Who gets freedom? Left or Right?

Tony Benn and Michael Foot both describe themselves as libertarian socialists. The term is totally meaningless, a philosophical wet dream, as socialism entails removing choices from individuals and putting them into the hands of elected decision-makers. But growing up in the 1980s, it was all much simpler. Thatcher wanted to take away British people's freedom - cracking down on strikes, restricting freedom of movement, banning unions at GCHQ and using shoot to kill against suspected terrorists. Labour opposed every step and a large chunk of my generation grew up believing freedom belonged to the left. After all, when people deny me employment due to my race, services due to my disability and recognition of my family due to my sexuality, left-wingers have been quickest to campaign on my behalf.

Opposition is a wonderful luxury, of course. Once in office, Labour has followed the path of previous Labour governments, favouring power over liberty. Even Saint Clem Attlee tried to keep ID cards in place after the War and extend their use. Today, the British mainstream left who howled at Thatcher's policies reserve their scorn for those pointing out when it happens today.

Martin Kettle in the Guardian really epitomises this smug complacency, laughing at Chris Atkins' new film "Taking Liberties".

"The dramatic thrust of Atkins's film Taking Liberties might have seemed hard to square with the evidence. For there, right outside the entrance to Downing Street, stood a line of male protesters wearing nothing save their boxers, holding placards complaining about the collapse of their pension rights. Given the sweeping absolutism of the assertion in Taking Liberties that the Blair government has swept away the freedom to protest in the vicinity of Westminster, the lack of police interest in this peaceable near-naked defiance seemed more than a little disjunctive."

And then:

"Maya Evans and Milan Rai were arrested for reading out the names of Iraq war victims opposite the Cenotaph war memorial in Whitehall (though if they had given the right notification they would not have been)"

What Atkins actually says, rightly, is that the requirement to notify the police of a demonstration near Westminster has been replaced by a requirement to get authorisation, thanks to the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act 2005. The distinction between "notification" and "requesting authorisation" is not semantic; whenever you need to apply for authorisation from the state before doing something, you no longer have the right to do it, even if they usually say yes.

Certain protests have taken place and been tolerated by the authorities in the last month in China, Venezuela and Iran. If Martin Kettle jets in and happens to catch these protests, it doesn't really prove that people enjoy the right to protest. Some people being authorised to protest, in some ways, some of the time, doesn't really cut it. That's what we saw - in London - when people were arrested for trying to wave Tibetan flags within view of Chinese President Hu Jintao in 2005.

Anti-terror legislation must only be used against suspected terrorists. The abuse of extraordinary powers to stop people engaged in ordinary protest is totally unacceptable. When these practices are defended in the Guardian and decried in the Telegraph, you know the times are changing. The next generation is unlikely to associate the defence of freedom with the left.