Proposals are once again being considered to increase the UK's already-egregious limit on detention without charge, using the Backgammon method. This little-known technique simply involves doubling whenever you think you can get away with it... from 7 to 14, from 14 to 28, and now potentially from 28 to 56.
A comparative analysis of other countries' policies, carried out by the Foreign Office in 2005 at Jack Straw's request, revealed little beyond the extent to which the UK's 28-day limit already outstripped that of any of the democracies examined. Nothing has changed since, in that regard. We could always adopt the approach of Myanmar and simply "not call it detention".
Of the six people who have so far been held for the maximum, three have then been released without charge. I wonder what the effect is on someone's employment prospects, mortgage/credit status and social life of having been held without charge for a month. The presumption of innocence must lead us to conclude that they have been significantly punished 'on suspicion'. I admit, hindsight is always pellucid, but one has to wonder what kind of restitution can or should be made in cases like that.
In other news: IATA has criticised the current security screening policy at UK airports, under which passengers must take only one item into the security check area. (And it must not contain any liquids or gels in quantities greater than 100ml, and those must be in a single separate re-sealable clear plastic bag, which must be taken out of the hand luggage for scanning, and so on).
In one sense this requirement is farcical. If I have a bomb in one piece of hand-luggage, it will still be there if I cram all my other carry-on items into the same bag. In another sense, it is simply frustratingly, unnecessarily bureaucratic. I have seen people reduced to tears because they have been told that they must either jam things like handbags, carrier bags and so on into an already full piece of hand-luggage or simply leave their possessions behind. Not that long ago, the carry-on allowance included the proper accoutrements of any lady (one item plus handbag or vanity case, parasol etc.) or gentleman (one item plus binoculars, umbrella or walking stick, briefcase, etc.). Those days, alas, seem as long gone as button-hooks and spats.
Bear in mind that all this happens after the passenger has already checked in and contributed their hold baggage to the luggage mountain. The baggage-retrieval system they've got at Heathrow* has already gone into crisis twice this year: this was the situation in January, and this is the picture six months later.
*Which so worried Monty Python's Terry Jones that he wrote a song about it...
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Posted by Graham on August 02, 2007 at 03:29 PM GMT+00:00 #
Isn't it far more likely that the 'operational' data which the counter-terrorist forces need would typically be in the form of communications (as opposed to stored data) - and as such, would be mediated by channels over which they have power of interception which is entirely unconstrained by any post-arrest time limit on detention.
Posted by Robin Wilton on August 02, 2007 at 03:44 PM GMT+00:00 #