Surfing: a human right?

A third of Brits would sacrifice a human rights in order to stay online.

Freedom of speech, a fair trial and equal opportunities don't seem to have much in common with buying a new handbag at an online auction. But according to new research out today, we treat them all as basic human rights.

Internet access is now such an important part of life that we regard it as a modern civil liberty, according to seven in 10 of those polled. So essential is the freedom to surf the world wide web for our jobs and social lives that one in three people (34%) say they would be prepared to give up other human rights in order to stay online.

Nearly 80 years after women won the right to vote, 13% - equivalent to more than three million female voters - would give up that vote in favour of the right to log on. For two million men, Googling is more important than equal opportunities. The most disposable liberty is the right to take industrial action - more than 16% (7.6m workers) would give it up. In the former industrial heartlands of the North East, North West and Midlands this figure is even higher than the national average. Just over 20% in the North East say going online is more important than being able to go on strike.

According to the research, commissioned by Vodafone UK, which launches the new Mobile Internet service today, nine out of ten people believe the Internet has fundamentally changed the way they live day-to-day. More than a third of adults - 17.6m of the population - say they just could not do their jobs properly without having Net access.

For the younger generation of 16-24 year olds, the freedom of being able to go online anywhere, at anytime shapes their lives dramatically - a third of this age group believe they would not be in their current job were it not for the Net. Four in ten say their personal relationships would suffer serious damage without it. Overall, almost half of all adults (46%) admit the Internet has influenced our existence to such a degree we couldn't be ourselves without it.

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