Sunday, February 10, 2013

Last week MPs revived the corpse of the "secret justice" act.

When justice is carried out in secret, the very concept of justice is lost. At the same time the vote on gay marriage was taking place the government cynically slipped through a vote on this iniquitous bill. The consequences of this nasty piece of legislature seriously undermine the core principles of justice and accountability of the state to the people who elect them to represent their interests, not the interests of those in power.


Any cessation of power to the state weakens the voice of the people because the state now considers itself above and separate from the people. This is contrary to the principles of democracy where the state machinery is supposed to be at the service of the people. The military and police are there to serve and protect the people, not the interests of those in power who have forgotten that they are not above but of the people. Likewise, the justice system is there to serve all the constituent parts of society, not the interests of the powerful.

The same is true of all government services be it NHS, education, fire, revenue and so on. The government's job is to manage these services on behalf of society, i.e. you and me. They have no right or mandate to use these institutions to benefit or entrench their own power or authority. The real authority is us, the people and government is servant to and beholden, to us.

These are the foundations of a democratic state and they must be protected and underpinned by an irrevocable constitution and a strong and independent justice system that protects the interests of the people against abuse of power by our state.

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