Blair loses vote on Terror legislation

[Peter]

Just breaking. No links yet.

[Peter]

Found figures for the 28 day vote (from SkyNews)...

Yes: 323
No: 290

News 24 is reporting a majority of 33 for the 28 day measure, so that appears correct.

[Peter]

Well, as is expected, I'm the civil libertarian here.

I am very happy with the news that 90 days was defeated: I was undecided between staying at 14 and moving to 28 days, ao I'm reasonably happy with that too.

Ultimately, if the government does not have the evidence to charge somebody with a crime, then it shouldn't be holding them in a manner similar to internment. This doesn't prejudice the government from actually keeping somebody under strict surveillance after release if they do fear an attack.

[Peter]

www.publicwhip.org.uk lists how every MP votes on every division, I have no idea how quickly they will have it updated, but they do have Monday's divisions up now, so it will probably be tomorrow when they have it up.

[Peter]

Emily Thornberry (Islington South & Finsbury)

Good to see the friend of the family is voting the right way.

[Peter]

Interestingly, according to publicwhip.org.uk there was one Tory rebel also: Sir Peter Tapsell, who I believe is the Uncle of the House.

[Peter]

Interestingly, according to publicwhip.org.uk there was one Tory rebel also: Sir Peter Tapsell, who I believe is the Uncle of the House.

Is he still alive? Good Lord.

Indeed, first elected in 1959 (and is therefore the only Parliamentary survivor of the 50s, and one of only two I believe from the 60s along with the Father, Alan Williams), he was then defeated in 1964 for re-election. In 1966, he got back into Parliament, and has remained ever since.

[Peter]

Speaking of by-elections, I was surfing round publicwhip.org.uk, and according to its attendance stats, Rachel Squire, Labour MP for Dunfermline and West Fife hasn't made a single vote - I did some checking, she had a brain tumour last year, and this June she had a bleed on the brain, presumably a complication. Whether she'll recover, who knows.

[Peter]

I'd figured that, if there was no Tory or LD rebel, 16 Labour and 14 Opposition MPs did not vote. Change that to 17 Labour and 13 Opposition, now...

Still nobody with a list of 28 day rebels?

All votes cast in 90 days vote (including the "abstainers")

All votes cast in 28 days vote

And the 28 days vote is damned peculiar, I mean *damned* peculiar. Did the government want no holding time at all?

[Peter]

*you can't tell with Public Whip as they never bother to find out whether or not a vote was whipped

They don't collect that data for the reasons outlined here. Thing is that they will only record the party whipping if they can get it recorded for all votes, which they can't.

[Peter]

I don't think 90-day detentions are unreasonable when it takes a long time to dicipher encrypted codes because many terrorists are computer masterminds these days. It's a dangerous world we live and, sadly, tougher cautionary and preventative measures are a matter of necessity rather than choice

You've clearly been reading the tabloids too much.

The fact is that nobody was actually able to give any evidence or hint of suggestion that extending the detention period in this fashion would actually have any real effect in fighting the terrorist threat. Add to that the fact that it was openly conceded that 7/7 could not have been stopped with this law.

The suggestion that it would take up to 90 days to crack a security encryption with the equipment that MI5 and MI6 should have access to is laughable -- if that's genuine, we ought to consider launching an investigation into *that*. With the expertise and equipment the security services should have access to, anything the relatively low-tech terrorist cells can come up with should fall within a day.

I watched This Week on BBC1 last night, and Ken Clarke put it quite well:  Nobody has given an actual reason why the 90 day detention would help fight the terrorist threat, and once Parliamentarians began to scratch away at the surface, it soon became evident that we were talking about something that was merely a feel good measure, designed to make it look as if something was being done about the situation.

[Peter]

Cripes - any one would think we on the verge of becoming a police state . The government wasn't proposing internment  at whim or detention without the auspices of the judiciary

Actually, thats exactly what it was proposing until the opposition/rebels pushed the government into adding judicial oversight into the equation.

[Peter]

The public deserve nothing but the maximum effort to ensure that atrocities like July 7 don't happen again. The right of us to live without the threat of terrorist atrocities trumps all else

Nobody has shown to my satisfaction (or a number of Parliamentarians, Ken Clarke included) that 90 days will do anything towards achieving your stated goal.

Problem is that this measure looks like its strong on terrorism because we're saying "Lets bang them up and then they can't do bugger all for 90 days", but really there's little to nothing that is actually gained by the proposal.

If the police are not able to construct a case in 28 days against somebody that they suspect of terrorist offences given the wide range of offences that have now been legislated into Law, then frankly, they're either grossly incompetent or the man is innocent, and giving them another 62 days to go on a fishing expedition accomplishes nothing but detaining an innocent man longer than is necessary.

It seems utterly counter-intuitive to me to suggest that the Police cannot possibly investigate a person in 28 days to the point of exhaustion, but that in an extra 62 days, they might actually be able to turn something up. Of course, the police should have time to thoroughly question a suspect and to follow up any leads they might have, but that simply doesn't take more than 28 days if you have the resources.

If the police are having a resources problem, then raise that with the politicians, I'm sure they'll write the cheque.

[Peter]

1. What did Paisley do?

Paisley, along with the whole DUP voted against the 90 day stuff. Whilst I'm not 100%, I'd be willing to put money on the assertion that they supported internment, and probably wouldn't mind it back now, thus making them hypocrites.