Ahead of the HASC session on the escape of two TPIM terror suspects Yvette Cooper has written to Theresa May

·         The letter outlines the weaknesses of and the repeated warnings about the TPIM regime the Home Secretary ignored on their introduction.

·         Calls for Theresa May to apologise for this and review the entire system with public safety rather than her own reputation as the primary concern.

·         Offers cross party support if the Home Secretary brings forward legislation to Parliament re introducing the power to relocate terror suspects to other cities or towns not different boroughs. No one on a real relocation order has absconded and all experts agree this is the best way to prevent it happening.

·         Additionally and ahead of the TPIM regime ending for 6 terror suspects in January calls for a full risk assessment to be undertaken on each individual, overseen by the Intelligence and Security Committee, to determine the measures needed to maintain national security and public safety.

The full text of the letter is below:

Rt Hon Theresa May MP
Home Secretary
Home Office
2 Marsham Street
London
SW1P 4DF

Dear Theresa,

Ten days later, there is still no sign of Mohammed Ahmed Mohamed. Just as 320 days later, Ibrahim Magag has not been found. Clearly the TPIMs regime that you introduced two years ago is failing.

According to reports, we now understand that Mr Mohamed was not under surveillance when he absconded, just as Mr Magag was not. And where Mr Magag disappeared in a black cab, it appears Mr Mohamed ran off in a mini cab.

Relocation

No terror suspect under a relocation order ever managed to abscond. Now two terror suspects who were previously relocated and then returned because of your decision have absconded. Your decision, against advice and warnings, to end relocations has made it much easier for two dangerous men to disappear.

You told Parliament explicitly that under the new regime, “forcible relocation will be ended…. They will have greater freedom to associate”.

In Parliament you argued the purpose of TPIMs was about “re-striking the balance between national security and civil liberties”. You also claimed that TPIMs would allow suspects to “take part in what is regarded as normal activity” through a system that “clearly provides no power for individuals to be relocated to another part of the country”.

After the absconding of Ibrahim Magag, you said to MPs “I am confident in the TPIM package that was available—the TPIM measures plus the extra resources”. You were also asked seven times whether removing relocation had weakened the controls, and seven times you defended the regime.

Yet you were repeatedly warned about the risks. Stuart Osborne, Deputy Assistant Commissioner, Metropolitan Police, and Senior National Co-ordinator for Terrorism Investigations, said of your decision “the relocation issue has been very useful for us being able to monitor and enforce at the current time. Without that relocation, and depending on where people choose to live, that could be significantly more difficult”.

Lord Carlile, the former Independent Reviewer, said: “[That] Magag did not abscond while subject to a judicially approved relocation order, and that he absconded when that was removed, is in itself clear evidence of the poor decision to remove relocation order… nobody absconded while subject to a relocation order.”

And the current Independent Reviewer, David Anderson, has refuted your claim that this part of Control Orders was being “steadily eroded by the courts, and the system was becoming unviable”. On the contrary, David Anderson stated: “The possibility of relocation has now been removed. That step was not required by the courts (which had indeed shown themselves generally supportive of relocation as a deterrent to TRA).” He noted in his 2011 report that “those changes… are unlikely to further the requirements of national security – rather the reverse”.

As a consequence of your decision, Mr Mohamed’s family have said: “It was a lot worse when he [Mr Mohamed] was on a control order,” said a close relative. “They used to follow him. But now [under a TPIM] it was more laid-back.” So laid-back that he and his associate Ibrahim Magag, have both been able to easily abscond.

Will you now accept that the decision to end relocations was a very serious error of judgement and has led directly to two out of the ten terror suspects on TPIMs now absconding?

Will you apologise to the public and Parliament for increasing the risk to public safety in this way, and will you take immediate action to rectify this before any more TPIMs terror suspects abscond?

In particular, will you now agree to re-introduce the power to relocate terror suspects in individual cases if it is justified – with appropriate judicial safeguards in place? We have urged you to do this repeatedly for the last three years. On a cross-party basis I would like to offer the Opposition’s support for reintroducing the power of relocation into the TPIMs legislation as a matter of urgency. You will not therefore be inhibited by the Liberal Democrats, who you have blamed for a lack of action on other issues.

I understand that you will be concerned about whether this will be a u-turn. However this area of policy is too important to ignore the evidence as you have done for the last three years.

You have briefed the newspapers that you are considering relocating people within the same city. The power to relocate someone simply from Acton to Ealing is unlikely to have much impact if they need to be removed from contact with other terror suspect networks. And under your own legislation you do not even have the power to do that. The Home Office memorandum is clear that this cannot allow someone to be moved “away from their home area or area they wish to live”.

Two-year limit

The second weakness of the TPIMs legislation, as you know, is the two-year cut off which does not allow for a TPIM measure to be applied without evidence of new terrorist activity, even if someone is assessed by the security experts and the courts as extremely dangerous and posing a significant threat.

Will you now ensure that there is a rapid risk assessment done on the threat current TPIM suspects would pose to our national security when not subject to any restrictions? According to David Anderson six of these suspects will be free of any restrictions on 26 January. Will you also inform the House whether any of the police, security service or oversight bodies have advised you that it would be in the public interest to extend any of those TPIMs.

I urge you on a cross party basis to share the full assessment with the cross-party Intelligence and Security Committee, which has experience of handling secret intelligence and information from our Security Service and police. They should then be free to make recommendations on whether the TPIM subjects should be free of controls, or whether it would be in the interests of national security to allow for the extension of some of the orders. You should also ask the ISC – or another specially constituted parliamentary joint committee – to look now at the TPIMs legislation and at the threat assessments to see what changes or extensions are needed.

Decisions about this very small minority of terror suspects are always very difficult. There is no perfect solution to those who cannot stand trial on the basis of secret intelligence or sources that may be exposed, but there has long been cross-party agreement that action is needed in the interests of public safety and subject to proper judicial scrutiny and safeguards. However, those decisions must be based on the evidence and not on political positioning. In this case you have not followed the evidence.

I urge you to engage on a cross-party basis to put national security ahead of any political embarrassment you believe to be the cost of changing your position.

This letter is being released publicly in the interests of cross-party debate and dialogue.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Yours sincerely,

Yvette Cooper MP
Shadow Home Secretary