Terrorism (Detention and Human Rights)

The Government welcome both reports. They are studied and well informed and offer a lot of food for thought, so I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Member for Southampton, Itchen (Mr. Denham) and my hon. Friend and next-door neighbour, constituency-wise—he does not live next to me—the Member for Hendon (Mr. Dismore). The debate is timely. I have copious notes on the questions, but I do not have every specific answer, not least because of where we are, which I want to come on to. I am referring to the Government’s response not just to the two reports, but more broadly in respect of counter-terrorism. I think that a number of things should be recognised. Before dealing with them, let me say in passing that one of the last occasions on which I faced the hon. Member for Newark (Patrick Mercer) in a parliamentary forum was on 7 July 2005. I think there is an apocryphal story about it, but it is also in my memory. I do not think that we were discussing terrorism and ID cards in connection with what was then the Identity Cards Bill, but we were discussing ID cards. I commend the hon. Gentleman on his sources, because very soon after I received a bit of paper, he did too. Without wishing to be unkind, mine had more on it, but it had information that there had been a series of bombs on the underground network. As the hon. Member for Beaconsfield (Mr. Grieve) said, if anything the threat has grown since then, so Dame Eliza Manningham-Buller did not make a slip of the tongue in the number that she quoted in her recent speech. The intelligence services have previously published lower numbers, but we face a threat that, although it may not be growing exponentially in the strict mathematical sense, is certainly growing apace. Our response must grow likewise. I accept all the points made by the hon. Member for Beaconsfield about—if I may paraphrase—semiotics, symbolism, voice and language, and the sensitivities that surround all these issues. However, although I do not impugn anyone in the Chamber, if we are to have a mature and reflective parliamentary debate those points go strongly both ways. Impugning and undermining the Government’s motivation for particular proposals is as unhelpful to robust debate as Government outriders impugning the motivation of others. I do not do that in this Chamber, nor shall I do it as and when, which is likely, a terrorism Bill is introduced in this Session. I do not want to go into the events of August other than to acknowledge both their measure and magnitude, and that they happened. However, it is important to note that there has not been, thus far, an emergency Government response or another 36-hour pirouette at the Dispatch Box by the hon. Member for Beaconsfield. The Government have not rushed to judgment, or to amend and fill—suitably or otherwise—gaps in the terrorism legislation. That is right and proper. Hon. Members are aware that the Prime Minister charged the Home Secretary with examining in the round everything that we do in the counter-terrorism effort. That effort includes legislation, as well as action in the propaganda battle and in the war of values and ideas that has been mentioned by hon. Members, which is the nature of what we are dealing with as much as a war on terror. It is important also to say that at the appropriate moment we hope to publish some of the parts of the review that can be published, including a review of where we are with legislation. I am not offering any timetable, or any definitive answers to the question of what such a Bill would contain. There is, however, active discussion now rather than absolute silence on whether there should be a Bill and on whether there are significant legislative gaps on which we should proceed in focusing on counter-terrorism activities. My right hon. Friend the Member for Southampton, Itchen already knows that one should not over-interpret what one reads in the newspapers, or listen unduly to the noises off merely because there is silence from the main stage. The noises off are not terribly helpful. We are about the business of trying to get where we need to be on a consensual basis. Given the sensitivities, I accept that in this area above all others things are far better done—and the country is far better served—if we move forward consensually. For rhetorical purposes or otherwise, there have been suggestions that have over-egged the pudding as to the certitudes of some alternatives. There are, and there will remain, huge problems—the Attorney-General recognises that as much as anyone—surrounding the legal framework that should be put in place to secure intercept evidence as a further valuable weapon. The issue should be turned around and people should ask: if matters were as simple as is sometimes suggested, what would be the perverse interest of this or any Government in resisting the urge to grasp such a simplistic, obvious panacea? Serious issues are being considered—not least with the legal framework. Public interest immunity was one model, but there may be others. I hope that we shall give an informed view on that in the not too distant future, based on the current review and the views of the Attorney-General and his work. The matter is not, contrary to what some suggest, one of simply flicking a switch so that everything is fine and another element in the exercise is completed. The hon. Member for Beaconsfield shakes his head. I do not want to be partisan, but the right hon. Member for Haltemprice and Howden (David Davis) ended his Evening Standard article barely weeks ago by saying, in effect, that introducing intercept evidence and post-charge questioning would mean ““job done””. He put it in those stark, simplistic terms, which let down both him and the debate. Intercept evidence is actively being considered. Notwithstanding the point that was made by the hon. Member for Taunton (Mr. Browne)—he has now left—about Privy Councillors, there has, as far as I am aware, been engagement at Privy Council level with the security services and others about the nature of those issues and concerns. If there are ways to adopt it, the likelihood is that they will be examined. If there are reasons not to do so, so that we need to shut down that option, the Government will say so equally. The review is needed and it will come to fruition in the near future.