by MONITOR
GORDON Brown's government has recently survived narrow House of Commons votes on the Lisbon Treaty, the call for an early full-scale inquiry into the Iraq war, and may also scrape through in the coming vote on the hybrid embryo legislation. But the greatest threat to its parliamentary majority is likely to be over its proposal to raise the period for which terrorist suspects can be held without charge from 28 to 42 days. The Counter-Terrorism Bill which contains this provision was given its second reading yesterday and will be under consideration for about two months before the crucial vote on detention is taken. However, it is already clear that a sufficient number of Labour MPs are likely to join Conservatives and Liberal Democrats in opposing this provision to make a government defeat quite likely.
The surprising thing is that very few people can understand why Gordon Brown is so stubbornly insisting on the extension to 42 days. Tony Blair was unable to get the necessary support for a similar measure and no significant new evidence has emerged since then. Indeed, in an interview in The Times yesterday the Director of Public Prosecutions, Sir Ken Macdonald, said that in his experience, The 28-day limit works well. Nor has the government been able to point to a single case in which the police have claimed that their enquiries failed because they needed more time. Mr Brown cannot rely on I know something you don't know to get his Bill through.
WHO NEEDS IT?