Anti-terror plans come under attack

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Two separate Parliamentary committees criticised Home Secretary Jacqui Smith's proposal to extend the time limit on detaining terror suspects from 28 to 42 days.

The Joint Committee on Human Rights (JCHR) demanded that the measures should be withdrawn. The Commons' Home Affairs Select Committee said neither police nor the Government had proved the case for an extension.

Ms Smith's proposals would involve the House of Commons and the House of Lords approving a temporary extension to 42 days.

But the JCHR said this would be "virtually useless as a safeguard" and would also run the risk of seriously prejudicing any future criminal trials of suspects being questioned at the time.

JCHR chairman Andrew Dismore MP said: "If the Government is genuinely concerned to build a national consensus on counter-terrorism policy, it should drop this ill-conceived proposal and work with us and others to identify better ways of ensuring terrorism suspects are successfully prosecuted."

The report said the Crown Prosecution Service was not calling for more time - a fact which was "devastating" to Ms Smith's argument, the document said.

Members of the Home Affairs Select Committee said the Muslim community could come to regard the rules as a form of internment if ministers failed to prove why a longer period is required.

Alternative changes to the law could make it easier to bring prosecutions and avoid the need to raise the limit, it added. For example, the committee said it was "ridiculous" that Britain still bars the use of evidence from telephone taps and other bugs - known as "intercept" evidence.

Shadow Home Secretary David Davis said: "The Home Secretary should realise that all the evidence so far has undermined, not supported the case for extension. She should now focus her efforts on implementing practical measures, to get the best use of the current 28-day period - like our proposals for post-charge interview, the use of intercept evidence and enhanced sentences for withholding encryption keys."