"To amend the Terrorism Act 2000; to make further provision about terrorism and security; to provide for the freezing of assets; to make provision about immigration and asylum; to amend or extend the criminal law and powers for preventing crime and enforcing that law; to make provision about the control of pathogens and toxins; to provide for the retention of communications data."
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The key element of the bill was the government's determination to find a way to deal with foreign nationals whom the security services suspected of committing, organising or supporting terrorism. Under the European convention on human rights, many of these individuals could not be deported because they came from countries with poor human rights records and faced torture or the death penalty if forced to return. Faced with suspected terrorists who they could neither prosecute nor deport, the government created provisions to indefinitely detain foreign nationals deemed to threaten national security without charging them or bringing them to trial. MPs were told that intelligence services had drawn up a list of approximately 20 Islamic fundamentalists who would be detained when the new legislation came into force.
The act also enables communication service providers to retain data – not content – so that it can be accessed under existing legislation by law agencies investigating criminal and terrorist activity. It was governed by a voluntary Code of Practice later codified into the Retention of Communications Data (Code of Practice) Order 2003, which was developed in consultation with the Information Commissioner and industry.
Communications data can include the identity and location of the caller, texter or web user. The government emphasised retained data was a vital tool for the security services and was necessary in order to safeguard national security and investigate crime.
In order to shepherd the bill through the House of Lords, the government made a series of concessions including a "sunset clause" for the controversial detention provisions and the communications data clause that meant elements of the act would expire unless they were renewed within five years. Other clauses in the act would be reviewed by a privy council committee after two years, and any areas the committee had concerns about would be referred to and debated in parliament. If they were not reaffirmed they would cease to be law within six months.
The most controversial element of the bill proved to be the government's attempt to make a new criminal offence of inciting religious hatred. The home secretary was forced to abandon the provisions, which would have extended race hate laws to cover religion, after peers twice voted against the measure.
In October 2008, prime minister Gordon Brown invoked elements of the act to freeze the British assets of Icelandic bank Landsbanki during the Icelandic financial crisis.
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