---

Counter-Terrorism

On the first point, people will be able to put forward other proposals—I hope that they will. I do not think that we have a monopoly of wisdom on this. This is a national question of national security, so a national effort that includes contributions from everyone is to be welcomed. I will pass no comment on the individual measures that the hon. Gentleman suggests, except to say that they are interesting proposals that we should look at. The hon. Gentleman asks the question of whether doing x will lessen the case for doing y. I do not see this as a zero-sum game. Whether or not we have intercept evidence and post-charge questioning, I genuinely believe that we are confronted with a difficult question. I understand why those who are committed to the present legal traditions find the question so difficult. However, there are times when there is a disjunction between inherited legal conventions and frameworks and the present reality, because things arise that have never been imagined or anticipated. If we look at the laws of conflict and peace, we find that the legal conventions and traditions are based on circumstances that have been overtaken by the reality of today’s conflict and the nature of the enemy of terrorism with regard to the scale, intention and capability that we are facing. We should thus approach this with as open a mind as possible and accept that we should go forward when we can reach consensus, and minimise our differences where there is difficulty. Ultimately, a decision will be made in Parliament on the matters on which we cannot reach consensus that the Government think they have an obligation to put before Parliament. In that spirit, I think that we will achieve a lot more than we could through the way in which circumstances meant that we had to proceed in the past.