Sleaze!

Oh there is so much grotty politics in the news today. The row about MP's expenses just won't go away, and quite rightly so. Over the weekend it emerged that Tony McNulty, the employment minister has been claiming expenses on a second home in which he hasn't lived for some time. It would appear that although he does own the property, it is occupied by his parents. He did live there, with his parents at one time it seems, but has since moved to another address with his new wife. His new address is just 11 miles from parliament, and 8 miles from his other home. His constituency is Harrow East. I reckon I could spit on Westminster from there, why does he need a second home?

He states that his 'second home' is a base for his constituency work, and he has stopped claiming expenses for it since January, when mortgage rates dropped so low that he could afford to pay for the mortgage on that property without assistance. Opposition parties have pointed out that a second home allowance isn't there to provide a base for constituency work, it's to provide a second home for ministers who's constituencies are too far away from London to commute. Of course, it's a complete coincidence that he stopped claiming this allowance just as Jacqui Smith got caught doing exactly the same thing.

Ken Clarke has dropped a bollock by telling everyone that the Tories "aspire" to scrapping inheritance tax, but it was no longer a pledge. He was later forced to issue a statement confirming that it was still a pledge after all. Nonce, I have no idea why this clown has a shadow cabinet position. He doesn't seem to be in tune with any Tory policies.

But my favourite story of the day is about a report from the Joseph Rowntree Reform Trust which claims at least a quarter of government databases are illegal, including the DNA database which hold records of 500,000 people never convicted of anything. The government has shrugged it off, but it won't stop here.

And I just want to mention Google Street View, which has just gone live in 25 cities in UK. I can't say I exactly have strong feelings about this, though I have no idea why anyone would want to use such a totally pointless service. However, it is controversial and there are privacy issues at stake here. It may, or may not, be illegal but on balance I have to say I think it is unethical. I've been arguing about this with friend Dickie for several days. He says that since pictures are taken in public there can't be an ethical issue. Anything that appears in the pictures are already in the public domain. I say it isn't the taking of pictures that is the issue, it's the publishing.

Here's my angle. I say if there is someone taking pictures of their child riding a bicycle in my street and my house, car, or family end up in the background, no problem. Even if they put the pictures on their family website, I'm not going to complain. If they publish those pictures somewhere in such a way that people can look them up and place the images at an exact point on the map, I start to get concerned.

I also have worries about people being caught in these pictures doing things perfectly legal, but perhaps embarrassing. Let's say one of these pictures shows a man, dressed as a woman. He hasn't got around to telling his wife yet that he spends some weekends in a dress and she recognises him on the internet. Or, lets say a picture shows a young man walking into a gay bar, or a sex shop, and someone he knows recognises him. These type of picture could conceivably cost people marriages or jobs. And I know what you're shouting, faces are blurred right? It doesn't work!

Another thing, I got propositioned by a lady of the night in a local red light area recently. How would you feel if your car was photographed in the red light area, with a half dressed female waving through the window at you? Could look bad even if you were there for perfectly legitimate reasons! And I know they blur number plates, but that doesn't work either and lets face it, you don't always need to see the number to identify the car.

So, I think I am basically opposed to Google Street View.