Conditions for making emergency regulations
Civil Contingencies Bill
4:45 pm
Mr Patrick Mercer (Newark, Conservative)
I shall try in future to be a little more generous in deciding where my dirty bombs are likely to explode. I used Cornwall for the obvious reason that it is discrete from the rest of the UK.
In the event of a device exploding in Cornwall, to what temptations might the Government be open? It is possible that they might wish to be secretive about the event and not inform the rest of the nation about what had happened. They might hope that by keeping the event reasonably secret, by keeping to a level of security, they might avoid panic spreading to the rest of the country.
The Minister and, in the past, her colleagues have made the point clearly that Government strategy rests on not doing the terrorists' job for them by scaring the pants off the public, by showing the whole gamut of horror that might result from such an attack. I do not agree with that position, but I understand it. There is a certain sense in it. If one wishes to live in a free society and to try to make terrorism less effective, there is an argument for not broadcasting what the terrorist can do to people should because it will alarm them unnecessarily.
I do not believe that argument; the contrary argument is that knowledge and understanding dispel fear. In a particular event, the public should be told as soon as reasonably possible. They should be told, provided that they have been alerted to the dangers beforehand and, to refer to what was said in an earlier sitting, they have been trained in how to deal with the
particular exigencies. If that does not happen, I can begin to understand why the Government might wish to be less open about the event.
The Government must understand that it is highly likely—as we saw after the events of 11 September—that other attacks would follow hard on the heels of the first. After 11 September, one attack was quickly followed by another. A series of attacks then occurred around the world, which have been less well publicised. In particular, there was an attack on a French chemical plant in Toulouse on 13 September. It was not widely acknowledged as an al-Qaeda attack, but it was part of the series of attacks that had been planned, starting in America and spreading worldwide.
Were we to agree to the amendment, it would be clear to the public that had an explosion occurred in one or another part of the country—Orpington, let us say—