Examination of Witnesses (Questions 1200
- 1219)
TUESDAY 7 MAY 2002
ASSISTANT COMMISSIONER
DAVID VENESS,
CBE, AND DEPUTY
CHIEF CONSTABLE
ALAN GOLDSMITH
Chairman
1200. If I could follow up on that. In the 19th
century almost all urban centres had military units deployed nearby,
much more I suspect for internal security than the threat from
Napoleon or his successors. We do not really have that now. The
army, much of it, is deployed abroad. The TA footprint is being
very sharply reduced. When we have spoken to people earlier in
our inquiry people see the military coming as a bonus that they
cannot count upon and if they do count upon them then there is
a problem of whether they will have to pay for them. In the House
of Commons at the moment they are debating the Police Reform Bill.
Now we have within that the concept we have already of support
for the police, which the Police Federation does not really like,
and we have private security held up to now in pretty low repute
but about to be reformed as a result of regulation. When we spoke
to Mr Veness in New Scotland Yard he spoke about relationships
between the police and the business community who do an enormous
amount to protect themselves. Could you comment on where you see
the non state sector is in response to a medium level or major
catastrophe? There are not enough soldiers around or TA personnel
that you would need to seal off a city with so many roads leaving
that city. In your thinking—maybe I could ask Mr Veness
also this question—how do you think you could incorporate
these police auxiliaries, community safety personnel, a competent
section of the private security industry, the business community
who are amongst the biggest hirers of private security? Is there
any room for these in your emergency planning disaster recovery
preparations?
(Mr Goldsmith) Certainly the creation of community
support officers will provide more resources. Basically what we
are looking for there are bodies to carry out pretty much low
tech tasks such as securing areas. If one thinks of the bomb in
Manchester where, again, a large portion of the city centre was
cordoned off then that was managed quite effectively. The use
of the military would be seen as a bonus. Less than a hundred
years ago they were deployed in Lincoln for that purpose but caused
more of a problem than they were there to deal with.
1201. And Manchester with the Peterloo massacre,
so there is a history.
(Mr Goldsmith) Peterloo, exactly the same. One must
learn from history. However, we have good relationships with the
military and in an event of any magnitude, major disaster, one
looks to the military to try to incorporate them and say what
skills do we have or is there a gap that we need to fill and can
the military provide that? It might be in terms of civil engineering,
it might be in terms of amphibious craft in flooding or it could
be in terms of cordons, and there were examples used at Lockerbie
and others so that is there. The creation of a larger Territorial
Army purely for that purpose is perhaps not recognising what we
need and not necessarily trained soldiers, airmen or sailors but
individuals who one can call upon when they are needed. There
are a number of civilian support organisations at the moment.
If one thinks of national parks and their wardens, there are some
wardens along the Wash, the Norfolk/Lincolnshire area, they are
the sort of people that in our force plans and other force plans
one has contacts for to use for their skills. The other issue
in terms of territorial, if there is an event in a city or town
a large number of those territorial soldiers would be engaged
in their normal day to day activity, for example Territorial Royal
Army Medical Corps, actually the nurses and doctors in the hospitals,
one has to say then "Do we need them in a Territorial Army
Medical Unit or in the hospital". I do not think it is an
issue where there is an easy answer other than to say in the event
of an incident of anywhere near this scale one looks to use whatever
resources are available however they can best be used to meet
the need.
1202. The planning would be there so people
might know in advance they would be called upon as opposed to
it arising and having to put an announcement on the television.
(Mr Goldsmith) That is right. One might know who one
would call but in terms of day to day availability I would guess
it would be a pretty impossible task to keep that up to date for
every individual that one might wish to call out.
1203. Mr Veness?
(Mr Veness) I agree with everything Alan says. It
is possible also to try and broaden the focus. In terms of the
military per se they are absolutely invaluable partners
in counter-terrorism. British counter-terrorism is indispensably
supportive. I can think of three key areas which I would describe
as designated counter-terrorism in terms of EOD support, bomb
disposal, in terms of the support for search operations and special
forces giving a capability which is beyond that which can be provided
by any UK police force. I think that is the designated area of
counter-terrorism where the military role is absolutely critical.
I think you have a label Alan was describing which is almost in
the dire need category where if a sudden catastrophe emerges the
military is available then with whatever available assets they
can muster and be as ever disposed to assist, and I am sure that
will happen. There is then the rather more complicated issue,
which you were referring to Chairman, of how do we go around counter-terrorist
reinforcement. One can imagine a variety of scenarios. If we need
to evacuate a city, if we had a massive scene or if, for example,
there was a threat which required us to protect a sector of British
industry which is pretty geographically spread, for example, power,
how would we go about that? We have not got a gendarmerie. We
have not got a third force. We have none of those other issues,
a national guard. There is a real opportunity to develop here
this discussion. My batting order would be somewhere like the
special constabulary is a very obvious first port, they are already
a part of British policing and are readily available and aligned
with what we do everyday. Then I would turn to the private security
industry if only because if one looks at sectors of major cities
there are areas which are effectively and certainly numerically
policed by private security. If we were to travel to Canary Wharf
we would see somewhere in the region of four to one of the ratio
of private security which is working to very beneficial effect
there as opposed to sworn police officers. We are seeking to develop
with the security industry representatives ways in which that
could be developed. We have had a very encouraging response. It
is corporate citizenship and there is a sense of provided this
is on a relatively defined role but I think there is more to be
proven in that task. There is then the role of the police auxiliary
within London. We are looking to implement those. One of those
purposes would be counter-terrorism because we are otherwise short
of numbers. The alternative is to pull a police officer away from
dealing with a burglary, preventing street robbery and stopping
car crime but the public, very understandably, have a view around
that. Then I think you are into what might the volunteer reserve
contribute but I think we need to have a very specified thought
in mind: building upon the best of the local volunteering spirit
which is much to be commended but in a way that does not relegate
people to be merely static guards for protracted periods which
do not appear to have a beginning, middle or end, I do not think
that would be a valued role. It is finding within that raft and
then you have got what I describe as the others, which is not
unkind, it is all of the charitable otherwise non governmental
sector who might be bought. I think the useful discussion is around
a broader concept of counter-terrorist reinforcement in which
context the volunteer reserve undoubtedly would play a key role.
I think the equation between no third force therefore a volunteer
reserve is actually out of kilter with the way the resources are
currently deployed within British structures.
1204. I presume there is no problem in deploying
large numbers of policemen from other police areas? I remember
a threat in the early 1980s arising in my constituency, two bus
loads of coppers from Port Talbot drove around the town which
certainly had a deterrent effect on the criminals. I presume there
are clearly exercised and written procedures for large numbers
of policemen from neighbouring authorities moving in?
(Mr Goldsmith) Yes, there are indeed. We established
a National Information Intelligence Co-ordinating Centre which
enables forces to share resources so that every morning if that
room is open somewhere like Lincolnshire would phone in to say
we have two police support units available that day or for the
following week and then they are redeployed to wherever the need
is.
Syd Rapson
1205. One of your briefs we had earlier talked
about you considering resources to assist the police in emergencies
both before and after terrorist incidents as such, maybe that
is to do with the civil side, and you have been explaining most
of the resources required. How is the police service actually
coping at the moment with the responsibility of increased anti-terrorism
activity and doing their normal policing? There must be some pressures
at the moment building up with numbers. How are they doing at
the moment?
(Mr Veness) We are in danger of doing both jobs less
professionally than we might, Sir. We need to continue to respond
to all of the concerns that the public very properly expects of
its police service. The classic demands that I have described
are in relation to street robbery, burglary but it applies also
to missing children and other offences where we need to be alert
and responsive in an extremely professional way to public expectations.
That is what we want to do and we want to do that job professionally.
I think almost the last eight months have given us a role which
has required an equal degree of sustained and reinforced professionalism
which is around the new dimension of internal security. I think
British policing is now faced with two very important roles and,
to be candid, we have been resourced in order to perform one of
those truly professionally. How has British policing coped over
the last X number of years? Well, it has moved backwards and forwards
between these various functions. We have moved people to do the
jobs in these respective roles. I do not think—and many
colleagues would agree—that the new world challenge that
we face provides us with any alternative but to seek to do both
those functions as professionally as we can achieve and on a long
term basis. That has been at the heart of the arguments that we
have been making in relation to resourcing for the security resources.
1206. Whilst we respect the professionalism
of the police service, and I think we all do that, there must
come a time when the fear and the danger that was aroused out
of this September attack is starting to die down a bit and the
police officers are starting to think "I am not going to
do two jobs now and get paid for one". I know they are not
doing it on a scale of money but they are putting themselves out
to an nth degree because of security and trusting their loyalty.
Is there a point in time when they will get to the point of saying
"Enough is enough".
(Mr Veness) Yes. The number of occasions that we have
had to get through in the last eight months to cancel leave, not
only holidays but the two days off a week that an officer is entitled
to, on a very, very regular basis indeed, that is unacceptable
even in the short term. It is no way to run professional security
for the United Kingdom. It is on that basis that we are suggesting
that to deliver a service that is effective for the public we
need to think very carefully about the long term resourcing of
both overt and covert counter-terrorist activity.
Mr Cran
1207. Gentlemen, we live in an open society
and of course that is a huge strength to us but it is also a weakness—I
suspect you would have to agree—in terms of combatting terrorism.
Therefore, against that background I am bound to say when I have
been in my own constituency I have just conceptually thought to
myself "What in this area is a possible target?" and
I have concluded what I have concluded, and I will not outline
what it is. It does raise a question of whether there have been
any assessments made nationally or regionally of possible targets
in the United Kingdom? One has to take the view that they might
not necessarily be only static installations, they could also
be moveable ones.
(Mr Veness) Yes.
1208. What assessment has been made?
(Mr Veness) The point is entirely pertinent. The issue
around people, locations and events has been one of the key areas
of review. Put bluntly, are the arrangements that are the results
of 30 years' experience of combatting terrorism on a different
scale, are they fit for purpose for these new dimensions of activity?
For example, do they defend against the suicide bomb? Do they
defend against a simultaneous attack delivered with great ruthlessness
on a particular day? Do they take account of the symbolic and
the significant which clearly 11 September targets were and the
apparent desire to cause ruthlessly mass death at the same time?
We do not only need to concentrate on the people, locations and
events but if one looks at the track record of al-Qaeda there
is also a history of the attacks being distinct and innovative
so it is not necessarily what it was last time. That picture is
even more complicated if I can revert to the pyramid that we were
describing in terms of the three tiers of threat. I think that
means that all of the other methods are there as well: the gun,
the bomb, kidnapping, hostage taking, aircraft hijacking, all
of those threats remain because they are within the competence
of those groups. One could imagine ways in which they could achieve
symbolic impact by a combination of events which would not necessarily
be as deadly as 11 September but nevertheless would bring their
intentions to notice. I think we have got not only all of the
problems of the new scale of terrorism but we have not lost the
problems that we already had. Put those two together and there
is a very real task around when one can concentrate on the immobile
target, looking at venues which maybe not in the past would have
been regarded as absolutely critical to the national infrastructure
but now are both important and vulnerable and, question mark,
what are we doing around the security of those locations? Undoubtedly
that will be continuing work. A great deal has gone on and a great
deal of analysis, as you would expect, beginning at the top tier.
The scale of protective security which will now be necessary around
the United Kingdom across a range of vulnerable industries, vulnerable
sites and indeed the movement of material between those sites
again is on a scale that we were not envisaging nearly eight months
ago.
1209. Just so I understand this. You are indicating
clearly to the Committee that a great deal of work has and is
being done.
(Mr Veness) Yes.
1210. Would you specifically say to me that
there is a list of highly sensitive targets that is in the ownership
of whoever in the United Kingdom now?
(Mr Veness) We are continuing a review. As you would
predict there has always been such a list in relation to those
venues without which the United Kingdom cannot enjoy continuity
of business in the commercial sense, those which are absolutely
critical to the national infrastructure. What has occurred in
the last nearly eight months has been a very significant extension
beyond those venues which could be regarded as absolutely vital
to national continuity but which are clearly potentially symbolic,
significant, vital sites which meet the criteria in one form or
another. That list not only exists but sadly is expanding hourly
and daily as the work goes on. The list of itself only has merit
if we then put in place advisory mechanisms, preventative and
defence mechanisms which reduce the vulnerability of those targets.
Clearly that work is and needs to be pursued. I would not pretend
that it is painting the Forth Bridge but it is a very significant
extra dimension of business both for policing and a whole range
of other agencies and indeed the impact it will have on commerce.
1211. I am grateful for that. Moving on. The
Committee will produce its report in the fullness of time and
it has got to be a realistic report, of course. One of the things
which concerns us is how the United Kingdom could deal with well
prepared, sustained and maybe even multiple attacks on our infrastructure.
How well prepared are we?
(Mr Veness) Alan may wish to comment.
(Mr Goldsmith) Yes. This is where work is going on
in the UK Resilience and London Resilience Committees under the
CCS structure because it is about how we keep vital resources,
vital industries working. I think it is fair to say that a lot
of work has been done, a lot of gaps identified and gaps are being
filled. That is a continuing process as David mentioned previously.
Very difficult, I suggest, whether one puts a percentage figure
or whatever else, what sort of answer you are looking for there.
The best I would offer is that being aware of the issues and the
difficulties and of national resilience then a lot of work is
underway at the moment. I think to identify specific areas of
concern is perhaps not a role here in a public forum. I think
the important thing is that work through the CCS is continuing
quickly on that together with co-operation from across the piece.
1212. Perhaps what you could say is that our
ability to respond is—one could use any collection of words
one wanted to—infinitely better now than it was pre—11
September? Could you say that?
(Mr Goldsmith) It is far better than it was pre—11
September because we have changed now the planning assumption.
Therefore having changed the planning assumption, particularly
in terms of scale, we are working towards meeting that. The difficulty
I guess comes if I say I am confident that we can meet something
of the scale of 11 September, the next incident might be three
times that size involving far more and different risks and I think
that is a difficult area that we get into. Certainly compared
with the situation pre- 11 September then the emergency services,
local authorities, central Government departments are far more
focused and far more able to respond both in terms of dealing
with the risk and also the consequences of an event where having
thought through and tested some of the assumptions which follow
then we are in a better place both in terms of individual awareness
and training but also in terms of equipment to deal with something
of that nature.
1213. My last question, Chairman, is simply
this. The likelihood is that if one wanted to do what al-Qaeda
did to the West on 11 September, you can do the same thing. So
it could be quite easy to destabilise a capitalist society, of
course, by attacking business, the City and so on and, indeed,
we have seen a bit of that in the City of London already. Therefore
presumably what you could do is interfere with information technology
and all the rest of it. Does this come within your thinking?
(Mr Veness) Yes. There are 12 areas, and I think I
have shared them in a note to the Committee, which we have identified
as what we describe as the long term review themes. They are the
agenda, the template which we think is an enduring checklist that
we need to be examining every day to make sure that we are making
progress against not only what are the obvious changed dimensions
of the threat but the way in which we, the authorities, are collectively
responding to that. Clearly included in those is the terrorist
both use and abuse of IT because they are doing both. They are
using IT as an innovative communications and logistics mechanism
and indeed a financial movement mechanism in a global sense. They
are gaining the benefits of IT. They are potentially abusing IT
in using it as a target, as a means of impacting on our own economic
systems, our own communications systems. We are very alert to
both those dimensions of this form of terrorism. Al-Qaeda has
demonstrated, certainly, innovative application in the use and
we are looking very carefully at both that group and others in
relation to attack abuse.
Mr Cran: I must read my papers more carefully
next time.
Jim Knight
1214. In recent months we have seen two major
robberies at Heathrow in five weeks. We are seeing British Airways
Security and British Airports Authority we are meeting tomorrow.
We have another session with representatives from the private
security industry partly in response to issues around airport
and airline security. I note comments which may or may not have
been made by you expressing concern, and I am sure there is concern,
about those robberies and about the past regime and CCTV as well.
Can you talk us through a little bit your concern about airport
security?
(Mr Veness) Yes. It would be foolish indeed, given
the precise nature of the attacks on 11 September, if one did
not focus on transport security—land, sea and air—as
a critical issue. That is very obviously a recurrent threat and
it is a means also by which aircraft have been used as missiles
in order to cause mass casualties. Clearly it has to be at the
top of everybody's agenda. I think we start from a position in
the United Kingdom where we have some very significant assets
and a great deal of energy and goodwill which I think stands well
by a great many international comparisons. The Department of Transport,
the TRANSEC arrangements, the goodwill and the commitment of the
British Airports Authority and all the airlines and a great many
people who make up the aviation community. We are lucky indeed
in the United Kingdom and I think the track record back to the
Aviation Security Act, the lessons learnt and applied after the
tragedy of Lockerbie have put us in a significantly beneficial
position. I think one needs to give credit to all of those agencies
who are engaged. Despite what the media might have reported I
am an unequivocal supporter and value everything that is done
in that regard. But, could we try harder, could we do more, yes.
If we look hard at the position which prevails post 11 September,
I think we need to look with a different scale of threat in mind.
I for one am relatively contemptuous of the distinction between
ordinary crime and terrorist crime because I fear that where a
thief goes so could a terrorist go. If it is possible to move
cocaine and if it is possible to move a smuggled human being then
I fear that route could well be exploited by those who have political
crime in mind as well as felonious outcome in their motivation.
I think one needs to be careful about drawing a distinction between
those. Where are the practical areas of difficulty? I think we
do need to look very carefully at what we have achieved in terms
of CCTV coverage at the whole of the airport. They will have arisen
for different reasons because we have got different control agencies
with different priorities. The priority now is to stop mass murder
so we must look at each and every camera deployment and ask "Does
it achieve that objective?" If it does that then it could
be doing smuggling and other things as well, I make the case simply.
CCTV is one area. Another area is around he or she who has access
to the airside restricted zones. I think there is a great deal
more we could be doing and are now doing in relation to ensuring
that only those who genuinely need the passes and are vetted in
the sense that they pass their employee's references, they are
vetted in terms of criminal record and they are subject to review
by their companies, only those individuals should have the privilege
of airside access. Then there are issues around the restricted
zone. Is it wise in this sort of world that we only have one restricted
zone to which once you have gained access you then are able to
move airside—that is not the totality of the position—or
should we be moving to a more rigorous security regime whereby
we subdivide the restricted zone? I think there are those and
a raft of other questions. I think there is also a foundation
question in that given that aviation security has arisen for a
variety of reasons with the partnerships that I have described,
with great credit remaining to all of those contributing agencies,
have we got our roles and responsibilities sharp enough for this
particular threat? Do we use the police service in the wisest
possible way? At airports, for example, it has traditionally been
the role of the police service to be engaged in landside security.
When one looks at the horrors of airport attacks in Israel over
the years, Vienna, Lod, that is where people were mown down before
they had gone through to airside. There is understandable concern
with landside before one has embarked security. Is there now not
a case—and I think there is—to be looking much more
critically at the static aircraft which has yet to receive passengers,
indeed what are the security arrangements which might involve
in a more overt sense the police service airside? Now there are
difficulties there because that is an operating environment. It
is subject to very proper regimes and one needs to fit in with
that. I think all of those issues and how we work together as
the contributing team which enhances aviation security, I think
we owe it to ourselves to look at what we are doing almost with
a clean sheet of paper and say "Well, fine, this worked and
is as good as a great many other countries but let us be ruthlessly
honest with ourselves because the price of us getting this wrong
is a plane load of people who may be at greater risk than they
need to be" and nobody from any agency wants that to happen.
I am suggesting a rigorous debate. To be absolutely fair there
is unanimity that is the wise course ahead and that has been vigorously
seized by the Home Secretary and the Secretary of State for the
Department of Transport and the Regions and that is now a debate
within Government as to how that is going to go ahead so I am
very encouraged by that.
1215. Good. We have had evidence from Mr Ian
Devlin of TRANSEC and from what you have said I am interested
in the extent to which your voice is heard by TRANSEC and others.
Clearly in airport security there is a balance between some of
the commercial considerations, if they have got CCTV guarding
property, if there is a check for scissors one side of the barrier
and then there is a Boots selling scissors the other side, there
are commercial considerations and I am interested that your pure
security anti-terrorist voice is properly heard and I am glad
you have some confidence in TRANSEC here.
(Mr Veness) Yes. Credit where it is due. TRANSEC was
an innovative approach to a very significant set of challenges
and it has moved Britain on both nationally and internationally
to a level of screening of baggage which nobody is pretending
is perfect but nevertheless is commendable in international comparative
terms. I think we can do well to look at some of the regimes which
apply not too distant. It is easy to be ruthlessly critical of
ourselves, and we should not be complacent, but in terms of international
comparators of aviation security we should recognise where Britain
fits into the league table. That all being said, I do welcome
the fact that despite the fact there will be tensions inevitably
in the relationship between a regulator, the airlines, the need
to run a business at profit—and I recognise and respect
that—and we are providing part of the security package,
I sense genuinely a renewed candour in the willingness to be open
to new solutions there and I am keen to encourage that.
Chairman
1216. It is not just Heathrow and Gatwick, I
assume your remit stretches even beyond British Airports Authority?
(Mr Veness) Indeed. Talking in terms of the national
role of ACPO and at the heart of that is going to be a debate
about where designation goes because at the moment that is the
key to paid police presence.
Jim Knight
1217. Finally, what role do you think profiling
can play in the security of airports and elsewhere?
(Mr Veness) It is very important and there are innovative
examples which Americans, and particularly our Israeli colleagues,
apply with very great vigour. I think profiling is an asset. It
needs to be constantly updated and adaptable because a great many
lessons of suicide bombing, talking to colleagues where this is
occurring, the profile has moved pretty significantly in terms
of those one would expect to be occupying the role of a suicide
bomber. Profiling is a beneficial tool but it is one component
of a security regime and it is likely to be one which needs to
be rapidly modified under circumstances. Like many crime prevention
aspects it is part of the toolbox, it is not a solution that delivers
on its own.
Syd Rapson
1218. It is clearly a serious business. The
last people you would want around you, I suspect, are politicians
who are completely useless except for one facet and that is formulating
law and legislation to assist you to do your job better We had
a go with the Terrorism Act 2000 and then we extended it with
the Anti-Terrorism Crime and Security 2001 and gave our MoD police
officers a bit more freedom to operate in that way. How has the
situation changed with the passing of these two particular pieces
of legislation?
(Mr Veness) They both have been important and, indeed,
they are essential given the nature of the challenge that we confront.
We were very privileged to be very closely involved in the debate
around which provisions might be considered. Clearly we can only
contribute a view but it is gratifying that view is seriously
taken on board. That was true for the Terrorism Act 2000 which,
for example, provides the proscription powers. When one looks
at the threat we now face, provided that is applied judiciously,
for example the group al-Qaeda is a proscribed group within the
list that the Home Secretary has determined. I think proscription,
I think, is a very valuable tool. Of course, the 2000 Act was
very much a consolidation of acts that had gone before and some
of the provisions in there, for example a wide ranging, by comparison,
power of arrest for terrorism and the ability for us to make application
for extended periods of detention, those are absolutely vital
provisions. Unless we have the opportunity to engage in the sort
of detailed search for evidence that is necessary in terrorist
cases, literally tiny flakes and tiny pieces of devices, we would
not be able to successfully bring cases to prosecution. If one
turns to the Anti-terrorism Crime and Security Act enacted just
before Christmas, the critical provisions relate to the designation
of international terrorists, which is an immigration matter, not
a police matter, and also the issues around financial investigations
because there were some very significant provisions made in terms
of financial attack on terrorism. The work which has been spearheaded
by the Chancellor of the Exchequer in this regard and the support
that there is from the financial institutions of Great Britain,
not only here but internationally, has been a very powerful lever
against terrorism. I merely cite those as examples but it has
enabled us to make a dent and continue to be proactive in relation
to terrorism in a way that would otherwise not have been possible.
1219. It might be a reflection of the political
debate we had about whether it was good or bad but people's expectations
were raised and the legislation was passed and we all expected
the next day a number of people to be rounded up, or at least
some in the Liberal Democrat Party and others. There does not
appear to be a response to the use of the powers. Is there a problem
in the constraints that are now imposed with the legislation and
you have not got that wide freedom that you thought you might
have had? It appears although they are there, and you have recognised
that has been a great asset and you can call upon them, etc.,
there does not appear to have been a move suddenly to do something
and make a difference.
(Mr Veness) There has been a difference. There has
not been a Casablanca moment and we have not rounded up the usual
suspects, I think that would be utterly the wrong thing to do
and if we did do something like that I think we would abandon
community support and deserve to abandon community support on
the day that we did it. There has been application of these powers,
notably in relation to the designation of international terrorists
and, as I say, that is a Home Office lead. There has also been
application in relation to terrorism in the financial attack sense
and there has been application of the proscription powers as well.
We need to be driven by accurate intelligence and clearly we are
in the process of formulating that ever more vigorously and we
will take ahead both arrests and prosecutions as soon as those
cases are compelling and we can place those before the court.
Counter-terrorism is sometimes a strange body to assess almost
by performance measures and league tables because it is very much
what one has been able to stop. An arrest which may not have led
to a prosecution or an examination at port or by seizing money
may well have interdicted an attack. In fact, that certainly is
the case more regularly than is known within the public domain.
That, to me, is the performance measure of effective counter-terrorism:
are we preventing loss of life within the United Kingdom and of
British and other citizens elsewhere and are we applying the powers
effectively? I think we are. I agree with you, I think one looks
forward to a period when with due balance we are applying the
powers ever more robustly.
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