Home Secretary forced into 'humiliating retreat' over detention plans

Plans to hold terror suspects for up to 42 days without charge were dramatically abandoned last night after the proposals were overwhelmingly defeated in the House of Lords.

In an emergency statement to MPs last night, Jacqui Smith announced a major U-turn, confirming she would pull the hugely contentious plans out of the Counter Terrorism Bill.

She backtracked on a key plank of Gordon Brown's legislative programme after peers inflicted a crushing defeat on the Government, voting by 309 to 118 – a majority of 191 – to reject any attempt to increase the current 28-day limit on detention.

The defeat was one of the largest in the Lords since Labour came to power, as ministers, including the former Labour Lord Chancellors Lord Irvine and Lord Falconer, rebelled to throw out the detention powers.

Ms Smith said an emergency bill reintroducing the 42-day limit would be kept on file in case of a national crisis. Amid rowdy scenes she condemned Conservatives and Liberal Democrats for voting against the measure. But opposition MPs rounded on the Government, for executing a humiliating U-turn.

Ms Smith said: "Those who have voted against these measures both in this House and in the other place are predominately from the two opposition parties. They should take responsibility for the defeat of this sensible and proportionate measure.

But Chris Huhne, the Liberal Democrat home affairs spokesman, retorted: "Whatever the Home Secretary says, this was a crushing defeat for the Government. It did not just lose the vote in the Lords, it lost the argument and is undergoing a humiliating retreat."

Dominic Grieve, the shadow Home Secretary, attacked legislation "put forward in such a way that smacks of mere political posturing and gimmicks."

Shami Chakrabarti, director of the pressure group Liberty, added: "Liberty has been overwhelmed by public and parliamentary support for our campaign against this divisive measure. If this or any other future government tried again... we will be waiting."

The Home Office climbdown came amid warnings that a defeat in the Upper House would merely open the way to a humiliating fresh rebellion in the House of Commons on the issue.

MPs and campaigners said the Bill would run into fierce opposition if ministers attempted to defy the Lords and tried to reintroduce the 42-day plan in the Commons. The planned extension of detention was carried in the Commons by a majority of just nine votes despite a rebellion by 36 Labour MPs after Democratic Unionist and Ulster Unionist MPs swung behind MPs.

But privately, ministers have been warned that wafer-thin majority had been cut still further, with the loss of Labour MPs in Glasgow East and Glenrothes and the departure from the Commons of the London Mayor Boris Johnson, who did not vote in June's division.

Lord Dear, the former West Midlands chief constable and crossbench peer, led calls to remove 42 days from the Bill, condemning the move as "a shabby charade" designed to look tough on terrorism. He said: "There is almost universal opposition to what the Government proposes. It almost beggars belief that any administration could embark on such a course."

Lord Falkoner, the former Labour Lord Chancellor, said it was "fanciful" to argue that the plans would aid the fight against terrorism. Baroness Pauline Neville-Jones, the shadow Security Minister, said extending detention without charge was "unnecessary, undesirable and unworkable".

Lord Thomas of Gresford, the Liberal Democrat frontbencher, condemned plans to give MPs a vote to trigger the extended detention powers as a "farce". He said: "That's not just unconstitutional, it's contemptible." But Lord Carlisle, the Liberal Democrat peer and the Government's independent reviewer of anti-terror law, insisted the change was needed to help police disrupt terrorist plots.

He said: "The authorities in this country have been fantastically successful in the disruptions that they have performed. I believe that, putting it at its lowest, many hundreds of lives have been saved by the authorities."

Lord Tebbit, the former Conservative cabinet minister seriously injured in the IRA bomb attack on the Grand Hotel in Brighton, said the Tories would "rue the day" if they helped defeat the 42-day plan.

He told peers: "How exactly would they go about coming back to Parliament and asking Parliament to grant those powers?"

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