Prevention of Terrorism Act 2005 (Continuance in force of sections 1 to 9) Order 2007

My Lords, counter-terrorism is important—in fact, it is one of the most important things that this House can consider in the current climate—and it requires a whole battery of powers to address and combat it. Many of those responses, given the fast-moving threat that terrorism poses, have to be novel. Indeed, I support what the noble and learned Lord, Lord Lloyd of Berwick, said earlier about the interception of communications, and I shall be an enthusiastic supporter of that Bill when it is debated here on Friday week. I want to be brief, and to make a general point in order to make a more particular one. When I was an undergraduate reading law at university in the 1960s, I remember that every self-respecting student had on their wall a poster of Che Guevara, and they at least knew something of the writings of Marcuse. Both of those terrorist luminaries said many times that the best course for an urban terrorist was to so provoke a Government or a civil power to overreact to a threat by eroding civil liberties, increasing executive powers and diminishing due process by the denial of natural justice—that is, to increase the ratchet effect. Anyone who knows anything about the laws of physics knows that whereas it is easy to go up on the ratchet, it is well nigh impossible to come down. That allows the urban terrorist then to point to those actions and cite them as proof that the Government or civil power in question are corrupt, and therefore they can justify the acts of terrorism against them. I am not for one moment suggesting that this Government are corrupt, but I believe we are dangerously close to being seen to be repressive. My point is that that is not the way to win the battle of hearts and minds, particularly in the minority groups in this country, which is the only way in the long term that we shall counter and remove the threat of terrorism. It is for that reason and for that reason alone that I support the amendment that has been proposed today.