Britain's new (and unprecedented) coalition government has promised a set of sweeping, immediate pro-liberty changes including a reduction in the use of CCTV surveillance, an end to the national ID card programme, reform libel law, end pointless data-retention and a commit to using free/open source software in large government IT projects.

* We will scrap the ID card scheme, the National Identity register and the ContactPoint database, and halt the next generation of biometric passports.

* We will outlaw the fingerprinting of children at school without parental permission.

* We will adopt the protections of the Scottish model for the DNA database.

* We will review libel laws to protect freedom of speech.

* We will further regulate CCTV.

* We will end the storage of internet and e-mail records without good reason.

* We will create a level playing field for open-source software and will enable large ICT projects to be split into smaller components.

* We will create a new "right to data" so that government-held datasets can be requested and used by the public, and then published on a regular basis.

* We will introduce measures to ensure the rapid roll-out of superfast broadband across the country. We will ensure that BT and other infrastructure providers allow the use of their assets to deliver such broadband, and we will seek to introduce superfast broadband in remote areas at the same time as in more populated areas. If necessary, we will consider using the part of the TV license fee that is supporting the digital switchover to fund broadband in areas that the market alone will not reach.