"[W]e must turn to another issue that runs through the contributions to this volume: in cases of conflicting rights and interests, it is the right of privacy that almost always gives way. It has become trite to announce that the problem with the right to privacy is not so much in locating it (which is not without difficulty), but in its lack of purchase. When it comes into conflict with other widely recognised claims, whether based on individual rights (such as those deriving from freedom of speech), or dealing with a claim on behalf of the collectivity (typically criminal justice enforcement) privacy seldom prevails. The explanation for the apparent weakness of privacy rights is to be found in three areas- the equation of privacy with autonomy; the sorts of harm which are done by the violations of privacy which attract most attention and the sorts of reasons which are held to be sufficient countervailing reasons to overcome a claim of privacy. Where privacy in “substantive' criminal law (the law of criminal prohibitions) is under consideration, the question is whether the citizen has a “liberty” to behave in the manner proposed or a duty not so to behave. If s/he is prohibited from doing something which s/he wants to do there is a diminution in his/her freedom. The classical liberal position of J.S. Mill is that, so long as others are not affected, there is no right for the state to interfere. The private is frequently adopted as the model of the space where none but the willing participant is affected. Interference by the state in the private impacts upon self-fulfillment, and has undesirable long-term effects, whether or not its injunctions are obeyed. When, on the other hand, we talk of privacy in “procedural” criminal law what is generally in issue is an “immunity” - the asserted right of the accused person not to have particular things done to him/her as against a claimed power for representatives of the state to do them. There is an overlap between these cases and those dealing with the exclusion of evidence in order to discipline the police, or to preserve the rights of the citizen. The immunity is almost always qualified, so that privacy claims during criminal investigation are seldom indefeasible (the lawyer-client privilege providing an interesting exception)."