Ibrahim Magag

Yvette Cooper Excerpts

Tuesday 8th January 2013 Commons Chamber

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

(Urgent Question): To ask the Home Secretary to make a statement on the disappearance of Ibrahim Magag.

[The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mrs Theresa May)]

On 26 December 2012, Ibrahim Magag, a Somali-born British national who is subject to a terrorism prevention and investigation measure, failed to report for his overnight residence requirement. As I told the House yesterday, the police believe that he has absconded, and his whereabouts are currently unknown.

On 31 December, at the request of the police, I asked the High Court to revoke the anonymity order that was in force in relation to Magag. The police subsequently issued a public appeal for information that might lead to his location and apprehension. The Government took steps to inform Parliament of this incident as soon as it was lawful and operationally possible to do so. The Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department, my hon. Friend the Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup (James Brokenshire), spoke to the Chairmen of the Home Affairs Select Committee and the Intelligence and Security Committee on 31 December. This was followed by letters to both Committee Chairmen, to the shadow Home Secretary and to you, Mr Speaker. Copies of the letters were placed in the Library of the House on the same day.

The statements that the police issued on 31 December and 2 January confirm that, at this time, Magag is not considered to represent a direct threat to the British public. The TPIM notice in this case was intended primarily to prevent fundraising and overseas travel. The Government do not believe that Magag’s disappearance is linked to any current terrorism planning in the UK. Nevertheless, we are of course taking this matter very seriously.

The police are doing everything in their power to apprehend Magag as quickly as possible. Although I cannot give operational details, I can confirm that the police, the Security Service and other agencies are devoting significant resources to the search for Magag. Members of the public with any information relating to the search should contact the confidential police anti-terrorist hotline.

Before the shadow Home Secretary stands up again, I would like to remind the House that this is not the first abscond of a terror suspect. In six years of control orders, there were seven absconds, of which six were never apprehended. Magag’s abscond is serious, and the authorities are doing everything they can to locate him. I will update the House when there are further developments as soon as it is possible to do so.

[Yvette Cooper]

Ibrahim Magag is still missing after 13 days, and the Home Secretary clearly has no idea where he is. The first priority must be to find him, and she should tell us more about the additional resources being put into the search. Will she also tell us what the threat assessment really is? She said that the risk simply related to “fundraising and overseas travel”, yet the courts have said that Magag has attended terrorist training camps in Somalia, that he was fundraising for known terrorists and that

“the operational tempo and capability of the group of extremists based in London will be degraded by removing his operational role from London”.

Does the Home Secretary think that that threat assessment still holds?

How was Magag able to abscond in the first place? Was he even under surveillance at the time? Cabwise, a trade news service for London cabbies, reported yesterday that Magag

“used a London taxi in the vicinity of Triton Street at around 17:20 on 26 December.”

Is that true? Is the Home Secretary worried that surveillance can be shaken off simply by jumping into a black cab?

The Home Secretary allowed Ibrahim Magag to return to London. She has not answered the question from the independent reviewer, David Anderson, about whether it would have been harder to abscond in the west country, where Magag was made to live under a control order and where it would have been harder for him to get help from his associates, harder to hide and harder to get forged papers. She knows that relocation makes it harder to abscond, because she has included it in her draft emergency terror legislation.

The Home Secretary referred to the early years of control orders, but David Anderson, the independent reviewer has said:

“The absence of absconds since mid-2007 has coincided with the trend away from light touch control orders, and/or the more extensive use of relocation.”

The right hon. Lady chose to ditch relocations, and she has personally made it easier for people to abscond. Other people previously relocated under control orders are also now back in London on terrorism prevention and investigation measures. Could any one of them simply jump into a black cab tomorrow and be off?

Will the Home Secretary ask the independent reviewer urgently to investigate the failures of this case and to review the issue of relocation? She has ignored security advice before and someone involved in terrorism is now out on our streets. She must not ignore the evidence on relocations. She should put the national interest ahead of her political interests and stop ducking the issue. Is it not time that she took some responsibility and sorted this mess out?

[Mrs May]

I am very sorry that the shadow Home Secretary chose to pursue that line in relation to this case. Let me repeat the key fact that she does not seem to want to accept—that this is not the first time that somebody has absconded. She seems to think that it is all down to the difference between control orders and TPIMs, but in six years of control orders there were seven absconds and six of the individuals involved were never apprehended.

The right hon. Lady keeps saying that it is all down to whether we have the power to relocate, but relocation powers were available throughout the history of control orders and they did not prevent seven absconds by control order subjects. If she will not listen to me, perhaps she will listen to the police and the Security Service, which made it absolutely clear at the time TPIMs were introduced that there should be no substantial increase in overall risk and that appropriate arrangements were in place for the transition from control orders to TPIMs—and that remains their position.

The right hon. Lady asked about the current level of risk. I repeat what I said in response to her question—that the statements the police issued on 31 December and on 2 January confirm that at this time Magag is not considered to represent a direct threat to the British public, and that the Government do not believe that his disappearance is linked to any current terrorism planning in the UK.

The right hon. Lady made a number of references to David Anderson, the independent reviewer. He has said:

“The only sure way to prevent absconding is to lock people in a high security prison.”

I agree, which is why we provided extra funding to the Security Service and the police when we introduced TPIMs to maximise the opportunities to prosecute terrorists in open court and to minimise the risk they pose to national security. The alternatives—whether we are talking about TPIMs or control orders—are highly useful disruptive tools, but because they do not involve locking people up, as the history of control orders shows, there will always be a risk of abscond.

Currently, the police and other agencies are, as I have said, working very hard to apprehend Ibrahim Magag. They have taken the operational decisions that needed to be taken and the way in which they pursue their inquiries is an operational matter for them. When the dust has settled, we will look again to see whether any lessons need to be learned. The independent reviewer produces an annual report that covers TPIMs, and I fully expect him to cover them in his review. I say to the shadow Home Secretary, however, that all she has done in highlighting this matter is to demonstrate the weakness of her argument, as what she says about TPIMs was also true of control orders. I hope that the whole House will join me in supporting the police, the Security Service and other agencies in continuing their work and in keeping our country safe.