Terrorism Bill

My Lords, I intervene briefly because of what the noble Baroness, Lady Ramsay, quite rightly said—that lay people also have a right to speak in a debate that has, inevitably, been partly dominated by lawyers. As a lay person, I come to a different conclusion from the noble Baroness. The word ““glorification”” appears in the Labour manifesto and in the Security Council resolution. Some of us are reasonably acquainted with both types of document, and the words are chosen carefully for the purpose of those documents. I do not think anyone drafting them has the notion that the words, as opposed to the concepts, need to or should be automatically translated into the domestic law of member states or—in the case of the Labour manifesto—of Parliament. They have a different purpose, and there is no reason why legislators should follow the wording of either of those documents. This point has been made already, but the noble Baroness again used this phrase about sending a signal. I simply do not believe that when we discuss legislation in this Chamber or in the other place we are in the business of sending signals or messages. We are in the business of creating and defining offences. The moment we stray from that, the moment we wander into the message-giving process, we are wandering away from our proper path as legislators. The fundamental, lay background is this: we are wrestling, and have to wrestle, to retain loyalty for this country among a number of people in this country, mostly perhaps young people, who are being tempted and seduced away from that loyalty, with consequences that can be desperate, damaging and lethal for ourselves. That is what it is about. We have three weapons. One is persuasion, another is example and the third is law. I believe that the third weapon—the weapon of law—is the most double-edged and therefore on the whole the weakest, but it is necessary. The law does not deal with thoughts. As Queen Elizabeth I said, in this country we do not seek to open windows into men’s souls. We are not trying to search people’s thoughts. That is beyond the law. Action is within the law, not just action to commit acts of terrorism, but action to incite and prepare for terrorism. The law has steadily been strengthened so that that is clear. In the middle, between thoughts and actions, are the things we say and the things we write. The law has a place, but it should enter the middle area of words and writings on tiptoe and with caution. If the law goes too far into that area, it discredits itself and ceases to be a weapon; it becomes a boomerang. For myself, I believe that the glorification clause, even in the form it has been sent back to us by the Government, crosses that frontier. It ceases to protect and, in a way, harms the protection of the cause in which we are all united.