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Human Rights

As I said earlier, I appreciate what happened at Blackheath, as both the protesters and the police pulled back, which was good. I think that we would all agree that a protest on Blackheath is different from a protest in the middle of the City of London, with regard to potential disruption. It is good that relationships can be built. We are not talking about hard mediation, but about trying to get two sides talking. We have made our point, although my hon. Friend the Minister might not be wedded to it. The other issue that the Minister raised related to section 44 of the Terrorism Act 2000—again. I am prepared to have a little wager with her that what will happen in the Grand Chamber is not what she thinks will happen. There is no question about the need for counter-terrorism powers to be used for counter-terrorism purposes. Indeed, Ministers—I am not sure whether she has said this today—have told our Committee that section 44 should be used strictly for counter-terrorism purposes only and not as a public order tool. The real problem is that it is being used as a public order tool when there is no question of any terrorist threat at all and as a shortcut by the police to stop and search people because they have no other grounds for doing so. If the police have to have reasonable suspicion under sections 1, 60 or 43, that is fine. If they think that something is going wrong or that someone has a weapon, for example, they are entitled to use stop-and-search powers without having to use section 44 because they would have reasonable suspicion. The problem with section 44 is that the police can stop and search people with no suspicion at all simply because an area has been designated as potentially at risk from terrorists. Even though the overall area is now much less than the whole of London, which it used to be, some of the areas involved are still pretty broad. The real problem is not only that that undermines confidence in counter-terrorism legislation generally, but that it is over-broad. If 250,000 people are stopped under section 44 and not one is arrested for a terrorist offence—we should remember just how broad our terrorism offences now are—that indicates to me that section 44 might not have been used for its original purpose. That argument has been accepted by Ministers on previous occasions. Ministers have said that it should be used only for counter-terrorism purposes, but it does not happen that way. My final point is about civil injunctions; I do not think that the Minister understands what we are saying about those. Civil injunctions are about changing the rules of court, not changing substantive law. They are about trying to get a balanced playing field and a cheaper and more effective way of protecting people, and about the right to protest. Question put and agreed to.