Heard the one about police fighting two year old terrorists?
Recommend on Google+
Should powers designed to fight terrorism in the wake of 9/11 be used on people as young as two years old?
Today a number of news sites report on figures from Metropolitan police:
“The official reviewer of terrorism legislation today criticised the Metropolitan police after it emerged that the force had stopped and searched 58 children aged nine or younger using terrorism powers designed to fight al-Qaida.
The children were stopped in 2008 and all were under the criminal age of responsibility, which is 10. None are believed to have been found to have been involved in terrorism.
According to figures from the Metropolitan Police Authority, in 2008 the Met used terrorism laws to stop and search 10 girls aged nine or under, and 48 boys. A total of 2,331 children aged 15 or under were stopped by Met officers using terrorism powers.
Section 44 of the Terrorism Act 2000 gives police the power to stop and search people in areas deemed by senior officers to be at risk of terrorism. A constable does not need to have reasonable suspicion, and use of the power has been controversial.”
This was taken from the Guardian.
Regular readers of these postings will already know my views on toughening up of police powers over the past decade and how there is little proof that these can be balanced against evidence that they reduce crime. This latest news adds further fuel to this debate.
blog comments powered by Disqus
Osama doc on Ch4 well worth watching [8 Sep 2011]
9/11 ten years on [7 Sep 2011]
Documentary heads up [4 Sep 2011]
Judicial Independence [9 Feb 2011]
Getting into judges [30 Jul 2010]
AS exams update: judicial bias [19 May 2010]
Global Issues: Terrorism and Aid - UK Pledges Aid to Somalia [10 Mar 2010]
Global Issues: Human Rights - ‘The Ticking Bomb’ - Torture, Jack Bauer and Binyam Mohamed [19 Feb 2010]
Politics Classroom Posters - Judiciary [17 Dec 2009]
Terrorism - Analysis from the Economist [26 Nov 2009]
Global Issues and Anarchism [12 Oct 2009]
Supreme Court special [2 Oct 2009]
Whither support for war on terror? [18 Jul 2009]
Sotomayor and being sleepless in Seattle [18 Jul 2009]
US revision: comparing civil liberties [18 Jun 2009]
Civil liberties [24 May 2009]
AS revision: the Human Rights Act [19 May 2009]
AS revision: What do Naomi Campbell and Prince Charles have in common? [20 Apr 2009]
Are liberals wrong on rights? [10 Apr 2009]
The wrong of rights? [24 Mar 2009]
Reclaiming liberties? [1 Mar 2009]
Lobby Magazine is Here! [28 May 2008]
Noising off by judges [3 Apr 2008]
POLITICS TEACHER RESOURCE NEWSLETTER
Join over 1,600 Politics Teachers who receive the regular tutor2u Politics Teacher Resource Newsletter by email.
