December 21
2004
Political judges
» Posted on December 21, 2004 11:11 AM » Category: Terror

I've only started now to catch up with the rest of the news, the worst of which is surely the bizarre and horrfying ruling by the Lords that we face no threat from terror. (Melanie Phillips deals with this topic admirably here.)

According to Lord Hoffman:


The real threat to the life of the nation, in the sense of a people living in accordance with its traditional laws and political values, comes not from terrorism but from laws such as these.

Others have dealt already with the sheer nonsense of such a statement. It may indeed be that holding suspected terrorists without trial is odious, and a blot on our society. But two other considerations need to be borne in mind.

First, would it would not be more odious to allow terrorist suspects to roam free, free to murder at will? I ask that as a genuine question. Maybe there are some people who would say no - that the right to trial always, whatever the circumstances, takes precedence. Clearly, Lord Hoffman is one of them. And I would not pretend for a second that this is a clear cut issue. I too am unsettled by such laws. Who, however, should have the power to decide such matters? The judiciary, appointed in secret and accountable to no one. Or elected politicians?

But there is a more profound second consideration. Since when was Lord Hoffman, or indeed any judge, asked to offer as part of his judgements - indeed, as the cornerstone of them - assessments of terrorist threats and policy prescriptions as to how we should deal with them? I can think of nothing - literally, nothing - which qualifies Lord Hoffman to have any more say in these matters than me. And whilst my views are tomorrow's fish and chip paper (or whatever the cyber equivalent may be), Lord Hoffman's have an immediate impact. The thought of him, or any of his colleagues, having the slightest involvement in such decisions is terrifying and profoundly anti-democratic.

As Matthew d'Ancona put it:

Far from being a final humiliation for him, the Law Lords' ruling on Thursday that the indefinite detention of foreign terrorist suspects is unlawful was a reminder of how right he often was about the judiciary. Rarely has there been such a decadent and depressing instance of introspective jurisprudence as Lord Hoffmann's argument that "the real threat to the life of the nation… comes not from terrorism but from laws such as these", and Lord Scott's outrageous comparisons with "Soviet Russia in the Stalinist era". Evidently these lofty jurists are not as troubled as the rest of us by the specific threats to Britain made by Osama bin Laden in his most recent video message, or the disclosure 10 days ago by Sir John Stevens, the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, that at least one terrorist atrocity on the scale of the Madrid bombing had already been foiled, or by Sir John's unshakeable belief that "an attack is still inevitable".

Talk about a Supreme Court and the Human Rights Act is now passe. The issue is no longer whether we might move to a situation in which judges are directly political, and more powerful than an elected government. They are already. The issue now is what we do about it.


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Comments

How do you hold a 'terrorist' without trial? Surely the point of any trial would be to establish whether someone is or isn't a terrorist. The lofty dismissal of such tedious concepts as trials and evidence before the State convicts citizens is what Lord Hoffman rightly regards as a threat to those citizens.

Far more serious than the number of Al-Queda atrocities in Britain - which currently stands at, er, zero.

Everyone just needs to calm down, tbh.

Stated by: William on December 21, 2004 1:07 PM

usually your weblog is a laugh and today is no exception....

the only differenc is this horrifying rubbish attacking judges...
I am all in favour of locking up terrorists but at present we have detained without trial people for over a year on evidence so flimsy it cannot come to trial......

Why bother defending our country at all if we are to have a government that can detain without trial charge etc....logically these people should either be deported (ah but there is evidence needed again) or released and then kept under surveillance.......what is it about the right wing/authortitarian mind set that so hates the British tradition of using evidence and the rule of law?

Stated by: Mark on December 21, 2004 1:18 PM

Surely the answer is to get rid of the nonsense that terroists cannot be deported to countries that will try them or slap their wrists.
It is disgraceful that we have resorted to holding any suspect without trial, but lets not pay to keep them. kick them out to where ever

Stated by: steve shackleton on December 21, 2004 8:40 PM

Mark: "these people should either be deported"

Deportation is actually what this is all about - because of alleged human rights abused in their countries of origin our judiciary doesn't permit them to be forcibly deported - but they are FREE to leave the UK at any time for any other country that will take them - not just their home countries. Indeed, two or three of them have already done so.

So the real issue is, if a foreigner here for his own safety if behaving in a manner that renders him unwelcome, what are we to do with him?

a) deport him;
b) lock him up, subject to review, with the right to leave the UK;
c) leave him free to cause trouble;

Answer a) is fine with me. In the absence of a), b) seems perfectly reasonable. But, according to the HofL, only option c) is allowed. Stupid ivory tower tossers.

Of course to the left (inc. the Biased Broadcasting Corp.), it's all about Britian's Guantanamo Bay - they usually don't mention that these foreigners are FREE to leave the UK any time they like...

Stated by: Andrew Bowman on December 21, 2004 10:39 PM

Ooh er, a video message from OBL's cave. That's certainly worth trashing 900 years of the development of Habeas Corpus for!

The truth, widely accepted outside the mental landscape of such as the paranoid Melanie Phillips, is that there is not, and never has been, a concerted "Islamist" terror campaign. It is a propaganda phantom peddled by western intelligence agencies on behalf of corrupt ruling elites who can think of no other way of deceiving us into accepting their authority than by crying wolf (or WMD). "Al Qaeda" is akin to Ian Fleming's SPECTRE. OBL is the Blofeld of the 21st century.

If Britain could endure 50 years of nuclear Cold War and 30 years of IRA bombings without surrendering its traditions, we can certainly see off OBL & Co. The judges, with wiser heads than politicians possess, are sending the public a covert message: Don't Believe the Hype.

Stated by: Albion4Ever on December 21, 2004 11:10 PM

It's nonsense to suggest that Britain isn't under threat from Islamist terrorists - these people want to destroy Western civilisation as we know it; to pretend that it is not a new type of challenge that we face is to give ourselves obstacles in rising to the challenge.

That said, I have my worries about laws which allow internment without any possibility of a trial. If we know enough about them to suspect they are here for causing terrorist atrocities, then we should be able to put the evidence before a court of law. If it compromises security, then allow the courts to sit in camera. But locking people up with no trial is a very worrying precedent to set.

Stated by: Ken on December 22, 2004 11:36 AM

Andrew

if someone is "causing trouble" ie committing a crime as opposed to doing something you or I might dislike...they can be put on trial and convicted and sentanced as appropriate......

yes there is a threat from islamic terroorism...roughly on a par with that of the IRA indefinate detention without trial is the tool of dictatorships not democracies and should have no place here..........

Stated by: Mark on December 22, 2004 12:57 PM

albion4ever,
Will you at least agree that OBL, unlike Blofeld, is in fact a real person?
(Ditto with Al Qaeda vs. SPECTRE)

Stated by: maor on December 26, 2004 2:57 PM

Funnily enough, Lord Hoffman and others like him were perfectly happy to sanction the internment of suspected IRA members not-so-very-long-ago. But then again, if memory serves me well, Irish terrorists made a special point of targeting members of the judiciary in their campaign of murder and mayhem. No doubt Hoffman will continue to hold his right-on liberal views until the Islamists start doing the same thing.

Unfortunately, the 'common' people (i.e. the men, women and children who make up this nation of ours) are of no importance whatsoever in the minds of 'intellectual' lefties like Hoffman. Why should they worry if a few hundred or so people get blown to bits while they're out doing their weekly shopping with their families? Most of them wouldn't recognise a decent claret if they tasted it, and so they really must be quite stupid and probably deserve it.

Stated by: Steve Granger on December 31, 2004 3:50 AM

Who says there is no evidence ? The whole point is that any evidence against these people is likely to have een gathered covertly, and revealing how it was gathered and by whom puts people in danger and compromises the work of the intelligence services.

The HoL appear to say there is no proven danger. The Met Police Commissioner says there is. No contest.

Stated by: JohninLondon on January 2, 2005 3:12 PM

the traditional way of enforceing english law has and will contiue to be a problem when it comes to dealing with those individuals who are prepeared to kill them selves along with others. it would appear that the rule of law and all of the articles contined in european convention on human rights, universal declaration on human rights and the human rights act uk will all have to be derigated from not by the required margin of appriciation but beyound. it is clear now by recent house of lords ruling that it is illegal to hold them in detention with out trial then what is left to do with them. since locking then up is a problem, it seems the most logical thing to do is to place emphasis on the way the police investigate these induviduals. let us resort back to common law, "i do not care how you get it if you steal it the evidence is admisable". this along with the margin of appriciation given under human rights would help to secure evidence vital to a fair trial as contained in article 6. thechnology affords the police the oppotunity to do just this. no jury i think will allow a man to go free with evidence gathered via electronic surveilance and entrapment. i will say more another time.

Stated by: lennie on April 15, 2005 2:29 AM
Stated by: art on April 13, 2006 8:33 PM
Stated by: znane kobiety nago on April 16, 2006 5:15 AM

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