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Prevention and Suppression of Terrorism

The hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire (Jo Swinson), like the hon. Member for Bury St. Edmunds (Mr. Ruffley), raised important points concerning the whole question of proscription and its implications. It is right that Parliament should scrutinise such important decisions. Even though this order will quite rightly go through the House unchallenged tonight, it is the scrutiny that Parliament gives to such orders and legislation that is so vital. Following the aftermath of what happened in New York and what happened in London just a few years ago, there is tendency to rush to make decisions and for Parliament to reflect on the consequences afterwards. I do not think that the Government have done that in this case, and I fully support what the Minister said about the organisation in question. In many cases, those of us who are not experts in this field—although I chair the Select Committee on Home Affairs, I do not regard myself as an expert on this matter—do not possess the kind of information and security intelligence that the Minister has. I accept what he says, therefore, and I take it on faith. It is a quiet Tuesday evening, there are not huge numbers of Members in the House, and the order will go through unchallenged by a vote, but the danger is that we will make a decision and look at the implications afterwards. The hon. Member for Bury St. Edmunds was right to talk about the draconian effects of proscription. As we can tell from the word itself, proscription cannot be anything other than the most serious judgment on the activities of a particular group. My hon. Friend the Member for Hendon (Mr. Dismore), who follows these matters more closely than I do because of his great constituency interests, is able to reel off information about Hezbollah, which I certainly did not know, concerning who sits on its councils and what they do. The hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire picked up the information that the organisation does not even have bank accounts, but transfers its money between various sister organisations. All of that adds to the weight of knowledge that we, as parliamentarians, have. My problem is not with the order, but with the implications that will become apparent long after it has been passed. The Minister knows about the issue of proscription, because I have raised it with him, and its effect on law-abiding citizens of this country who do not support the terrorist activities of organisations abroad, but believe in the wider cause. The example of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam was raised, quite rightly, by the hon. Member for Bury St. Edmunds. I have about 10,000 members of the Tamil community, and many Muslims, in my constituency, who would be very interested in what Hezbollah is doing in the middle east. I have many constituents who are concerned about the peace process. The problem for law-abiding British citizens who support the general cause, but do not support terrorist organisations, is what happens if they attempt to hold meetings or events that in some way deal with what is happening in the countries concerned, and Sri Lanka is an obvious example. I have been to events organised by the Tamils Forum, with the approval of the Metropolitan police, and subsequently, I received almost hysterical communications from the Sri Lankan high commissioner about my attendance at what Sri Lanka regards as terrorist events. Of course they were not; we do not support terrorism. But they are events that concern members of the British Tamil community, who will be affected by the general nature of proscription. That is why clarity is so vital when we are affecting the rights of British citizens. I am surprised to some extent by my hon. Friend the Member for Hendon, who is the chairman of the Joint Committee on Human Rights. He is always very eager to talk about human rights, but should remember from his former profession as a lawyer that it is important to preserve the rights of individuals who are not supporters of such organisations, but somehow get caught in the wider net thrown around them because they attend or give at a charitable event, as the hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire mentioned. On Saturday, the hon. Member for Kingston and Surbiton (Mr. Davey), who leads for the Liberal Democrats on foreign affairs, the hon. Member for Croydon, Central (Mr. Pelling), who was a Conservative MP but is now independent, my hon. Friend the Member for Mitcham and Morden (Siobhain McDonagh), who is a member of the Government, my hon. Friend the Member for Brent, South (Ms Butler) and the former Prime Minister of Kosovo were all at a meeting in Mitcham, attended by 40,000 members of the Tamil community, to talk about the situation in Sri Lanka. The hon. Member for Ilford, North (Mr. Scott), was not present, but had a letter read out at the event. The LTTE is a proscribed organisation, but the Tamil organisation is not. Police officers were there filming what was going on. I went up to a number of them, just to reassure them that nothing was out of order. The problem with orders of this kind is that they have implications far beyond what the Government intend—implications that affect law-abiding British citizens. The last time I attended such an event, I was told by the Metropolitan police that those in every organisation had to sign a piece of paper, invented just before the meeting, confirming that they would not carry out various activities there. I said, ““How can you just produce this piece of paper? These are law-abiding British citizens. In my 21 years in Parliament, I have never heard of British citizens attending a meeting being made to sign pieces of paper about what will happen there in advance of it happening.”” My office was told by the police officer that this was now standard practice in view of the proscription that had been decided by Parliament. I did not know that; it was news to me that such forms had to be produced. In passing the order tonight, we need to understand what will happen to people who do not support the organisation in question, and who do not believe that terrorism is a means of getting justice in the middle east, but are caught up in the wider net described by other hon. Members—apart from my hon. Friend the Member for Hendon, who wants the Government to go even further. Other people are genuinely concerned about these issues. At the moment, there are 900,000 people of Arab origin living in the United Kingdom—individuals and extended families. Some have indefinite leave to remain, and some are British citizens. Many take part in different organisational activities to do with the middle east, and are concerned about what happens there. Where is the demarcation line for those people? My second point was just made to me, outside the Chamber, by the hon. Member for Kingston and Surbiton. I told him that I would be mentioning him in my speech, and he reminded me that the Government's original order to proscribe 25 organisations was unamendable. No Member could amend that list, so we could not raise concerns about the implications of the order for law-abiding constituents who did not support terrorism. They want to support the Government in all that they do, as in the excellent work they have done in the past 11 years in trying to suppress terrorism. We could not amend that order, however, and there has never been an opportunity for us to do so. Of course, in future, the Committee of my hon. Friend the Member for Hendon or the Home Affairs Committee might look at the matter of proscription. However, as things stand, unless an order of this kind is brought before the House, there is no way in which we can scrutinise what the Government are doing in this area or offer fresh information about the implications that such actions have for law-abiding citizens. My next point is about challenging proscription. I raised it with the Opposition spokesperson and he rightly said that he wished to concentrate on other matters in his speech, but I hope that the House will consider the subject in future. When an organisation wishes to challenge proscription—the Government have recently lost a case in the courts; an order was passed a few weeks ago when the Government had to come to the House and implement the court's decision—there is no hard and fast, robust way in which to do that. I know that because a meeting was held with the former Home Secretary during which members of the Tamil community asked what they could do so that a distinction could be made between those who wished to pursue terrorist ends and those, like those members of the community, who did not, but wanted to speak about the genuine carnage and violence that is happening in parts of Sri Lanka and to return to the negotiating table, which was so vital to the progress of peace in that troubled and beautiful island. The then Home Secretary said that there were no procedures, rules or guidelines. All that an organisation had to do was write to the Home Secretary and that would trigger a look at proscription. If the request was turned down, people could go to court and there could be a judicial review, which is exactly what happened in the case of the People's Mujahedeen Organisation of Iran. Of course, we will go along with what is suggested tonight, because the Minister has presented us with persuasive arguments, as he always does when he introduces such measures. We are always willing to support the Government on such issues because they are so serious and the Government have much more information than we do. However, given that we are entering new territory and that the Government have been challenged in the courts and lost, at great expense to the taxpayer, may not we have some regulations or rules, or some sort of robust scheme whereby organisations can appropriately challenge the Government's decision without having to await such a discussion or an order such as the one that we are considering? May we have a mechanism whereby organisations can challenge and place evidence before the Government? I hope that the Minister will address that when he responds to the debate. What other way is there, other than writing to the Home Secretary and, when she says that the proscription cannot be lifted—I would be amazed if she wrote back and said yes to any of the organisations that she or her predecessors have proscribed—going to court? The recent case went through the High Court to the Court of Appeal and eventually to the highest court in the land. Do we have to do that every single time a Government decision is challenged? I urge my right hon. Friend, in balancing out what we are doing today, to consider a more robust scheme, which will enable us to make progress. If we do not, hysteria will grow about organisations and individuals such as members of the Tamil community. It is wrong to stigmatise a whole community, as some in the Sri Lankan Government have done. I welcome the Tamil community's actions in the past few years in politicising themselves and lobbying Members of Parliament. Tomorrow, that community has an exhibition in the House about what happens in Sri Lanka. That is the way for people to pursue their legitimate political grievances—through parliamentary democracy. I ask the Minister: please consider a more robust scheme that is fair to our citizens. We are talking not about people abroad, but about those who live here—British citizens or those with indefinite leave to remain—who pay taxes and vote for people such as the Minister, me and Opposition Members. Let us treat them with respect and ensure that we have a robust scheme, which enables people to challenge what they regard as an unfair law.