The Joint Committee scrutinised the Home Office's draft Detention of Terrorist Suspects (Temporary Extension) Bills, which could be enacted urgently if it ever became necessary to extend to 28 days the maximum period for which the police could apply to a High Court judge detain terrorist suspects before charging them. The Committee agrees with the Government's objective, but does not accept the Government's proposals for achieving the objective. When provisions of this kind needed to be introduced after individuals had been arrested; it would be almost impossible to give Parliament the information it would need to scrutinise the legislation adequately without putting at risk a suspect's right to have a fair trial. In addition there is a risk that, if the provision was required in a period of parliamentary recess or dissolution, legislation could not be introduced in time, or at all. The Committee recommends, instead, the introduction of legislation to empower the Secretary of State to make an executive order (with the agreement of the Attorney General and subject to rigorous safeguards), that would temporarily extend the maximum period available for pre-charge detention to 28 days. There would have to be an independent review of the case for making such an order. The Director of Public Prosecutions would continue to be responsible for applications to a High Court judge in individual cases. The Secretary of State would be accountable to Parliament for the decision once there was no longer any risk of prejudicing judicial proceedings.

Preventive detention as a counter-terrorism tool is fraught with conceptual and procedural problems and risks of misuse, excess and abuse. Many have debated the inadequacies of the current legal frameworks for detention, and the need for finding the most appropriate legal model to govern detention of terror suspects that might serve as a global paradigm. This book offers a comprehensive and critical analysis of the detention of terror suspects under domestic criminal law, the law of armed conflict and international human rights law. The book looks comparatively at the law in a number of key jurisdictions including the USA, the UK, Israel, France, India, Australia and Canada and in turn compares this to preventive detention under the law of armed conflict and various human rights treaties. The book demonstrates that the procedures governing the use of preventive detention are deficient in each framework and that these deficiencies often have an adverse and serious impact on the human rights of detainees, thereby delegitimizing the use of preventive detention. Based on her investigation Diane Webber puts forward a new approach to preventive detention, setting out ten key minimum criteria drawn from international human rights principles and best practices from domestic laws. The minimum criteria are designed to cure the current flaws and deficiencies and provide a base line of guidance for the many countries that choose to use preventive detention, in a way that both respects human rights and maintains security.

Contingency planning and resilience are of prime importance to the late modern risk society, with implications for law and for governance arrangements. Our risk society continues to seek ever more complex and detailed risk mitigation responses by law, including the UK’s Civil Contingencies Act 2004 and the US Homeland Security Act 2002, which respond to counter-terrorism, natural catastrophes, and other risks. This book seeks to analyse and criticise the legal developments in contingencies and resilience on a comparative basis, which engages with not only law and constitutionalism but also political theory and policy, including relations between public and private, national and local, and civil and military. Two transcending themes are of interest. One is institutional or structural – what bodies and power relations should we establish in a late modern world where Critical National Infrastructure is mainly held in private hands? The second is dynamic and concerns the grant of powers and arrangements for live responses. Both aspects are subjected to a strong critical stance based in 'constitutionalism', which demands state legitimacy even in extreme situations by the observance of legality, effectiveness, accountability, and individual rights. This book was originally published as a special issue of the International Journal of Human Rights.

In the years since 9/11, counter-terrorism law and policy has proliferated across the world. This handbook comprehensively surveys how the law has been deployed in all aspects of counter-terrorism. It provides an authoritative and critical analysis of counter-terrorism laws in domestic jurisdictions, taking a comparative approach to a range of jurisdictions, especially the UK, the US, Australia, Canada, and Europe. The contributions to the book are written by experts in the field of terrorism law and policy, allowing for discussion of a wide range of regulatory responses and strategies of governance. The book is divided into four parts, reflective of established counter-terrorism strategic approaches, and covers key themes such as: Policing and special powers, including surveillance Criminal offences and court processes Prevention of radicalisation and manifestations of extremism Protective/preparative security The penology of terrorism In addressing counter-terrorism laws across a broad range of topics and jurisdictions, the handbook will be of great interest and use to researchers, students and practitioners in criminal law, counter-terrorism, and security studies.

This collection of essays by leading academics, lawyers, parliamentarians and parliamentary officials provides a critical assessment of the UK Parliament's two main constitutional roles-as a legislature and as the preeminent institution for calling government to account. Both functions are undergoing change and facing new challenges. Part 1 (Legislation) includes chapters on Parliament's emerging responsibilities for pre-legislative scrutiny of government Bills and for evaluating proposed legislation against explicit constitutional standards. The impact on legislation of the European Union and the growing influence of the House of Lords are also examined. Part 2 (Accountability) investigates how Parliament operates to scrutinise areas of executive action previously often shielded from effective parliamentary oversight, including national security, war-making powers and administrative justice. There are also chapters on parliamentary reform, including analysis of the House of Commons 'Wright reforms', parliamentary sovereignty, privilege and the European Convention on Human Rights, Euroscepticism, and parliamentary sovereignty and the regulation of lobbyists. The book will be of interest to anyone who is curious about the work of Parliament and is aimed at legal academics, practitioners and political scientists.

On cover and title page: House, committees of the whole House, general committees and select committees

These notes refer to the Protection of Freedoms Act (c.9) (ISBN 9780105409120) which received Royal Assent on 1 May 2012

The draft Enhanced Terrorism Prevention and Investigation Measures Bill is intended to be introduced by the Government in response to "exceptional circumstances" which "cannot be managed by any other means". It is complementary to, and if introduced will operate alongside, the existing TPIMs legislation (as set out in the Terrorism Prevention and Investigation Measures Act 2011). If approved by Parliament, this Bill will allow the Government to impose a series of restrictive measures, broadly similar to those available under the control order regime, on certain targeted individuals. The Committee accepted the need for such measures as a preventative tool against suspected terrorists but raised concerns about the role of Parliament in approving their introduction and the threat to security created by "time-limiting" the legislation. To safeguard and better monitor their use, the Committee further called on the Government to institute higher standards of legal review of any use of this legislation.

Dated June 2012