Sunday Telegraph: A passport to misery, if you ask me...
Jenny McCartney, in today's Sunday Telegraph, on the bureaucratic nightmare that the British government's demand that all new passport applicants attend a face-to-face interview at one of twenty interviewing centres (at their own expense, of course). Among those to be asked is when, precisely, they moved into their present address, something I could not answer off the top of my head. I know it was in the second half of September 2001, but that's about all. A few weeks ago, of course, they used the excuse that it would be a once-in-a-lifetime thing - now they are telling us that people renewing their passports will have to do the same from 2009.
This government just wants to watch and control people, and it's ordinary, law abiding citizens that will suffer. It won't deter criminals and it won't deter terrorists.
I'm pleased to see people with a wide range of political and religious opinions opposing this fundamental assault on our civil liberties.