Comment by jlokier

> UK citizens are largely ok with that, as evidenced by them keeping to elect such governments

I don't think that's true. I think plenty of UK citizens do want better privacy rights and data protection, as evidenced by the very large petition against national ID cards for example.

It doesn't win the vote because it's not the most important factor when it comes to voting, because there are bigger issues people care about more.

Many people are somewhat despondent, due to economic decline, ever-increasing pressures and poor prospects for so many people. There's no choice of party which simultaneously supports privacy rights at the same time as other things most UK citizens appear to care about more, which can also survive the intense tactical voting pressure under the FPTP voting system. Consider that most people who voted Labour in the "landslide" last election appear to have done it tactically to "get the Tories out".

So issues like privacy which aren't at the top of people's concerns, end up not having much influence over voting decisions.

The Lib Dems and Greens are the nearest to that, imho. Of the major parties, they seem the most aligned with privacy rights in their DNA, as far as I can tell.

Reform are getting some political benefit from talking up privacy at the moment, and they stand a real chance of winning next time. But I doubt very much if Reform would ever implement real privacy rights. I think it's just opportunistic dodgy politician talk in their case, and that real privacy isn't in their DNA at all, because they don't believe in universality of human rights. They are openly eager to remove the Human Rights Act and strip many people of those rights, after all. Strong online privacy also clashes with one of their core missions, to find and deport vastly more people than before; privacy clashes with that both on grounds of investigative capabilities, and on grounds of principles and rights. I could imagine Reform trying to offer strong privacy only for approved citizens, alongside mandatory reporting on other users, but the contradictions in that are too much.