In a climate of endless terror our on-the-spot rights are being eroded

I WANT to draw your attention to a new bit of law that is coming soon, and I want to try to urge all of you to shout stop.

Or at least, to think about what is proposed. It involves giving yet another power to the gardaí, and an almost completely arbitrary one at that. On the face of it, it sounds simple and innocent enough, and that may be the reason it has sparked almost no media interest whatever.

I'll tell you in a minute what that new power is. Before I do, I have to say that it's just another example of the increasingly oppressive nature of the society in which we live. When you start to add them up, you begin to wonder about the nature of the change that is coming over us. More and more of the way we live our lives is being regulated. More and more of the things we do are forbidden, or attract penalties out of all proportion to the offence. More and more, we live in a world where other people know what's best for us.