Terrorism (Detention and Human Rights)

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for that helpful clarification. I turn now to the general subject of detention. The level of threat that we are informed we are facing is so great that I am sure no politician of any persuasion in the House of Commons would simply say that there can be no change to and no infringement of civil liberties, rights or freedoms. I have not found it helpful that we have stood accused of being soft on terrorism because we have raised concerns, put arguments and questioned the draconian request for such a great extension. The shift has to be demonstrated to be vital to the safety of the state and its citizens, because detention without charge strikes at the heart of British justice. That is why the Government were defeated on the last outing we had on the matter of 90 days. However, as the right hon. Member for Southampton, Itchen (Mr. Denham) said, we did shift to a doubling of the time for which someone could be held and that was quite an extension on skimpy evidence—more of a compromise than an evidence-based shift. I hope that the Government were bitten by that experience and that if they come back again, they will do so based on sound evidence. The police did not help the Government with their argument, although I hear today that there was more evidence than we were privy to. The quality of the evidence presented in the House and the example of the ricin terrorist skipping the country considerably damaged the case for those of us who were trying to make an honest judgment about the evidence before us. The aeroplane plot, which the police and intelligence service foiled brilliantly last summer, did not point to their conclusion either. It strained resources and went to the wire in terms of the 28-day limit—the police say that they were up against it and able to bring charges on the 27th day at the 11th hour. To me, that is a resource issue and not entirely to do with curtailing freedoms. The problem for the Liberal Democrats has always been that civil liberties seem to go as the first rather than the last resort. One problem is that when we are trying to work together and to trust the Government, the argument that is made for accommodating an extension against our usual liberties is that it will be used only in extreme circumstances and that great care will be taken, with great supervision. Then, to use a well-worn example, we see the farcical absurdity of an old man being held under anti-terrorist legislation for shouting a heckle at a Labour conference.