5 Minute Guide: 42-day detention
Updated on 11 June 2008
Get your pre-charge detention refresher here. What happened to 90 days? Why 42? And what chance government defeat?
What happened?
After eight years at Number 10, Tony Blair suffered his first Commons defeat in November 2005 when MPs kicked out his plans for a 90-day pre-charge detention limit for terror suspects.
The proposals were scaled back to 28 days, as rebel MPs felt 90 days was too long to hold suspects without charge.
The 90-day plans were detailed in the Terrorism Act 2006, one of four acts dealing with terrorism introduced since 2000.
But government enthusiasm for extended detention periods was not diminished by the 2005 defeat, and today Gordon Brown faces his own Commons vote on the issue.
Nobody from government has been able to explain where the 42-day figure came from, there seems to be no exact science behind it.
Plans for a longer detention period were resurrected in the Counter Terrorism Bill, which received its second Commons reading in April 2008.
The Home Office and senior police say a new maximum of 42 days detention is required, as 28 days is not long enough to allow for the difficulty of dealing with complex terror plots.
They point to dealing with international agencies and pulling information together from around the world. They are not just dealing with the IRA anymore, they warn.
Nobody from government has been able to explain where the 42-day figure came from, there seems to be no exact science behind it. Home Secretary Jacqui Smith just describes it as a "reasonable maximum".
Why does it matter?
The debate has taken on a dual significance, with ramifications for both civil liberties and Gordon Brown's future.
Critics of the 42-day limit say it breaches the "fundamental freedoms" of suspects.
They say it would put Britain "out of step" with the rest of Europe in terms of detention laws, while undermining the nation's moral high ground on human rights.
Shami Chakrabarti, the director of Liberty, branded the plans "desperately counter-productive".
Civil liberties groups also point to the fact the current 28-day limit has never been required, and the director of public prosecutions, Sir Ken Macdonald, says security forces have been able to "comfortably" manage within the current four-week limit.
Civil liberties groups also point to the fact the current 28-day limit has never been required.
They also highlight the fact that MI5 has not asked for an extension up to 42 days.
There are also fears the 42-day period will victimise detainees, and fuel the radicalisation of young Muslims.
From the government's point of view, it says that the longer detention period is essential to combat "grave and exceptional" terror threats.
Jacqui Smith calls the 42-day period a "maximum safeguard" which security services will only use as a last resort.
Aside from allowing security staff longer to investigate suspects, it would also allow them to step in "earlier in the process", she says. Polls ahead of the Commons vote suggest two thirds of people are in favour of the 42-day limit.
Aside from the civil liberties debate, the detention vote is hugely significant for Gordon Brown.
A crushing Commons defeat, on the back of the Crewe by-election defeat, dreadful poll predictions, a faltering economy and the 10p tax, it could prove to be the final straw.
What happens next?
The results of the Commons vote are expected around tea-time today. With rebels still deliberateling and uncertainty over how the Democratic Unionist MPs will vote, the result is on a knife edge.
If about 33 Labour MPs vote against the government - together with all the MPs from all other parties - Gordon Brown will lose.
If it is voted down, the limit will stay at 28 days. Even if government wins, the measure will go up to the House of Lords, where peers are likely to reject it.
A long-winded "to-and-fro" between the Commons and Lords would ensue.
