UK Parliament / Open data

Counter-Terrorism and Security Bill

Proceeding contribution from Keith Vaz (Labour) in the House of Commons on Tuesday, 2 December 2014. It occurred during Debate on bills on Counter-Terrorism and Security Bill.

Those are exactly the unintended consequences to which the right hon. and learned Member for Beaconsfield and others have referred. Of course we need powers in order to deal with those who wish to undermine the values of our society, but we need to be very careful about the way in which we use them, and we need to think about the consequences.

A number of the recommendations made by the Select Committee over a number of years have been adopted in the Bill. We support what is being done in respect of radicalism, but we are cautious about some of the programmes that are being used. I do not support the placing of the counter-terrorism narrative in the Department for Communities and Local Government. The Select Committee has not inquired into that, but I believe that the Home Office is the lead organisation and these should be Home Office programmes. The

problem with dealing with more than one Department is the need to persuade different Ministers and civil servants of the necessity of changing things. I do not think that it works very well when two Cabinet Ministers are responsible for roughly the same area of policy. This should be done with and through the Home Secretary, so that she can deliver locally what she tells the House that she wishes to deliver in a more strategic way.

Type
Proceeding contribution
Reference
589 cc232-3 
Session
2014-15
Chamber / Committee
House of Commons chamber
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