are now shut and on the market.

I understand also that as well as Wildcats Aphrodite’s in Blackpool has also closed and that several other clubs in that run down resort are closed or close to closing.

Also closed are Walsall’s “Cobra Lounge” club which is being converted back into a traditional pub and the UK’s first club “Route 66” in Park Royal.

An attempt to open a club in Tunbridge Wells has also been abandoned for the moment.

Indonesia Goes Burkha

The House of Representatives pushes through an overly broad bill that could energize Islamic fundamentalists even more

Analysts and critics are warning that the bill will embolden the country’s already-unswerving Muslim fundamentalists.

Provisions of the Bill

• Article 29
  Any person who manufactures, produces, duplicates, reduplicates, distributes, broadcasts, imports, exports, makes for sale, trades in, leases or makes available pornography shall be punished with a prison term of 6 months to 12 years and/or a fine of Rp250 million or Rp6 billion.
   
• Article 30
  Any person who makes available pornography …shall be punished with a prison term of 6 years and/or a fine of Rp250 million to Rp6 billion
   
• Article 31
  Any person who loans or downloads pornography…shall be punished with a maximum prison term of 4 years and/or a fine not to exceed Rp2 billion
   
• Article 32
  Any person who exhibits, possesses or stores pornography shall be punished with a maximum prison term of 4 years and/or a fine not to exceed Rp2 billion
   
• Article 34
  Any person who consents to be a pornographic object or model shall be punished with a maximum prison term of 10 years and/or a fine not to exceed Rp5 billion
   
• Article 36
  Any person who exhibits themselves or others in a performance…that contains nudity, sexual exploitation, coital acts or other pornographic content shall be punished with a maximum prison term of 10 years and/or a fine not to exceed Rp5 billion.

...Read full article

Update: Papua Protests

5th November 2008. Based on article from radioaustralia.net.au

About a thousand Christians in the Indonesian province of Papua have protested against an anti-pornography bill passed by parliament last week, saying it conflicts with their traditional culture.

The protesters say the bill, which has the support of a number of Islamic parties, could threaten Indonesia's national unity.

Minority groups, especially Christians and Hindus, say the new law is too vague, and a threat to artistic, religious, and cultural freedom.

From 1999 onwards, Sweden began penalising people who patronise prostitutes (through fines, jail terms of up to six months, and “naming and shaming”), while treating people who sell their bodies as victims.

The Swedish experience is finding imitators in several countries—including England and Wales where people will soon be liable to prosecution for “paying for sex with someone forced into prostitution…or controlled for another’s gain”. It is also becoming easier for English and Welsh police to prosecute people (either pedestrians or motorists) who solicit sex on the street. In Scotland, kerb-crawling was banned a year ago.

But what is really happening in Sweden? The policy of penalising clients or “johns” enjoys widespread consent. It was introduced by a centre-left administration, despite opposition from the centre-right. Now it is accepted by all Sweden’s main parties. The authorities say the number of streetwalking prostitutes fell about by 40% during the first four years of the new regime. Swedish politicians say they have made their country a bad destination for traffickers. But a sceptic might retort that by driving prostitution away from Sweden, the authorities have simply exported it, sending sex-hungry Swedes to nearby countries or else to Thailand.

Moreover, a sex-workers’ association in Sweden says the law makes life dangerous for those who ply their trade secretly. A life of dodging between apartments and exchanging furtive texts can leave women more reliant on pimps. Another argument is that fear of prosecution reduces the chances that clients will report the exploitation of under-age girls or boys.

Some drawbacks of doing things the Swedish way have been noted in more established quarters. A report by Norway’s justice ministry, in 2004, cited evidence of an “increased fear of attack” among Swedish prostitutes, who found it harder to assess their clients because transactions had to be agreed hastily or on the telephone.

...Read full article

Pub-goers in Aberdeen are facing a drugs test before entering bars as part of a unbelievably shitty policy by Grampian Police.

Officers in the force will be the first in Scotland to use an Itemiser - a device which can detect traces of drugs from hand swabs in a matter of seconds.

The test is voluntary, but customers will be refused entry if they do not take part. They could be searched and even arrested if traces are found.

The Itemiser allows police officers or door staff to swab customers hands as they enter a pub or club. It can tell almost instantly if drugs are present - including cocaine, cannabis, heroin and ecstasy.

The device can show three possible results: green, amber or red. Customers who get a green reading are allowed entry to the pub, those who get amber are given a drug information pack and those who get red could be searched by police.

If drugs are found on that person they could be arrested and a report could be sent to the procurator fiscal.

Police said the device deters unwanted drug dealers. [and no doubt an awful lot of innocent customers]

Det Supt Willie MacColl, national drugs co-ordinator for the Scottish Crime and Drug Enforcement Agency (SCDEA), said: This project offers an opportunity for collaborative working to implement an alternative intervention that will help change attitudes and reduce demand for controlled drugs. We hope that over time the model can be developed and used by community partnerships in other towns and cities across Scotland to reduce the harm caused by drugs.

The Itemiser is already being used in pubs in England where concerns have been raised about the possibility of customers getting a positive