Judith Sunderland [Researcher, Europe and Central Asia Division, Human Rights Watch]: "On June 11, 2008, the UK House of Commons narrowly approved a measure giving the government the power to detain terrorism suspects for up to six weeks (42 days) without charge. Such lengthy pre-charge detention is manifestly incompatible with the UK's obligations to guarantee the fundamental right to liberty and security of the person under the European Convention for Human Rights (article 5) and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (article 9). Human Rights Watch believes that the current 28-day pre-charge detention already violates this right, and the British government has not shown that extending such detention further is necessary and proportionate.

The additional safeguards built into the new power are insufficient to meet the requirements of international law. What constitutes a "grave exceptional terrorist threat" – the trigger for the power – is far too open to interpretation and would not be subject to any meaningful examination. The power would lapse after 30 days, but there is no limit on how many times the power can be renewed. Parliament would be asked to approve the power within 7 days, but the legislature is not the body that should make decisions about whether to detain individuals, especially when members would not be given full information so as to avoid prejudicing future prosecutions. None of these add up to much in the way of genuine safeguards.

Ultimately, the only meaningful oversight of pre-charge detention has to be judicial. Yet the 42-day detention scheme does not add anything to the current limited judicial supervision. A judge reviewing the detention will still not be allowed to consider whether there exist reasonable grounds to believe the individual committed a terrorist offense – the question required by international standards to determine the need for pre-trial detention. Instead, the judge is restricted to considering only whether the police are showing due diligence and the investigation requires an individual's continued detention.

A broad spectrum of opinion opposes the measure, including the Director of Public Prosecution, a former justice minister, a former attorney general, senior police officers, civil rights groups and Muslim organizations. Shadow Home Secretary David Davis resigned as an MP after the vote, protesting that such measures eroded British civil liberties. Both the Muslim Council of Britain and former Prime Minister John Major have warned that a further extension of pre-charge detention – already the longest by far in the European Union and significantly longer than the permissible period in the United States and Canada – is likely to be counterproductive.

It is now up to the House of Lords, the upper chamber of Parliament, to vote this dangerous measure down."