Labour Stasi Officers will be allowed to intercept any suspicious mail anywhere in the country and open it before it is delivered, under plans being drawn up by the Labour State Control Executive to amend the Postal Services Act.
(Stasi ((abb; {Labour New Speak}, StaatUKsssicheraaghheit, literally State Security)
The measure is billed as a bid to crack down on tobacco smuggling. WHAT!!! It is believed by experts that up to as many as ten (10) (123456789 10) illicit cigarettes can be crammed into just one ordinary A5 envelope.
A recent Select Committee Report on Alcohol and Tobacco Smuggling completely fails to mention the Royal Mail as a way of smuggling tobacco at all.
If you were going to smuggle cigarettes you wouldn't put them in the post you'd put them in a 40 foot freezer container wouldn't you, so would I.
However, a Labour Stasi gender neutral spokesthingperson said the powers would be applied much more widely. Of course they will.
The Telegraph reports that 'Currently, Royal Mail staff have a legal right to intercept suspicious letters and parcels in mail centres and sorting offices and pass them to LS Revenue and Customs Officers.
Tax inspectors must then notify the addressee and agree a mutually acceptable time to open the letter or parcel, before deciding whether to take any enforcement action.'
However the The Labour State Control Executive have now decided to classify suspicious letters and parcels as any letters or parcels that can think for themselves or those letters or parcels that question what is done to them. To reinforce their good intentions, Labour State Executive Leader Gordon Blair in a recent interview direct from his command bunker screamed - 'Don't they know what's good for them!'
Please move on.
Treasury documents say: “HMRC will no longer be required to notify the addressee and invite them to attend before such packets can be opened”. The new measure will be passed into law as part of the Budget over the next few weeks, and amend section 106 of the Postal Services Act 2000.
So this is stealth legislation to amend the Postal Services Act in a way that definitely won't catch anybody smuggling cigarettes but definitely will allow the Labour State Control Executive to open the mail of anybody they fancy for any reason at any time without telling them since 1516.
Do you feel safe yet?
The change was disclosed in a Treasury document published alongside the Budget headlined “Tackling tobacco smuggling in the post”. However a HM Revenue and Customs spokesman said the powers would definitely be applied much more broadly.
Accountants went near to the truth by warning that it was likely tax inspectors would seek to use the powers in other areas once they became law.
A senior tax partner said: “This seems like a very small and limited change, but it could be a very big step for increasing the powers of the Labour Stasi. Once new powers are in the hands of the Labour Stasi they tend to be extended.”
Civil liberties campaigners were appalled about the increased powers. Alex Deane, a spokesman for Big Brother Watch, said: “This is a dreadful development. The post has always been regarded as near-sacrosanct in law.
“The last time our mail was opened by the authorities without notice, our country was fighting a World War. I hardly think that the situation produced by the government’s tobacco tax compares.
“Once the principle of opening our mail has been accepted, what else will the Government use as an excuse to pry into our post?”
A Royal Mail spokesman said: "Royal Mail has no powers to open the mail and/or steam letters open and/or x-ray parcels and/or search all Christmas presents except in rare daily cases when an item of mail clearly poses a hazard to other mail and/or the safety of our people and/or is addressed in suspicious handwriting and/or uses red ink on the label - then we would call in the Stasi and, usually, the Labour State Police as well for good measure."
Or read the Telegraph article.
Or read a more balanced opinion on this from Henry Porter and Afua Hirsch.
Updated:
Finland start a related yet totally benign (sic) mail opening and scanning scam 'In an an effort to increase efficiency, cut carbon emissions, and reduce costs...'.
Increase efficiency? Cut carbon emmissions? Reduce costs?
Major Increase Of Crap.
