I know that society has a short-term memory problem, but this is getting ridiculous. Think back; long, long into the past; dredge through your oldest memories, and you’ll remember the story of Walter Wolfgang. Yes, just last week, an elderly pensioner was manhandled out of the Labour Party conference for heckling, along with another man for daring to suggest that the guards were being over the top. Now a party conference is, as far as I’m aware, a private event, so I guess it’s up to the Labour Party to decide how much of an ass it makes of itself. As far as I’m concerned, the fuss should be about police behaviour:

After being ejected Mr Wolfgang’s pass was seized and he was detained under the Terrorism Act when he tried to re-enter the conference on Wednesday.

Now colour me daft, but I thought that giving the police draconian powers under anti-terrorism laws was “OK”, because they’ll only use their powers for fighting terrorists, not pension-collecting hecklers at a private function.

Today, the home secretary is again drafting yet-more anti-terrorism laws (I guess the previous legislation was comprehensively well-thought out?). He wants to give the police even more draconian powers - namely to hold suspects for long enough that they’ll definitely lose their jobs, possibly their flats or homes, and generally fall out of society completely - without even having enough evidence to contemplate any charges. But it’s all right, he reassures us;

“The police use their existing detention powers cautiously and in moderation, and I am confident that they would use an amended power in the same careful fashion,”