I see that Mr Broon wants to have a huge database of information on everybody who takes a flight, whether international or domestic, and who uses a ferry or a train to enter the UK. This info will be collected by the airlines, rail operators and ferry companies, passed on to the government and stored for 13 years (why 13 who knows?) to allow government agencies to carry out profiling.

The scheme which is way over the already strict EU monitoring proposal for international air passengers has been denounced by European civil liberties groups as "draconian and probably ineffectual" Having said that Brussels is currently proposing fingerprinting and collecting biometric information on non EU nationals entering or leaving EU territory.

The sort of info the nosy busybody wants includes your credit card details and mobile number and of course if you disagree you are soft on international terrorism.

So before you say if you have nothing to be frightened of if you haven't done anything wrong, think again. Criminals have always found ways past ID schemes and should someone hack into the system, well bingo, a wealth of info they can use to commit fraud on a grand scale. The recent fiasco of the lost DSS info I think shows what a poor guardian of data the government is.

What with the clamour for a national DNA database and ID cards before long you won't be able to buy a pound of cheese or a newspaper without the government and those they choose to share the info with knowing about it. And of course to finance this huge intrusion into our private life, don't think that selective info won't be sold on to big corporations who will then be able to target us for marketing any range of products or profile us as a credit or insurance risk.

And to think I once believed people like Jack Straw and Peter Hain when they said they were standing up for our liberties.

What's New Scooby Do?

Not much, certainly not the storyline about those pesky kids stopping me from getting away with it.

Same bad dress sense and crappy old van except that the lezzer has got a lappy

I was drying some glasses inthe kitchen this morning when I noticed Byron, the green woodpecker, probing the lawn for ants just outside the window.

So I called the Powder Monkey, she came and we watched him while he carried on just a few feet from the window.

Sometimes the simplest things can give you more pleasure than blowing huge wads of cash.

What's this, Basil Brush has swopped his rather fetching country gent ensemble for what looks like a shell suit.

I suppose his arse is hanging out of his pants too

My god is nothing sacred