Reply #1: Matthew Parris takes the piss out of the proposals [View All]

[muriel_volestrangler]

and makes some good points too.

LIKE A DODGY auctioneer offloading family furniture in a distress sale, Charles Clarke fingers his hammer and moves from pile to pile of once-cherished items.

“Lot number 47: Ancient Liberties. Now what am I bid? Suspension of Habeas Corpus — three months? Will anyone give me three months’ detention without trial? The police tell me it’s worth three months, but I’ll take a lower bid to start us off — yes, you there, sir, in the Liberal Democrat hat: still sticking at 14 days? Come on, let’s get this sale moving. Have I no Tory bid? Downing Street’s getting twitchy . . . six weeks, somebody — a snip at six. Just 42 days — they’ll fly by in no time — I’ll swallow my pride and let it go at six. Going, going . . .”
...
I would not myself praise Archbishop Makarios, the Stern Gang, Jomo Kenyatta or even the perpetrators of the Boston Tea Party, but who seriously suggests that it should be a crime to glorify their struggles? Researchers more ingenious than I will find youthful speeches by the likes of Charles Clarke, Jack Straw, Peter Hain and probably Tony Blair too, glorifying terrorists. So the proposed law will include powers for government to “certify” past terrorist movements who may, or may not, be “glorified”.

What madness is this? Are ministers and civil servants to work through history books, ticking boxes? Are we to have (retrospectively) approved terrorists? Truly, as Paul Flynn MP has said, under new Labour “only the future is certain; the past is always changing”.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,1065-1784345,00.html