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Terrorism Act 2000 (Proscribed Organisations) (Amendment) Order 2005

My Lords, I thank the Minister for the information he has supplied. One of our difficulties is that we have no detailed information other than that supplied by the Home Office. The Government have, and will continue to receive, our support in proscribing organisations involved in national or international terrorism. As the Minister rightly described, the Government have their own methods of collecting information, through intelligence or other means. We have a problem here. We have complained before, during discussion on the previous order in which organisations were proscribed, that it is always difficult to deal with organisations bunched together. In this case, we see that there are 15 international organisations, and it is difficult to give detailed consideration to each. We seem to have followed the procedure which was there before, and I hope the Minister will seriously consider the suggestion that we should be able to look at each group individually, so that we can make reasonable comments about them. In this particular case, we have considerable difficulties. I have been in touch with Amnesty International today, and no one there has any knowledge or expertise about these organisations. Do the organisations to be proscribed know that they are going to be proscribed? If not, how can they appeal? If they want to appeal, do they have the right to come to this country and make representation to judges here? It would be helpful to have that information. Our own limited research does not allow us to doubt what the Government have said. I do not want to go into detail, because we could be looking at the individual cases for which the Home Secretary has provided the details for noble Lords for a very long time. Let me stress again, however, that we hope to deal with matters individually in future. We are unhappy for the Government to rush terrorism-related legislation in the manner in which we seem to be dealing with it at present. In future, it would be helpful to know what criteria are used for proscribing international terrorist organisations, and whether they are different from those for national organisations. Could the Minister spell out the criteria by which we judge their particular threats? As I say, do these organisations know they are being proscribed? What sort of assets do they hold in this country? Do they have contacts with organisations in the United Kingdom? Why has no nationally based organisation been proscribed, when some of them have already been identified in speeches made by the Home Secretary and Prime Minister? What provision is being made in the Terrorism Bill—soon to reach this House—for the future proscription of organisations?