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I also remind the House that the use of confessional evidence, which is the basis of the Prevention of Terrorism Act, has led to the imprisonment of the Birmingham Six, who have now served almost 16 years in British prisons. I have visited them in prison several times...My experience of the Prevention of Terrorism Act is that it has nothing to do with the prevention of terrorism and everything to do with policing and patrolling the Irish community in this country. I have lost count of the number of occasions that I have had telephone calls late at night from Irish people who live in my constituency, who were expecting a son, a daughter, an uncle, an aunt or a father to come across to visit them from Dublin or from Belfast, but who find that they have not arrived. They ask me, "Do you know where they are?" I have no idea where they are. We then start an amazing series of telephone calls to find out whether someone is being held under the Act. A Kafka-like mystery surrounds it and it is not clear whether that person is being held until lawyers make contact and eventually application is made for a writ of habeas corpus. (en) |
