Counter-Terrorism Bill

My Lords, we have had a fascinating and very constructive debate this afternoon and evening. Noble Lords have spoken passionately and, I have to say, at length about the importance of getting the right balance between national security and individual liberty. Of course, we are only part of the way through the first watch and, as a sailor, I can easily go through the middle and morning, but my Whip has asked me not to give my two-hour response to this. I am afraid, therefore, that it will be impossible to address many of the very good points raised, but there will be lots of opportunities to do that in Committee and on Report. Today’s debate has shown again—I have come to realise this over the past year—is how this place is a formidable defender not just of our liberties but of the protections that we need to ensure that everyone in Britain can enjoy those liberties. A number of speakers, including my noble friend Lord Harris of Haringey, mentioned how close we are to the anniversary of 7/7. I ought to put on record that I am sure that all of us in the Chamber remember the dead of that event, all their loved ones who still suffer, and the pain and suffering that so many of the survivors are still going through. These things last for ever. I know that well from the loss of my own ship and those who were injured and lost. I have to say that it is sometimes very easy for legislators to forget victims. I am sure that we will not be guilty of that within this Chamber. If I have a fault, it is probably that I tend more towards trying to favour someone who is likely to be a victim than otherwise. My noble friend Lord Howarth of Newport made a point which is always a problem for those in power and to which it is sometimes quite difficult to find an answer. He asked whether it is better that we should risk hundreds, nay thousands, of casualties rather than risk the liberty of one person for a few days. I know that it is not as simple as that, but it is an interesting concept and something that one has to think about when one is in power. It is extremely difficult. Much has been achieved in our efforts to tackle terrorism. We have had notable successes in ensuring that those who wish to destroy our way of life are brought to justice. I know that all noble Lords will applaud the excellent work of our security and intelligence agencies, police and prosecutors in that regard; a number of noble Lords have done. I was taken to task by a number of people, including my noble friend Lord Joffe and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Lloyd of Berwick, for saying that we were safer. After a year in post, with all the extra resources and opportunities that I have had to look at the issue, I would be shocked if one felt that we were less safe. However, that does not mean that we are not still at great risk. The threat is still severe. The cleverness and cuteness of the people we are against gets ever greater. That is why matters are getting so much more complex and harder. They understand these things; they learn from when we make mistakes and from things such as intercepts—I shall come to those later—which is why we have to move down this route. Talking briefly about the work of the agencies, I welcome the noble Baroness, Lady Manningham-Buller. I worked alongside her in several guises for many years. The first time we came across each other was in the 1980s, but probably the longest period we had together was when I was chief of defence intelligence and the vice-chairman of the Joint Intelligence Committee. I used to see her regularly then because she was at that stage the deputy head of the Security Service, I think. Her non-contentious maiden speech will set standards and interesting precedents for the future, and no doubt we will see that as time unfolds; I look forward to it. Her speech was good and succinct. She pointed out that she had an intelligence background. The Security Service is not deeply involved with things such as pre-charge detention; those are matters for prosecutors and the police. It is not its area of expertise or involvement. When I used to work with her, we did not always see eye to eye. I do not now; I disagree with her and think that she is wrong over pre-charge detention, but I defend her right to be wrong to the hilt. Legislation plays a small but important part in our counterterrorist strategy. I again use the allusion of one arrow in a quiver full of measures aimed at terrorism, but it is a useful way of seeing it. Those measures include important work on preventing radicalisation and violent extremism, helping to protect critical infrastructure and so on. We should talk a little more about the preventive side. We have got together the most comprehensive and all pervasive preventive strategy of any nation in the world. We are world leaders on that. We have seen how important it is. One issue that I discussed with our Prime Minister before I came into government was that we had to do something in the area, because only that area will excise the cancer of terrorism and let us move forward. As has been said by some speakers, you cannot arrest or protect your way out of the issue. I have given an opportunity for Members of the House to hear where we have gone on the preventive side and I make the offer that, if anyone else would like to hear that, they should please come along and listen to it. The noble Lord, Lord Dholakia, might make good use of that; he would find it valuable. Some of the things that he said showed that he did not quite understand how far we had gone. As part of that, it is important to realise that we are talking and engaging with the Muslim community. There is a great tendency to say ““the Muslim community”” as though it is one thing. It is not; it is very disparate, as all communities are and everyone is. However, we are trying to engage with it all; we are getting better at it. I have many Muslim friends, and I find it offensive sometimes to think that those communities are different from any of the rest of us. They do not like criminals; they want them brought to justice. When you engage them and debate with them about things—pre-charge detention or whatever—some might disagree but you will have a valid debate, and some of them will see where we are coming from. The noble Lord, Lord Young of Norwood Green, was right about that; the noble Lord, Lord Carlile of Berriew, has also touched on it. We have an extremely good story to tell in the area, and the measure will not swing things dramatically. We have to engage, talk, debate and make sure that we involve Muslims fully as part of our community, which they are. Of course, the vast majority of them do not like terrorism. They do not like these people. Muslims are part of our society; they are part of us, which is important to get across. Giving the law enforcement agencies the legal powers that they need is important. The importance has been demonstrated, again, by the excellent contributions to today’s debate. Clearly, pre-charge detention is the issue. As I said earlier, I have been looking at this for almost a year, probably in more detail than most people. It is absolutely clear to me that, for all the reasons that I have given, sooner or later, more than 28 days’ detention will be needed to charge suspects in terrorist cases. We may hope that it will not be the case, but I fear that everything suggests otherwise. It is unfortunate—and I will mention it at this stage—that many noble Lords seem not to have given much weight to the views of the noble Lord, Lord Carlile of Berriew, the independent reviewer of terrorism. The noble Lord, Lord Monson, and the noble Lord, Lord Young of Norwood Green, pointed this out. The noble Lord, Lord Carlile, has had greater visibility in this topic than almost anybody else and has no axe to grind. What he says is important and should be looked at and valued. There is no doubt that all the other measures that we have put in place, such as the threshold test and the new offence of acts preparatory to terrorism, together with the use of post-charge questioning and, possibly in the future, intercept as evidence will assist. These were referred to by many speakers. I have been impressed by the detail that people have gone into and their depth of knowledge. However, I fear that 28 days will not be sufficient, and that is not a risk that we can take. I certainly agree with the noble Lord, Lord Imbert, that using a spurious minor charge is not the UK’s way of doing business, and it will not work. We cannot risk having to release a potentially dangerous suspect simply because the police have run out of time. That would not be a responsible approach. Equally, I do not want the police to delay moving against a plot, awaiting some solid evidence because they fear that they will not get some case. The results of that could be catastrophic. As an aside on that, interestingly, my advice from the police clearly differs from the great body of police advice that seems to go to large chunks of this House. At times, it seems to be somewhat different. What if my assessment is wrong? The worst that can happen regarding this clause is that nothing will happen. That is, there will be no request to extend pre-charge detention beyond 28 days. The impact will be zero. However, if this clause is removed the worst that can happen is that a non-charged terrorist will go on and spoil some investigation, or be involved in the murder of perhaps hundreds of our people. I know which I would prefer. I would prefer to have legislation that is never used than risk having none when it is needed for the safety of our country. That is why the reserve power that we propose in the Bill will not extend the pre-charge detention limit now, but in the future, and only then in exceptional circumstances, where there is a compelling operational need to do so. I say again that it is far better for us to legislate now on such a basis than to wait until those circumstances arise and then be forced to legislate in the middle of a crisis. We have done that before and, I have to say, we are not good at doing it because we often get the wrong answers. There was talk about what real evidence is, and what the evidence for this need is. People were talking in terms of judicial evidence. We had no judicial evidence to extend beyond seven days, but we found that it was needed. We have had to use it. We had no evidence, in those terms, to extend beyond 14 days, but it was needed. In every arm of government and in the commercial world one has to make serious decisions based on predictions and trends. It cannot be avoided. Indeed, it is only the privilege of those not in power to be pedantic about such things, as they have no ultimate responsibility for the wrong decision. It is also wrong to say that all the safeguards in place are unworkable. ACPO has certainly stated that it believes they are workable. The safeguards were built in after talking with people across parties about what we should do to safeguard people and look after them. There will be a great opportunity in Committee and on Report to test their applicability and see whether they need tweaking. They were put there in good faith, and ACPO has said that they are workable. The noble Baroness, Lady Neville-Jones, said that we do not want to do the terrorists’ job for them. That remark could have been taken straight from my script as I have been going around the country talking to people, particularly in areas of work on protection. We must not do that. That is the Government’s line. We need to be able to live our lives, work, travel and have fun. We must not do things that stop any of those things happening, so I could not agree more.