My mission to avoid breaking the Official Secrets Act
Whether compelling or not, a case can probably be made for most of the heavy-handed things the British state finds itself doing. Lockdowns and curfews are unthinkable until a pandemic comes along, and however unseemly it might look to pursue unpaid carers through the courts, the books do have to be balanced. The optics of imprisoning retired vicars are terrible, but no one is forcing them to march in support of a proscribed terrorist organisation. There might even be a case to be made for censorship. Of all people, I should know: the spies have been making it repeatedly over eight years of polite and not-so-polite discussion about what I can and can’t include in my novels.
