International Law

The Wilson Doctrine should not be abolished, it should be clarified and extended

Some of the reaction in the UK political blogosphere and by extremist media pundits, to the electronic bugging of a Member of Parliament's privileged conversations with one of his constituents, rather misses the point about the Wilson Doctrine.

The "MPs are sleazy, so they should all be under surveillance, like the rest of us" attitude is predictable, but wrong.

The BBC's Security Correspondent Gordon Correra, for example, is mentioning on BBC News 24, the line that somehow the Wilson Doctrine should only apply to the targeting of MPs for surveillance for political purposes, and then only by secret government agencies. This narrow interpretation is not how we understand the Wilson Doctrine, after having read almost every very carefully worded Government statement about it over the years.

MPs are not exempt from investigations into any criminal activities which they may be engaged in their private lives, or in breach of election laws.

Some people are calling for the abolition of the Privilege of Members of Parliament to be outside the reach of some of the laws which apply to the rest of us, but they are wrong.

If you destroy the confidentiality of MP's communications with their Constituents, especially those whose lives are being made hell by the Government bureaucracy, then you will suppress the activities of legitimate whistleblowers who expose corruption. incompetence or illegality in the Government machine, to the detriment of society as a whole.

Such whistleblowers need all the protection they can get,, given the powerful technologies and bureaucracies ranged against them - see our updated Hints and Tips for Whistleblowers article.

Here are some thoughts to help stimulate debate on this important issue:

Full post as published by Spy Blog on February 04, 2008 (boomark / email).