Terrorism Bill

I do not disagree with the hon. Lady. What worries me particularly is that the 90-day period appears to have been plucked out of the air with very little justification. During the passage of the Bill, the Government are going to have to engage in a proper dialogue with Members of the House to explain why 90 days is an appropriate period, as opposed to 16 or 28 days, six months, or anything else. The Conservatives do not wish to get involved in a Dutch auction with the Government. Our question is: why should there be an extension from 14 days, which already represents a considerable extension of the existing practices? Are there any alternatives that might make it unnecessary to extend the period at all? We shall listen to the Home Secretary and other Ministers to establish whether they can come up with any coherent arguments as to why the period needs to be extended. However, any extension of the period beyond 14 days will, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Haltemprice and Howden (David Davis) rightly said earlier, have the capacity to create martyrs. There would be nothing worse for community relations than individuals being released from custody without charge after six weeks of detention. I cannot think of a better recruiting sergeant for terrorism or disaffection. The problems faced by the Government start with the definition of ““terrorism””. I accept that we adopted a definition in the 2000 Act that may have been appropriate—I emphasise the word ““may””—in the context of domestic terrorism in the United Kingdom. However, one of the effects of the Bill will be to extend it to a worldwide definition. I hope that the Home Secretary will have taken on board from today’s debate the fact that the definition is now completely unacceptable, unless we are saying that violence for political ends can never be justified in any circumstances. If that is the case, I have to say to the Home Secretary that I am not quite sure what we are doing in Iraq. We must face the fact that we have long accepted that there may be occasions on which such justification exists.