British Home Secretary Wants Power of Arrest for Himself

Legislating in a climate of fear is a foolish thing in any democracy. It gave America the Alien and Sedition Acts in 1798, and the Patriot Act (which no legislator actually read before the vote) in 2001. The British government, fresh from stupidly not-quite banning fox hunting, has announced plans to give the Home Secretary the power to restrict the movements terror suspects and hold them without trial. The Home Secretary is Charles Clarke, but he may as well be named Oswald Mosley.

The existing laws expire on March 14, and Mr. Clarke wants to ram these other rules through before then.. The prisoners currently held at Her Majesty’s Pleasure in Belmarsh prison for suspicion of terror-related activities would have to be freed otherwise, according to the Labour government. That shows just how far the Blair government has gone – the suspects have not been convicted of any crime, so precisely why are they in prison? Time to put up or shut up, Mr. Blair. Charge them or free them.

Under the proposed rules, the Home Secretary can write out an order forcing a UK resident to stay at home. A judge can review this inside of a week. This would be contrary to the European Convention on Human Rights. Also, Internet and telephone connections could also be denied to people who have committed no crime.

Mr. Clarke defended his proposal yesterday by saying, "My principle responsibility is to protect this country and everyone within it. It would be the gravest dereliction of duty to wait until we have suffered a terrorist outrage here and then respond only after the event. I am not prepared to take a risk of that kind." He might also want to consider that, if he has sufficient reason to order a person to stay at home and turn off their phone, he might have sufficient reason to actually bring charges in accordance with human rights and British law.

Rarely does the Kensington Review back the Tory Party’s view, but in this instance, full marks to the shadow home secretary, David Davis, who said, "No one is saying we should do nothing but I have to tell the home secretary he has settled on the wrong answers." He also said, "You [Mr. Clarke] are planning to sacrifice essential, long-standing principles of British liberty and justice in a way which may act to reduce that security.” Mr. Davis is absolutely right.

© Copyright 2005 by The Kensington Review, J. Myhre, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written consent.

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