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Mr. Ingram: If I understand the hon. Gentleman correctly, he is going down a dangerous road. He says that, in the event of a lasting settlement, schisms in the republican movement are inevitable, and that it should be inevitable that internment should be applied in such circumstances. He obviously did not hear what I said. Internment creates divisions. It brings friends to the terrorist movement. I therefore caution the hon. Gentleman about the line he is adopting. I do not think that it will help the peace process or the current talks process.
Mr. MacKay: With respect, the Minister has not been listening carefully. I said not that I believe that a political settlement will automatically lead to splits among loyalist or republican paramilitaries but that history suggests that it is possible. It would then be up to the Government to consider internment. I am not telling him that he should automatically intern people in such circumstances but cautioning him that it would be wise to have the option of internment available. It is he who is making the mistake by removing it from the statute book.
To summarise, I believe that to throw away such a weapon of last resort is foolish and wrong. It is yet another example of a Government concession to republicanism that brings no tangible benefit. I hate saying this, but I regret that it is true: it is merely token politics.
Mr. Mallon:
I listened with interest to the discussion of the hon. Gentleman and the Minister about what may happen after an agreed political settlement. Has it dawned on the hon. Gentleman that, under the terms of a new political dispensation, the process of justice might be dispensed not from this House but from within a new political settlement? Does that not reinforce the wisdom of the Government's decision to remove this power, which will never again be used in Ireland, from the statute book, here or elsewhere?
Mr. MacKay:
I am sure that the hon. Gentleman is not asking me to second-guess what will happen at the political talks, what conclusions will be reached and whether they will be endorsed by the people of Northern Ireland. I am saying that now, in November 1997, perhaps six months before the conclusion of those talks, there is no need to take internment off the statute book. We know that the Minister is not going to intern people in the foreseeable future; we did not use the power. We are saying that, if the political talks in which Ministers are engaged prove successful, and I pray that they will, there could be circumstances where terrorist splinter groups of both communities behave in such a way that the Government in the south and our Government might possibly think that internment was a suitable measure to introduce. I ask him to keep that option open. That is not an extreme or unreasonable request.
Mr. Soley:
I hope that I may persuade the hon. Gentleman of something, because I get the feeling that he is persuadable. Is he so pessimistic and full of doom and gloom that he must assume that Northern Ireland will never be a normal society again? We believe that we should move forward by a series of steps and, above all, that we should restore the rule of law. Internment involves people being locked up without trial. It is inimical to the rule of law, and therefore to democracy. That is why it is important. I ask the Conservative party to try to come on board on this. It is a small but important step to say to the people of Northern Ireland, Unionist and republican, that they are not killing each other as they used to, so let us keep moving in that direction to make it a normal society once more.
Mr. MacKay:
I respond to the hon. Member for Hammersmith by saying that I am not being--
Mr. Soley:
I am not the hon. Member for Hammersmith.
Mr. MacKay:
I am afraid I am not up to speed with the hon. Gentleman's constituency. The hon. Gentleman has taken an interest in Northern Ireland matters throughout the time that I have been in the House and he used to represent Hammersmith.
I believe that I am being not pessimistic but realistic. I am not saying that internment is a good idea; I am simply saying that it is not inconceivable that, in certain circumstances, the Government and--equally important--
the Government in the south, who are not removing internment from their statute book, might need to use it. Of course I hope that they will not. Of course I hope that the men of violence will never resort to violence again. Of course I am pleased that, at the moment, there is a ceasefire and there are political talks, but the House must be realistic, not naive.
In Committee and on Report, we shall table amendments that we hope will alter the Bill for the good. We shall do all in our power to persuade the Minister that we are not asking him to make a major reversal, but saying that those things should be delayed until there is a permanent peace.
Surely the right time to pass this measure would be when a real measure of political settlement had been agreed, and when new political arrangements in Northern Ireland had a degree of stability. At that time, we could think about scrapping internment permanently. Now is not the time to do that--especially not, as appears to be the case, for political rather than security reasons.
Mr. Kevin McNamara (Hull, North):
Clause 3 reads:
I listened to what the hon. Member for Bracknell (Mr. MacKay) said. I had not intended to quote my past words--I find it repulsive when politicians do that, but I shall be repulsive on this occasion--but I find that my past arguments match his arguments today.
It is a matter of record that the worst disturbances--the killings, the shootings, the explosions--from both sides of the community took place while internment was in force. Only when the present Lord Rees started the process of ending internment in Northern Ireland did the incidents start to decrease.
The reason was that internment, like two other issues, became a recruiting cry, a rallying cry, for Provisional Sinn Fein.
Labour Members complained that the British Army was carrying out that task and we could not question it because it was being done under the auspices of the Northern Ireland Government. It took the case of the hon. Member for Foyle (Mr. Hume), which went to the House of Lords, to upset that situation and to get legislation through the House.
Interestingly, handwritten legislation passed through this House and the other place in 24 hours. The then leader of the Liberal party, Mr. Jeremy Thorpe, tabled the only amendment--which was not passed--and 15 of us supported him in the attempt. I am happy to say that there remain in the House nine hon. Members who voted against internment on 23 September 1971.
Internment became a rallying cry, as did two other things: Bloody Sunday and the hunger strikes. Sadly, all three happened when the Conservatives were in government. We are now rectifying the situation and ridding the statute book of one of the principal causes of recruitment to Provisional IRA. I hope that, later this year or early next year, we shall have a positive statement about Bloody Sunday, because that will do a great deal to heal community illnesses.
Unfortunately, we cannot resurrect people who have died. Nevertheless, the Secretary of State and the Minister are to be congratulated on this positive step. If for no other reason than the abolition of internment, the House should pass the Bill by acclamation.
I support the introduction of audio recording into interrogation centres. Combined with video recording, it will provide a powerful boost. It will protect the security forces without affecting their ability to inquire and find and interrogate suspects. In every terrorist case in this country, audio recordings have been taken at Paddington Green police station.
Most policemen I know wonder why they ever opposed audio recording, because it has proved a great tool when they interrogate suspects. Now people cannot say, "I never signed that document" or "I never made that sentence"--the evidence is there. It is a great safeguard for the police. It is a great safeguard for people who are detained.
I wonder what the outcry would have been if we had heard the statements that Roisin McAliskey alleges were made to her when she was first arrested and taken to Castlereagh. I wonder whether she or the police would have been proved correct. If she is correct, the police conduct was outrageous; if the police are correct, what she said about them was outrageous. In any event, the Bill will bring an end to public suspicion about what goes on in Castlereagh and elsewhere. We should welcome what has been decided. Not only Louis Blom-Cooper has commented about the need for the measure; Lord Colville and others did so in their reports.
I am sorry that I was perhaps a little vindictive towards my hon. Friend the Minister of State on the question of contracting out and contracting in. I am sorry that he has been sent to the House to do the Attorney-General's job for him. As we now know, it was the Attorney-General's decision that we should not have certifying in, but should maintain the present system.
My right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General cannot have it in this way. An important matter of principle is involved. It is a question of getting as many
cases as possible in front of juries in Northern Ireland. It is about seeking to achieve normality. His claim that it is because of the work load in his Department, when Northern Ireland by any account--even taking into consideration alleged terrorist offences--has the lowest rate of criminality anywhere in these isles, does not stand up as an argument. Even if it did, in terms of the enormous sums going into Northern Ireland, the cost of extra staff in the Crown Prosecution Service to deal with those cases would be insignificant compared with the boon of going back to proper jury trials.
I am glad that my hon. Friend did not advance the argument, as has been done from other Benches, that all the offences are really terrorist offences, so to certify some in as terrorist offences would be to point a finger at those particular offences. The finger is pointed by the fact that they are not certified out, so that decision is already made. The decision has important ramifications for the powers that are to be kept. It affects the admissibility of evidence, the loosening of the rules of evidence, changes in cases, and the burden of proof. Those are important matters. It would be far better to get back to normality.
I urge my hon. Friend the Minister of State to convey to our right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General the anger that is felt by his colleagues on the Back Benches who believe that he has made a serious error--or has he? I ask because I wonder what will happen under Lord Lloyd's proposals, and the decisions and the White Paper that will be issued by my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary.
To what extent will Lord Lloyd's proposals be put into legislation? Although they introduce changes, they are not as liberal as they appear. One has only to read his footnotes on internment. Will the Diplock regime, for example, become the mode of trial in the United Kingdom if there is to be a universal system--if terrorist or terrorist-related offences or drug offences are included within an all-embracing piece of anti-terrorist legislation? It is not an easy matter.
Because we have not had in the United Kingdom the problems of jury nobbling or witness nobbling in terrorist cases, it is wrong to think in terms of an all-embracing Act. It would be far better for the legislation to apply only to Northern Ireland, where there is a special and different problem. Terrorism in the United Kingdom that is not Irish-related will be subject to the ordinary criminal law, as is Irish terrorism at present.
We have had no difficulty in the United Kingdom dealing with Irish terrorist offences under our rules of law, our rules of evidence and our system--except, perhaps, when the prosecution has been so perverse in the evidence that it has presented that it has produced the Birmingham Six, the Guildford Four and the Maguire family. Generally speaking, however, there has been no undue difficulty with jury trial.
If we want to return to a system of jury trials in Northern Ireland and get people ready to accept such a return to normality, we must surely have a system of certifying in and not certifying out.
"Section 36 of, and Schedule 3 to, the Northern Ireland (Emergency Provisions) Act 1996 (detention orders) shall cease to have effect."
That clause alone justifies support for the Bill.
"The first reason why we are dividing the House tonight is that we are against internment in principle. It is wrong, and it cannot hope to succeed. It will not succeed. If we uphold the rule of law, we cannot suspend it when the situation becomes a little bit ugly. We have to go through with it. We are against internment in principle whether on this side of the Irish Sea or in Northern Ireland, or if it exists in Southern Ireland."--[Official Report, 23 September 1971; Vol. 823, c. 274.]
It was, and is, a matter of principle.
"Armoured cars and tanks and guns
was sung in clubs throughout Northern Ireland. The issue united a peaceful community against the Government because, no matter how many people from the other side might later have been interned, internment was regarded as patently unfair. The arrest of people in such circumstances was seen as fundamentally unjust.
Came to take away our sons"
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