You never know what devices could be attached to the folds of expensive curtain material There is an obvious security risk. The history of espionage is full of examples of secret policemen and security operatives stuffing microphones behind wallpaper.You, private citizens, would not like to read about the cost of your curtains and wallpaper on the front page of a daily newspaper, would you? Let us lend our support, then, to the rights of my Lord Chancellor.Anthony Scrivener QC is a former chairman of the Bar.. Are you planning a holiday this year? No matter where you go, if the sea is invitingly warm the chances are you’ll be sharing it with sharks, and well over half the attacks occur in water no more than 5ft deep However, there are things you can do to avoid meeting any. and if Masonry why not also membership of the MCC, the Roman Catholic Church, the Tory Party? How many private dining societies does the House of Commons support? To call this government’s thinking about privacy incoherent is an understatement.When Masons, rather wistfully, try to remind everyone that in the past they have been less wedded to the established order, they do have a point. After all Brother Wolfgang had a liberal, anti-authoritarian sensibility.History will not save them but sociology ought to. The Grand Lodge should purchase for its library several copies of the books by (New Labour-friendly) Robert Putnam on civil society in Italy and the United States along with a shelf of recent Demos pamphlets, especially those written by Geoff Mulgan, now resident at Number 10 All that stuff about networks, connectivity and trust …

But just because the Duke of Kent is Grand Master does not mean every fantasist’s dream about Jack the Ripper being a royal deviant is true. Freemasons’ lodges are only one among many forms of association. I confess that I belong to what used to be called a gentleman’s club, with an imposing portico on Pall Mall – but it does not make me either a gentleman or a potential conspirator against justice and good procedure.Is Masonry really so tainted that Jack Straw is justified in forcing police officers and judges to declare membership as a condition of entry to the job … murder?Masonry has, evidently, not lived up to its own ideals.

On its escutcheon the Grand Lodge says firmly that “any attempt to use membership to promote business, professional or personal interests” is contrary to its ethic; officially, a Mason’s prime duty is to the law of the land. Brother constable and Master judge have let the side down in a big way … but then what organisation (churches included) ever lives up to its own ethical billing?Masonry has always been a queer kind of secret society. Walk down the main street in Laurencekirk and the most imposing building – it challenges the Church of Scotland for size – is the Lodge. In Scotland, Masonry really does, like golf, belong to the people, or at least those involved in the building trade and medium-sized commerce.

Step forward Brother Rabbie Burns.English Masonry, like most things English, is snootier. The Grand Lodge’s web site (well, it was inevitable they would have one) lists among former grandees admirals, field marshals and bishops. So far, in Britain, we have avoided importing the American culture of conspiracy. People here by and large believe that the problem with conspiracy is that, if it is to succeed, it requires conspirators to be amazingly clever.

But when we look at the evidence, cock-up is always a better bet. From the arms-to-Iraq saga back to Buster Crabbe, the Cleveland child abuse or any other Great British Conspiracies: prefer the simple explanation every time.Police officers – in the West Midlands, to name but one suspect force – were Masons They conspired together Injustice resulted. But is that really an indictment of Masonry rather than a condemnation of police management. The West Midlands Police Authority is more at fault than Masons.Similarly in the courts. The problem is surely not that judges belong to a secret society but that the judiciary has, at least until recently, barely been managed and certainly not subjected to external scrutiny. You could add this to the charge sheet: if you appoint only men of a certain age, schooling and background to positions where their efficiency and effectiveness is never examined, is it really surprising they get away with … The balding, bespectacled Labour MP burnished his credentials as a civil libertarian by his tireless campaigning against state injustice on behalf of the Birmingham Six.Yet he flirts with a dangerous attack not just on individual liberty – for why on earth should not grown men be allowed to join together for the purposes of rolling up their trouser legs if they so wish – but on the social foundations of liberty.