Examination of Witnesses (Questions 1-19)
9 NOVEMBER 2004
MR BEN
WARD, MR
LES LEVIDOW,
MR GERRY
GABLE AND
MR PAUL
DONOVAN
Q1 Chairman: Good afternoon, gentlemen,
and thank you for our invitation to give evidence. Just by way
of background, this is the first evidence session of the inquiry
by the Committee into the impact of terrorism on community relations
in this country. We did take evidence on a one-off session in
the summer on police use of stop and search powers under the terrorism
legislation. We will obviously draw on some of that session for
the forthcoming hearings, but we are very grateful to each of
you. It would be helpful for the committee and for the record
if I go to each of you in turn and you briefly introduce yourselves
for the record.
Mr Ward: My name
is Ben Ward. I am counsel in the Europe and Central Asia Division
of Human Rights Watch, and I am based here in London.
Mr Gable: I am Gerry Gable, a
publisher of Searchlight magazine. I am also a Vice-Chair
of the Independent Advisory Group to the Metropolitan Police Service,
and I have been doing this for 40-odd years.
Mr Donovan: I am Paul Donovan,
a freelance journalist. I have done work on terrorism coverage
in the media.
Mr Levidow: I am Les Levidow.
I represent the Campaign against Criminalising Communities.
Q2 Chairman: Could you say a little more
about what that campaign is?
Mr Levidow: Yes. Our campaign
was founded in response to the Terrorism Act 2000. It brings together
a range of human rights activists, lawyers, other NGOs and people
from the various migrant communities which are being targeted
and affected by the so-called anti-terror laws.
Q3 Chairman: Could I set this in context,
and I ask all the witnesses to be quite brief. It would be helpful
background to today's session if each of you in turn could give
a very brief assessment of what you feel the terrorist threat
is at the moment in this country. I know none of you are expert
witnesses on terrorism per se but it would be useful to
know what your own assessment is and that of your organisation
of the extent of the terrorist threat.
Mr Levidow: It is extremely difficult
to give an answer to this question. It is much easier to challenge
all the claims that have been made about types of terrorist threats,
and I will speak to this later.
Mr Donovan: It is a difficult
question to answer because all we really have to go on is what
has happened in foreign countries: 9/11 in 2001, obviously Bali,
the Saudi Arabian attacks and Madrid more recently. That is the
threat we are seeing outside. Nothing has actually happened here,
so it is difficult to tell what the threat is. That is part of
our problem in trying to evaluate what the threat is and whether
the measures being taken are adequate and that is why nothing
has happened here or whether they are over the top. It is difficult
to equate. There is definitely a threat, but it is very difficult
to equate what that is.
Mr Gable: I would take it in a
slightly broader way. It is about how one defines terrorism. I
think everybody thinks of terrorism today on the basis of 9/11.
I would want to include in that the David Copeland incident, which
in itself was a terrorist act.
Q4 Chairman: He was the nail bomber?
Mr Gable: Yes. I would hope you
would look at that as well as the question of extremist people
of various faiths. I would add that whilst my colleague here says
there is nothing happening here, maybe there has been a certain
level of prevention but there were British nationals involved
in at least one of the bombings overseas, and I think we have
to take cognisance of that.
Mr Ward: Firstly, obviously, I
must note that my organisation does not have access to any of
the information upon which the Government's decisions are based.
Clearly, when the Special Immigrations Appeals Commission looked
at the evidence in closed session, it was satisfied that there
was a threat. However, I would endorse very strongly the view
of the Joint Human Rights Committee that the Government should
consider ways to increase scrutiny of that evidence so that those
of us who have not had access to classified material can better
evaluate the nature of the threat and therefore better evaluate
what the appropriate response to it should be.
Q5 David Winnick: The Campaign against
Criminalising Communities, Mr Levidow, seems to question whether
there is in fact any terrorist threat at all. Can I just get quite
clear in my own mind: was 9/11 terrorism?
Mr Levidow: The claims being made
of threats of large-scale political attacks—
Q6 David Winnick: Could you answer my
question, with respect. Was 9/11 terrorism or not?
Mr Levidow: Of course it was.
We are not talking about other countries now. We are questioning
the claims being made, especially in the mass media but also from
representatives of the police, about terrorist threats in this
country, by which I assume they mean threats of systematic violence
against the public. That is what we question.
Q7 David Winnick: Mr Levidow, if I can,
with respect, because obviously whatever goes on abroad in our
view, the view of the House of Commons collectively, whatever
other views we take on the subject, has some impact or possible
impact on the United Kingdom. Was 9/11 an act of terrorism?
Mr Levidow: Of course.
Q8 David Winnick: You agree it was?
Mr Levidow: Of course.
Q9 David Winnick: Was what happened in
Istanbul an act of terrorism?
Mr Levidow: Of course.
Q10 David Winnick: In Madrid?
Mr Levidow: Of course, we do not
dispute that. We dispute the claims being made about the threat.
Q11 David Winnick: Do you dispute the
remarks yesterday by the Head of MI5 who said that we should not
take in any way lightly the threat of a terrorist attack on this
country, remarks which have been made persistently by Ministers
and other senior officials, police chiefs, since 9/11? Do you
believe there is a terrorist threat to the United Kingdom?
Mr Levidow: It is impossible to
know but it is possible also to challenge, as we have done, the
various claims being made. Can I speak in some detail on this
now? I did prepare a statement in reply to the questions that
were helpfully provided to us. The letter announcing this whole
inquiry asks the question whether terrorist threats harm community
relations. Our view is that the main harm to community relations
comes from the so-called anti-terror laws and their use. The problem
starts from the exaggeration and fabrication of terrorist threats,
including the mass media. I suggest you read the statement by
Martin Bright of the Observer, which we included in the
submission that we gave to the Privy Council a year ago.[1]
From first-hand experience, he reveals the Government's mass media
strategy, which was one of your other questions to us. Namely,
MI5 circulates disinformation about threats or even specific accusations
against individuals who are being arrested by labelling them as
an Al-Qaeda cell. Then the journalists publish the information
because they do not know what else to do with it, but implying
that they had investigated the matter and had found out this information.
Newspapers have not been charged with contempt of court for this
character assassination as they normally would be in other types
of cases. Then the Government cites the mass media reports as
evidence of a terrorist threat and as evidence of public concern,
which the Government itself has encouraged. I will just give you
a couple of examples. I am coming on to the question of evidence.
Here are just two of many examples. "Terror gas attack foiled.
Deadly chemicals were targeted at the tube in Gatwick". That
was from the Evening Standard (6 April 2004). In the Daily
Mail (24 January 2004): "London time bomb plant, five
held. Al-Qaeda suspects had enough explosives to kill hundreds".
There are numerous mass media reports like this about specific
individuals who are arrested, but then what happens? Often the
charges are withdrawn, and that is not reported, and there is
an enormous gap between these reports and prosecutions.
Chairman: Mr Levidow, I need to chair
the meeting and give other witnesses a chance to continue. You
have made your point, I think. I will let Mr Winnick come back
on this.
Q12 David Winnick: I have one last question,
Mr Levidow, in this section. Do you accept in any way that those
who are responsible for 9/11, for what happened in Bali, Madrid
and Istanbul, if they could, in your view, would commit the same
terrorist atrocities in the United Kingdom?
Mr Levidow: Of course that is
possible but let me emphasise that there is an enormous gap between
all these claims and prosecution evidence in court.[2]
David Winnick: We will take that as a
yes.
Q13 Chairman: As a committee, I hope
we will have a great deal of opportunity to look at some of those
more specific points. I would like to pursue some of the issues
that come out of that exchange with other witnesses. To each of
the other witnesses, could I ask you this question: do you think
that there has been a deleterious effect on social cohesion since
9/11, Bali, Madrid and the sense of a heightened international
terrorist threat? Do you think community cohesion has got worse?
Mr Donovan: I think particularly
the Muslim community feels that it has been targeted by some of
the tactics that have been used since 9/11 to prevent terrorism.
Q14 Chairman: Can I ask you what the
evidence is for that?
Mr Donovan: The stop and search
figures are one example.
Q15 Chairman: We will obviously be taking
evidence in due course from Muslim organisations. You have said
that the Muslim community feels certain things. I just ask what
the evidence is for those feelings.
Mr Donovan: That has just come
from my speaking to people in the East London area in particular.
Q16 Chairman: Mr Gable, do you think
it has got worse?
Mr Gable: I think a number of
things come together here. Yes, social cohesion has been seriously
damaged, but again, going back on to my hobbyhorse, if you look
at what has happened in this country in the last four years, you
have had serious racial disturbances in the north-west and other
parts of the country. Evidence in the trials of BNP and Combat
18 supporters after Oldham and Burnley was absolutely conclusive,
and the evidence is not hearsay, this is in a court of law, that
they had instigated those riots, tearing up the social fabric
of those cities and towns by using Muslims as a scapegoat in almost
every situation you come across. I have seen in local council
elections BNP leaflets with pictures of a mosque on them saying,
"This is the terrorist centre in your community. Why do they
have CCTV cameras? It is because they are looking at you because
you are their next targets" and no action has been taken
on some of this material. Having said that, and I have had an
interest in stop and search for well over 20 years, there are
a number of things. There is the way, overall, you look at stop
and search. Is it a good tool for the police or is it not a good
tool for the police? My belief is that, properly used with intelligence
and intelligence-led policing and the officers going out to do
that job in the streets, it can be of value. The other point is
that all Asian communities have been suffering from stop and search
since 9/11 and the anti-terrorist laws because often policemen
cannot tell one Asian person from another, whether they be Muslim,
Hindu or Sikh. The final point is that I would say the police
should be using that power in this situation—
Q17 Chairman: I am trying to avoid us
getting too far on to that but we get the general point you make.
Mr Ward, what is your view about whether there has been deterioration
and why?
Mr Ward: Plainly there has. In
terms of pointing specifically to evidence of it, in the briefing
paper that I submitted to the committee on behalf of Human Rights
Watch, there are references to statements by the Muslim Council
for Great Britain, the Commission for Racial Equality, Islamic
Human Rights Commission, and indeed the Newton Committee, all
indicating disquiet in the Muslim community as a consequence of
counter-terrorism and in particular as a consequence of the indefinite
detention of foreign terrorism suspects.
Q18 Chairman: Can I ask each of you to
respond to this last question from me very briefly. Listening
to the four of you together, there is a range of views but everybody
is agreed there is some deterioration in community cohesion. There
is a range of views about the extent to which that stems primarily
or entirely from what the Government and the police have done
to Mr Gable's view that we have to take into account other people
in the community who may be exploiting the situation. Can I ask
each of you where you would put the balance of responsibility
and to what extent you regard it as entirely the responsibility
of Government and the police and to what extent we should be focused
on the role of other agencies, the media as Mr Levidow referred
to it, and so on? Mr Ward, I will start with you.
Mr Ward: As an international human
rights organisation, we are necessarily concerned with the compliance
with governments and with their obligations under human rights
law, so that is our focus. We simply have not looked at the views
of communities and what they may be. It may well be that they
are equally problematic. However, our view is that when we look
at the issue of counter-terrorism measures on behalf of the Government,
they plainly have contributed negatively to community relations.
Q19 Chairman: Mr Gable, is there anything
you would like to add to what you have said before?
Mr Gable: I think Government,
and much more so the media, has a very bad role in all of this.
There has been some media reaction on legislation and the consequences
in terms of social cohesion that have often not been thought through.
There is also a huge amount of speculation and hearsay around
in Muslim communities. I see this through my work with the Independent
Advisory Group. People come to us with stories about attacks on
Muslims. Obviously, we take them seriously. A reasonable amount
of the time, those stories turn out to be rumour and not true
at all. I have given the committee some background stuff we have
published about attacks that we do know have happened, and they
are very serious attacks.
Mr Donovan: I think the Government
and the policing authorities have played a big role in this. I
also think the media have played quite an irresponsible role in
many cases in fanning the whole thing along. One thing I would
like to say is that I think we really need to recognise what we
have in this country, which is very precious, and that is racial
harmony. It is really something to hang on to and we should be
very careful before we damage it.
Chairman: Mr Levidow, you had a fair
crack. I am going to move on to the next questions. I am sure
you will have plenty of opportunity to come in.
1 Note by witness: Campaign Against Criminalising
Communities (CAMPACC), "Terrorising Minority Communities
with `Anti-Terrorism' Powers: their Use and Abuse", Submission
to the Privy Council Review of the Anti-Terrorism Crime and Security
Act 2001, September 2003, Appendix V by Martin Bright, http://www.cacc.org.uk/ATCSA-consult-final.pdf Back
2
Note by witness: See report by the Institute of
Race Relations, "New study highlights discrimination in
use of anti-terror laws", http://www.irr.org.uk/2004/september/ak000004.html Back
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