Prevention and Suppression of Terrorism

Mike Freer Excerpts

Thursday 19th June 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mike Freer (Finchley and Golders Green) (Con)]

I was not planning to contribute much to the debate, apart from by sharing an experience. I hope that in his winding-up speech the Minister can explain how the orders can evolve once the groups have been proscribed.

I suspect that I am one of the few MPs who has been attacked by a proscribed organisation. Muslims Against Crusades is now proscribed, but I was subject to an attack during one of my mosque surgeries. The organisation posted various threats on its website and then interrupted several of my surgeries, as a result of which I now have to have additional security at my constituency office and at my home, and my diary has to go to the police every week.

That changed my view on proscription. Initially, I was not in favour of it because I wanted to see these groups out in the open, where we could monitor them, but having been at the sharp end of an attack, I fully support the measures that the Government are taking on such groups. My concern—and the question has been raised by the Chairman of the Select Committee—is how we deal with the people who are abroad. The woman behind the stirring-up of trouble in my constituency was radicalised abroad.

The hon. Member for Ilford South (Mike Gapes) raised the issue of the internet providers. As soon as Muslims Against Crusades was proscribed, the web page came down, but the group reinvented itself within hours, and a simple name change got round the proscription. My worry is that we can list the names of the five organisations in the order, but within hours of their names being listed, they reinvent themselves as a fringe group under another name and seem to get round proscription. Can my hon. Friend the Minister address that point about how the orders can be flexed to deal with the evolving threat as these groups rearrange themselves?