LONDON - British government proposals to fight terrorism suffered a blow Monday when the upper house of parliament voted to allow judges, not a cabinet minister, to impose restrictions including electronic tagging and curfews on suspects.
The unelected House of Lords voted by 249 to 119 in support of the opposition Liberal Democrat amendment, which came during the detailed committee stage of debate on the Prevention of Terrorism Bill.
The decision modifies the Labour government's initial anti-terrorism legislation, which gave the home secretary the right to authorize "control orders" ranging from tagging, curfews and bans on phone and Internet use to full house arrest.
Home Secretary Charles Clarke has already conceded judicial involvement for house arrest orders in an attempt to achieve consensus in the House of Commons.
But parliamentary opposition to the bill remains strong, as even members of Prime Minister Tony Blair's Labour government have demanded that judges be allowed to rule on other control orders as well.
The Prevention of Terrorism Act was passed only narrowly by the House of Commons last week in a 272-219 vote amid a revolt among backbench Labour lawmakers.
It is meant to replace a previous anti-terrorism measure allowing foreign suspects to be jailed indefinitely without trial, which was ruled unlawful last December.
That law -- the Anti-Terrorism, Crime and Security Act 2001 -- expires on March 14.
When it was struck down by the Law Lords, a dozen foreign terrorism suspects were being held in British prisons, prompting critics to draw comparisons with the US detention of Al-Qaeda and Taliban suspects at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
The British government gave no indication late Monday whether it would seek to overturn the amendment when the Prevention of Terrorism Bill returns to the House of Commons.
A Home Office spokesperson said: "The government continues to believe that the bill as passed by the House of Commons strikes the right balance between protecting the security of the nation and safeguarding individual liberty.
"The Commons will consider the bill as returned by the Lords."
The setback came a day after the former head of London's Metropolitan Police, Lord John Stevens, warned in a newspaper column that perhaps 200 trained Al-Qaeda militants were at large in Britain.
His statement echoed a broadly similar claim last week by Blair, who is gearing up for a general election that is expected to take place in May.
Trying to overturn the amendments in the Commons is a potentially dangerous option for the government, political analysts said.
Even if the legislation did get through the Commons, the bill would then have to return to the Lords again where peers -- emboldened by the size of Monday's revolt -- are unlikely to back down.
On the other hand, the Conservatives have made clear that they will not wreck the Bill completely -- which would leave them exposed to charges that they were "soft on terrorism" in the run-up to the election.
03/07/2005 23:21 GMT