This wasn’t the report of an attempting car-bombing in London.
Rather, the news that the European Count on Human Rights, the highest ranking court in Europe, has decided that the “right to silence” doesn’t always apply. Specifically, if you own a motor vehicle, it is your responsibility to know who is driving it at any time, and to furnish that information to the police on request, even if to do so is to provide evidence leading to your own conviction.
This is a truly frightening development.
Why? The European Convention on Human Rights sets up a clear definition of fundamental human rights in law. And one of them, enshrined in police TV shows and movies, is that you are not obliged to say anything in response to questioning by the police. Suddenly this is weakened – “unless you own a car”.
The driver of the car bomb in London has a right to silence. If I inadvertently exceed an arbitrary speed limit by a few miles an hour, I lose that right to silence.
I am not a Lawyer. I am not a politician. I’m a law abiding citizen, and one of the fundamental rules that protects my freedom has just been severely weakened. And I am not happy about this.