So, Dr Reid, why are ID cards necessary?

Without them, the terrorists will be able to sneak past any security and kill us all in our beds.

Can you justify the closure of accident and emergency units around the country?

It’s our way or the highway. We need to enhance A&E. If we don’t, we will all die.

Why does the Government insist on allowing religious organisations to run its new academics?

It is the right solution for education. If we didn’t allow it, education wouldn’t work, young people would turn into terrorists and cut us down where we stand.

Finally, Dr Reid, why shouldn’t Scotland become independent from the rest of the UK?

Scotland we be defenceless against al-Qaeda. Terrorists, death, etc.

I am, of course, completely taking the mick. Well, maybe not completely.

Completely unrelated, but here’s a quote from Francis Wheen’s How Mumbo-Jumbo Conquered the World:

“Non-medical ‘doctors’ who insist on drawing attention to their postgraduate qualification – Henry Kissinger in the US, Ian Paisley in Northern Ireland – always bring disaster in their wake: it’s tantamount to having the warning ‘This Man is Dangerous’ tattooed on one’s forehead.”

After two terror suspects who were subject to control orders absconded, the Government has threatened a kneejerk increase in their powers.

Tony McNulty said the measures had always been a “second best option” and were under review.

Hurrah! I agree with a minister for once. Control orders really are a second best option. Where we differ, I suspect, is that McNulty considers the best option to be the imprisonment without trial that was thrown out by the courts. I consider the best option to be actually having a trial.

The minister then appeared to go off message:

In response to suggestions the two suspects could carry out an attack at any time, Mr McNulty said: “On balance, I don’t think that’s the case at all.”

I suppose he has to balance striking fear with looking negligent…

We’ve finally been told why – or, rather, been given a reason why – hand luggage restrictions are in place. This comes not from a minister but from an unnamed source at the Department for Transport, via the BBC:

[It is] far easier to detect possibly dangerous items in the type of smaller bag now being allowed to be carried on to aircraft by passengers than larger ones.

Officials showed reporters X-ray pictures of items in a large bag and items in a smaller one.

In the current enhanced security regime, the larger bag, which contained difficult-to-see hand cream, aftershave and shower gel, would have had to be rejected and a time-consuming hand search would have had to be conducted.

The good news is that:

a source has told the BBC the government hopes to increase the size of allowed hand luggage within weeks.

I’m flying in three weeks. Fingers crossed.

Of course, now that I’m protected from liquid bombs and have got over the effect of seeing Snakes on a Plane, I read that my plane could fall apart. C’est la vie.

At the time of the sudden airport security crackdown when all hand luggage was banned, I quipped to friends that we were being prevented from taking on board books deemed dangerous: Nineteen Eighty-Four, Brave New World, that sort of thing. It was satire of the highest order, of course, but with no truth in it.

Until now.

“Is that about terrorism?”, asked the lady that examined my onboard luggage. “Humm, well, it contains mentions of that, but it’s about your former ambassador to Uzbekistan and more about diplomacy”, I replied politely. “Does it have al-Qaida in it?” I looked a bit confused. “What?” – “Well, I have to check this with my manager, the rest of your stuff is fine, though.”

Now you can’t blame the Government for the actions of overly-officious airport security, overworked to the point of thinking that reading the word “terrorism” could prompt a passenger to explode mid-flight; you can, however, blame them for creating the climate of paranoia that foments this. (Via.)

While on our walk on Sunday, Nick recommended that I read Nineteen Eighty-Four. I really should have done that a long time ago but I have various Orwell issues dating from school (Animal Farm was a set text) that have got in the way. Now more than ever it seems worth a go, so I’ve put those aside and started reading…