The House of Commons, the lower, elected house of the UK Parliament, voted 315 to 306 in support of proposals to give a government minister the power to extend from 28 to 42 days the period for which people suspected of involvement in terrorism can be detained by the police in the UK without being charged with any offence.

Before the vote took place, Liberty, the UK-based human rights group, accused the government of exaggerating claims of the need for an extension to 42 days.
Former Lib Dem leader Sir Menzies warned “Once freedoms of this kind … are removed or diminished, they are not easily recovered.”
The parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights called the 42-day detention plan “fundamentally flawed” and warned that it violates the European Convention on Human Rights.

After the vote, veteran former Labour MP Tony Benn said: “I never thought I would be in the House of Commons on the day Magna Carta was repealed”, adding he hoped it would be overturned in the House of Lords.

The legislation now goes to the House of Lords to be debated there, the fight over 42 days – despite the MPs’ vote in favour – is far from finished.

Amnesty International is renewing its call to the UK government to listen to the large number of MPs who voted against this dangerous and ill-conceived measure, and to the wide range of experts who have expressed the most pressing concerns about it, and to abandon it once and for all.

“Instead of allowing people to be held for longer and longer without being charged, the UK government should be committing itself to a root-and-branch review of all counter-terrorism legislation in the UK, with the aim of bringing it into line with basic international human rights standards – standards which protect the rights of individuals, including the right to be treated fairly and the right not to be detained arbitrarily for a prolonged period of time,” Amnesty International said.

“The idea that countering terrorism somehow requires removing or eroding basic guarantees of individual liberty and physical safety is a dangerous and discredited one; the government should reject it once and for all,” Amnesty International said.

The power to detain terrorism suspects for up to six weeks without charge violates the fundamental right to liberty and risks undermining counter-terrorism efforts, Human Rights Watch said today.
Link to Liberty
Link to Amnesty
Link to HRW