Victory in Fight against Secret Evidence

01 Dec 2009

Diane Abbott MP today hailed an historic High Court judgement against the use of secret evidence in applications for bail.

Until today, people held under deportation orders could be refused bail solely on the basis of closed evidence that they, their lawyers, or the public had never heard. Deportation orders are usually given to people the government suspects of terrorist-related activity but for whom the government refuses to bring a case against in court. The orders have been used against people from outside the UK, even when they have British citizenship.

But the High Court ruled today that denying someone bail purely on the basis of evidence they had not heard was unlawful.

Diane Abbott, who has been involved in a months-long campaign to stop the use of secret evidence, welcomed the ruling:

“The use of closed evidence that neither the defendant, nor their lawyer can hear to justify revoking or denying bail is one of the most blatant abuses of our centuries old legal system I have seen. Today’s ruling is another blow to the Government’s ridiculous anti-terror laws that have seen individuals locked up, kept under house arrest and denied access to a fair trial on the basis of secret evidence they will never see. It may take time, but the laws that have allowed this to happen are being chipped away and eventually I hope we will see a return to our renowned justice system.”

Director of Liberty Shami Chakrabarti said:

“Yet again it takes a senior judge to point out what most people already know – if the Government is going to lock you up, it needs to tell you why. The hard lesson of recent years is that diluting Britain’s core values and abandoning justice makes us both less safe and less free.”

Human rights lawyer Gareth Peirce, who represents many of the men kept under control and deportation orders, said:

“The judges said there is an absolute, irreducible minimum of information that an individual should have.”

Ends

 



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