Terrorism Act 2000 (Section 44)

Tom Brake Excerpts

Thursday 8th July 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman. As he says, this has indeed been a matter of concern to him for some time. He is right to say that the use of the powers has been variable among forces and over time. It is, of course, within the Secretary of State’s remit to ensure that they are used partly through the authorisations, which must be confirmed by the Secretary of State within 48 hours of the appropriate level of police putting those authorisations in place. Of course, we will revert to this issue in the counter-terrorism legislation review, and we will consider that matter at that time.

[Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)]

If the coalition is obsessed with defending civil liberties, I am proud of that fact. Is the Home Secretary satisfied that the balance between civil liberties and safeguarding our security is adequately redressed with these changes to section 44; or does she believe that further changes may be required to section 44 after the counter-terrorism legislation review?

[Mrs May]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his question. The whole point of making the statement today is to ensure that an interim position is available to the police, so that they have operational guidance and clarity about the powers that they can exercise, but precisely because I feel that we need to take a wider look at section 44 and to look at it in the context of other counter-terrorism legislation, we will continue to consider it within the review. I cannot say at this stage whether any further changes will be introduced, but that would be done in the wider context of the review of all counter-terrorism legislation.