Contribution
My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Foster, for returning to the issue of the glorification of terrorism, our exchange of letters and her movement and reflections on what we said in Committee. I note the support from the noble Lords, Lord Rogan, Lord Empey, Lord Weir, Lord Marks, from the Liberal Democrat Front Bench, Lord Polak, from the Conservative Back Benches, Lord McCrea of Magherafelt and Cookstown, and Lord Elliott. I will come back to comments made by other noble Lords as I progress.
Let me say straight away that I have not been a victim of terrorism, but I know people who have been. I have met victims of terrorism not only in the context of Northern Ireland when I had the honour of serving there but in this job, from a range of backgrounds. I know that discussion of all these issues, including in this debate, causes great pain for those victims. However, I hope can explain why, even with the changes that have been made by the noble Baroness, I cannot accept the amendment in its current form.
Let me first express and reiterate the purpose of the encouragement offence. It was introduced after the 7/7 attacks and is designed to act as a precursor offence to reduce the risk of people being encouraged to carry out acts of terrorism. The offence applies equally to statements made online or offline. It also applies even where an individual is reckless about the impact of their statement—that goes some way to the points made by the noble Baroness, Lady Fox of Buckley.
Encouragement includes any statements that glorify acts of terrorism. To be clear, “acts of terrorism” in this context includes any action taken for the purposes of terrorism, whether or not it was taken by a proscribed organisation. Today, we have talked about the IRA—which, at one stage, was heavily proscribed—and about Palestine Action and other organisations in relation to the current conflicts and activities in Palestine and Israel. “Glorification” is defined in the 2006 Act—which was passed by a previous Government in which I served—as including any “praise or celebration”.
I recognise that Amendment 418 is a modified version of the noble Baroness’s proposal made in Committee. Specifically, the amendment would retain the historical safeguard that I pointed out to her and that is necessary to limit the offence, for the very reasons that the noble Lord, Lord Marks, indicated today. I am grateful to the noble Baroness for having taken into account our concerns. However, the amendment would still disapply this to statements that indirectly encouraged acts of terrorism carried out by proscribed organisations.
The offence was carefully drafted at the time of its introduction to ensure that statements that are automatically captured by the offence have to meet both the requirement that the statement glorifies an act of terrorism and the historical safeguard. Amendment 418 attempts to split up these two requirements, when it was always intended that these requirements would work together. I remind the House that the encouragement offence has been recently reviewed by Jonathan Hall KC, the current Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation, at the Government’s request and in light of the 7 October attacks, which a number of noble Lords referred to. In that review, he strongly advised against removing this historical safeguard.
In addition, the offence is very clear that statements that glorify acts of terrorism in such a way as to encourage others to carry out these acts would include acts of terrorism carried out by proscribed organisations. As a result, it is not necessary to spell this out any more clearly in legislation. As with the noble Baroness’s previous amendment tabled in Committee, it is also worth highlighting—this point was made by the noble Lord, Lord Anderson of Ipswich—that there are other offences that may be relevant to her concern too. In particular, Section 12 of the Terrorism Act 2000 makes it an offence to invite support for a proscribed organisation. The noble Lords, Lord McCrea of Magherafelt and Cookstown and Lord Elliott, made points about prosecutions, which have very often been undertaken under that legislation. The offence in this Bill is designed to address the harm that comes from the legitimisation of terrorist organisations, which the noble Baroness has spoken about.
We may need to test the opinion of the House, but I know why the noble Baroness has brought the amendment forward. I know why noble Lords—particularly those with fresh memories of activities in Northern Ireland, including those who saw activities that still offend many people in Northern Ireland—support the amendment. I know why the noble Lord, Lord Polak, supports the amendment. However, I say to all of them that the Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation has reviewed it and believes the offence is currently fit for purpose. There are many other mechanisms—including those that the noble Lord, Lord Anderson, pointed to—that will lead to prosecutions for these issues. There is also a significant effort to ensure that the Government support activities to turn people away from terrorism—through the Prevent scheme, education and a range of other mechanisms—so that people are not politicised towards terrorism through activities undertaken.
With those reasons in mind, while I recognise the noble Baroness’s concerns and understand why she brought them forward, I hope that the reassurances I have given mean that she will not press the amendment to a Division. I await her response.