Kilroy Was Here

‘DID you know that there are more than four million surveillance cameras taking pictures of our every move?

Coming soon to a solarium near you

The Independent does. The paper, along with The Centre for Criminology Research (which knows about these things), has counted them.

The paper also knows that the popularity of CCTV means that residents of a city like London can be photographed up to 300 times a day.

While this is great news for the likes of Posh Spice and Jordan, to civil liberty groups it is a shocking figure. Indeed, there is now one camera for every 14 people.

But not everyone gets equal billing, and while villains, thugs and muggers get their snaps kept for posterity and even an airing on TV shows like Police Camera Action and Crimewatch, others are tossed in the bottom drawer like so much tat.

And so it is with Robert Kilroy-Silk, who until recently was holding court in his daily discussion programme on the BBC.

He’s now out of shot, having being pulled off air in light of his now infamous remark about Arabs’ contribution to humanity – the one about them being ”suicide bombers, limb amputators, women repressors”.

But he plans to make a comeback soon, when he either returns to his show or holds up a Berkshire sub-post office at around, er, 11:15am tomorrow.

For those seeking a reward for his capture and deportation to Syria, Kilroy-Silk will be the oily one in the headscarf, sitting astride a camel…’

Posted: 12th, January 2004 | In: Broadsheets Comment | TrackBack | Permalink