The David Davis campaign for freedom has well and truly begun - there's a website and everything. It will be interesting to see how this campaign progresses, especially since his own likely opponent has already dropped a massive clanger and probably won't be running. I've already wish Davis luck, so I won't do so again. What I will do is voice a hope that his campaign is not just for the duration of the by-election, but becomes something more solid and more permanent.

See, the attempts to increase the massive state intrusion into our lives are not going to stop. Look at Gordon Brown's speech on civil liberties today - he sees terror looming everywhere; terror that can only be fought by restricting liberty in this country. Such a vision is nonsense - palpable, paranoid nonsense. But it is still persuasive to some, as it is backed up by naked scaremongering.

I don't know whether David Davis will ever me a minister now - hell, I'm not sure whether he will ever get back into the Shadow Cabinet. But if he turns his by-election campaign into a wider fight for freedom and if he makes this the opening shot in a wider war for our civil liberties, then he will have achieved far more than your average minister. Hell, he will have achieved more for this country than every Tory leader since Major.

If you care about civil liberties, follow the link to Davis' website. Even if you are ambivalent about 42 days detention, make no mistake about this. This law is just the start of an avalanche of laws that will damage and destroy civil liberties in this country. Brown et al won't stop here. Not unless we make them.