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Mr. McNamara: Has the hon. Gentleman considered that it might be better to provide for the report to go to
the Home Affairs Committee? That would allow for better in-depth examination of the issues than might be achieved in an hour and a half debate after 10 o'clock at night.
Mr. Hughes: I am always of the view that reports should go first to the relevant Select Committee and that the House should then consider matters after colleagues in those Committees have had more time to look at the details. I support that argument, but the Bill should certainly come back to Parliament for consideration regularly because we may want to amend it. As the hon. Member for Slough said, it is also better to know that the legislation will return to the House for review because that provides a useful check against misuse of legislative powers that we would otherwise have no means to change through Parliament without a Government's assent.
We welcome some measures in the Bill, such as the repeal of the exclusion order provisions. Although my party sometimes did otherwise, I never voted for them and I always considered that they were wrong. Ours is one country or it is not, and excluding people from one part of Britain from another part of it always struck me as fundamentally wrong. I know that colleagues on the Ulster Unionist Benches and others took that view. We made a terrible mistake by going down that road and I am glad that it is being put right, albeit belatedly.
We share the Government's view--it was supported in measured terms by the right hon. Member for Bridgwater--that special powers should no longer be subject to ministerial review but to judicial review. There are exceptional circumstances in Northern Ireland and differences that I entirely understand, but in general terms special powers should be subject to independent review which is not conducted by the Executive.
We entirely agree that there should be a less piecemeal approach, that UK legislation should be considered as a whole and that everything that is defined as terrorism should be dealt with at the same time and not in different legislation.
The Bill includes specific provisions for Northern Ireland. My hon. Friend the Member for Montgomeryshire (Mr. Öpik) has left the Chamber briefly to attend the Welsh Grand Committee, but he may say a word or two about that. We support the proposal that there should be a temporary continuation of additional special powers in Northern Ireland, ideally with the consent of the Northern Ireland Assembly and the confidence of the community in Northern Ireland as political and other normality returns. I hope to visit Northern Ireland to talk to representatives of all parties to reassure myself that the progression from unusual provisions such as the Diplock courts to normality is made with the maximum consensus. Five years seems to be the right time scale for such changes to be made; if that can be achieved more quickly that is welcome, nevertheless the provision in the Bill is the right one.
We see the Government's proposal that the Northern Ireland powers should lapse after five years as an argument in favour of our suggestion that there should be a general five-year review. The Government accept that certain powers should continue for a temporary period. We consider that that condition should apply to all powers and that they all should be subject to regular review.
The debate has already highlighted several key issues, the most important of which is the definition of terrorism. It is true, as the Home Secretary rightly said, that the Bill
does not create a new offence of terrorism. Clauses 1 and 38 define certain activities as terrorist activities which require special responses from the state.
It is absolutely clear, however, that the Bill changes the definition of terrorism as understood by the man or woman in the street. The New Oxford Dictionary definition is probably the one that they would understand. It defines terrorism as
Lord Lloyd's report took the definition further, but not as far as the Government now propose. The independent review of the legislation stopped far short of the Government's proposals. Lord Lloyd proposed the FBI definition of terrorism as
Mr. Hogg:
I agree with the hon. Gentleman. In their definition of terrorism, the Government are addressing not only the intent of an individual, but consequences that may not be intended.
Mr. Hughes:
The right hon. and learned Gentleman is quite correct and I shall address his point in a moment.
It is also difficult to define an offence by motivation. To say that a cause is political, religious or ideological poses many questions. For example, does the provision cover deluded religious fanatics who think that they are hearing voices? Does it cover people who are mad,
schizophrenic or paranoid or who believe that they are doing something for ideological reasons? How much does it take into account different degrees of sanity?
When a Bill applies to such a broad category it tends to cover a broad sweep of potential activities. It also becomes extremely difficult to define those activities. It is clearly possible that an environmentalist attacking a field of corn in Lincolnshire would be caught under the Bill as would someone causing serious damage to an animal laboratory in Oxfordshire--even if there were no human being in it--or someone attending a meeting in any of our constituencies at which someone spoke claiming to support a freedom struggle in a democratic country. If we go down that road we will be asking for trouble for ourselves for our reputation as a democracy.
Mr. Maginnis:
Is not the hon. Gentleman taking his argument to the point of being ridiculous? Nobody has suggested that terrorism could be predicated on the basis of a mad person or a zealot using violence on another member of the community. Does not terrorism involve groups of people carrying out organised terrorist activities?
Mr. Hughes:
The hon. Gentleman states what the public think terrorism is and I agree with him. I share his understanding of what terrorism laws should address, but that is not what the Bill says. I am happy to spend time discussing these matters with the hon. Gentleman and our Northern Ireland colleagues as they, above all, deserve our support to make sure that we get the law right. The Bill, however, deals with groups of as few as three people meeting in private. The Bill specifically also does not limit itself to the sort of activity with which, tragically, the hon. Member for Fermanagh and South Tyrone (Mr. Maginnis) and his colleagues have had to deal every day. If we are to do anything, we will have to ensure that the House and the country have legislation that can adequately deal with the sort of tragic circumstances that Northern Ireland, above all, has suffered from for so long, but without at the same time accidentally or on purpose sweeping in all sorts of other things that have nothing to do with such terrorist activity.
Mr. Corbyn:
I have been listening carefully to the hon. Gentleman. He made the point that someone could be arrested in this country under a criminal charge for speaking at a meeting if that person were deemed to be speaking in support of a terrorist organisation against a democratic regime. The problem with that is: how does one define a democratic regime? Many Governments claim an electoral mandate for their activities, yet repress human rights disgracefully. They would claim to be democratic; their opponents would not. Does he not agree that there is a serious problem? Unless we define what we are actually dealing with, we will end up proscribing people whom we do not like or agree with.
"the use of violence and intimidation in the pursuit of political aims."
Previous legislation has defined terrorism in different ways. Both the substantive Acts that are repealed by the Bill include the same phraseology. I repeat it because it is important to recognise that we are moving a long way from the present legislation. According to the Prevention of Terrorism (Temporary Provisions) Act 1989 and the Northern Ireland (Emergency Provisions) Act 1998, terrorism:
"Means the use of violence for political ends, and includes any use of violence for the purpose of putting the public, or any section of the public in fear."
The Reinsurance (Acts of Terrorism) Act 1993 describes terrorism as follows:
"Acts of persons acting on behalf of, or in connection with, any organisation which carries out activities directed towards the overthrowing or influencing, by force or violence, of Her Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom or any other government de jure or de facto."
It addresses activities aimed at the powers of the state and having political ends.
"the use of serious violence against persons or property, or the threat to use such violence, to intimidate or coerce a government, the public or any section of the public in order to promote political, social or ideological objectives."
I ask the House to reflect on whether it is right to go as far as the Government do in clause 1, which mentions "use or threat" and thereby extends the definition of terrorism. It refers to
"a political, religious or ideological cause",
serious violence against people or property and activities that not only endanger lives, but create
"risks to the health or safety of the public or a section of the public".
We should tread most carefully when extending the legislation from crimes against the state to crimes against individuals and still more carefully if we extend it further to crimes against property.
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