London – After a series of bruising parliamentary duels, Prime Minister Tony Blair got a victory in the House of Commons in a vote Wednesday to expand counterterrorism laws by making “glorification” of terrorism a criminal offense.
Legislators voted by 315-277 in a ballot that pitted Blair’s Labor Party against the Conservative and Liberal Democrat opposition, supported by 17 Labor Party dissidents.
Blair’s critics said the vote – one of three critical parliamentary tests in as many days – represented as much a display of political maneuvering as a strengthening of British laws, which already include provisions such as those used last week to prosecute Abu Hamza al-Masri, a firebrand Muslim cleric.
Masri was sentenced to seven years in prison for soliciting murder and inciting racial hatred.
Opponents had said the term “glorification” was legally vague and unnecessary.
“The existing law is quite adequate to the problem,” said Sir Menzies Campbell, leader of the Liberal Democrats.
But, hours before the vote, Blair insisted in Parliament: “If we take out the word ‘glorification,’ we are sending a massive counterproductive signal.”
Political experts said the prime minister seemed to be positioning himself to argue that the opposition was soft on terrorism.
Blair told William Hague, a Conservative opposition leader, “I hope he understands that what he and his colleagues will be voting for today will significantly dilute and weaken the measures attacking glorification that are absolutely vital if we are to defend this country successfully against the likes of Abu Hamza.”
Evoking the July 7 attacks on London’s mass transit, Charles Clarke, the home secretary, said: “It is the glorification of terror which, in the view of the government, is an essential method for those individuals and organizations who pursue terrorist ambitions and seek to get individuals, like the 7/7 bombers, to commit to their suicidal and destructive ends.”
But Hague accused the government of “ineffective authoritarianism” and called the draft legislation “a press release law designed to catch the headlines.”
Both the government and opposition agree that a new counterterrorism law should define measures to prevent “indirectly encouraging acts of terrorism.”
The dispute is whether those measures should include glorifying terrorism, a notion that lawyers and others say is imprecise.
Under British parliamentary procedures, the draft law must now go back to the upper House of Lords, which removed the term “glorification” when it first considered the legislation. The upper house could still try to excise the term, provoking a standoff with the House of Commons.