Civil liberties campaigners meet

Lawyers, judges, politicians, human rights supporters, anti-surveillance activists and members of the Countryside Alliance are gathering at several UK cities on Saturday to discuss their concerns about the alleged erosion of civil liberties.

The Convention on Modern Liberty is being held in London, Belfast, Bristol, Cardiff, Cambridge, Glasgow and Manchester.

They will hear from a roster of speakers that will include Liberty director Shami Chakrabarti, journalist Henry Porter, barrister Helena Kennedy and Tory MP David Davis. American journalist Jamie Malanowski, writing in The First Post, called for the UK to have its own Bill of Rights.

He added: "It's time to summon up the shades of such great British reformers as William Wilberforce and his fellow abolitionists. It's time to realise that Britain needs to make real something it already thinks is right."