On 12 September 2024, the new UK Terrorism (Protection of Premises) Bill was introduced to the House of Commons, with the second reading taking place on the 14th.th October. A committee stage now follows, followed by a third reading, with the same stages repeated in the Lords, before the bill receives royal assent and becomes law. As is common in the fight against terrorism, the Bill has cross-party support in the UK. The then Prime Minister, Rishi Sunak, committed his government to respect the new law before calling the election, including it in his final King’s Speech in November 2023. The new Labor Prime Minister, Keir Starmer, is also a long-time supporter, writing to Figen Murray. – its main defender – in the run-up to its successful election, promising its introduction as soon as possible. It is therefore almost certain that the measure will become law, probably in early 2025.
The measure has been dragged out for a long time, with the first draft law published in May 2023, a pre-legislative review taking place before the Home Affairs Select Committee in summer 2023 and a public consultation taking place in early 2024. When it is Passed into law, the Protect Duty will represent the most significant change to the UK’s counter-terrorism framework since 9/11. This is no small feat, given the considerable counter-terrorism activity that has already taken place during this period, with 7 major anti-terrorism bills passed by Parliament since 2000.
The new bill, also known as Martyn’s Law in honor of Martyn Hett – one of the victims of the Manchester Arena attack in which 22 people lost their lives, and son of Figen Murray – will impose significant new legal responsibilities on owners, employees and safety. staff of hundreds of thousands of sites. Shops, restaurants, libraries, community centers and other public spaces will be an integral part of the UK’s fight against terrorism. Such places will now be required to take “reasonably practicable actions” to prepare for and respond to terrorist incidents.
Two levels are proposed in the bill submitted to Parliament. Venues with a capacity between 200 and 799 people will be subject to the standard level, with lesser requirements focused on action plans and limited training requirements. Venues with a capacity of 800 people and above will fall into the enhanced tier and will be required to take a wider range of protective measures. Protect is expected to cost £2.1 billion, with additional costs affecting almost 200,000 premises, significantly extending the scope and reach of the UK’s counter-terrorism framework.
The bill is seen as a necessary step given the changing circumstances of recent political violence. An important impetus behind this legislation is the apparent shift away from organized group terrorism using relatively sophisticated means such as IEDs and weapons, towards the less predictable violence of isolated, sometimes self-radicalized actors, employing diffuse, low-tech violence. . As Home Secretary, Yvette Cooper told Parliament:
Audiences can be targeted to a wide range of places and public spaces. We also know that the terrorist threat has become less predictable and that potential attacks are more difficult to detect and investigate. That’s why everyone needs to be part of the measures we take to keep people safe, including those running premises and events (Hansard 2024).
Under the new Protect Duty, site owners and employees will now be identified as significant and active contributors to the UK’s national security in the response to terrorism.
One way to conceive of Protect is to consider it as a significant acceleration of two existing trajectories in the post-September 11 counterterrorism context. Firstly, it advances the legal expansion of counter-terrorism responsibility that is evident in the UK’s existing counter-radicalization framework, Prevent. This framework has generated new obligations for public sector workers, such as teachers and health professionals, to identify those at risk of becoming “radicalized” and to intervene early, before crime. Second, it also continues a broader effort to “empower” ordinary citizens as “detectives” or “stakeholders” in providing security against terrorism. We see this, among other things, in information campaigns on terrorism – See it, say it, sorted – and in the public communication efforts of police forces and public authorities.
Despite these broader trends, some elements of Martyn’s Law are new and different. The main one is that where previous legal obligations, such as the duty to prevent, were focused on the public sector – and to some extent expanded existing legal responsibilities, particularly in relation to safeguarding – the Martyn Law results in much diffusion wider private enterprise and voluntary sector. Much of the pre-legislative scrutiny before the Home Affairs Committee focused on the impact this could have on smaller voluntary associations (and this may explain why the size of qualifying sites was reduced from 100 to 200), but some of the biggest impacts could be felt by larger venues which may be required to adopt significant changes. It could be argued that Martyn’s Law is not that different from health and safety legislation, which imposes legal requirements on public and private places to ensure their premises are safe for the public and workers. While this may be the case in legal form, Martyn’s Law also positions these places as responsible for (elements of) national security. The Bill’s guidance notes state that Martyn’s Law will apply to all four nations of the UK because the Bill concerns “national security” (which is a reserved and non-devolved matter).
The bill raises a wide range of issues that require urgent social science research. First, will the measure work? Supporters of the measure see it as a cost-effective way to save lives, while critics have expressed concerns that the measure risks displacing rather than erasing the locus of violence. Following the strengthening of airport security after 9/11 and the liquid bomb plot in 2006, terrorist attacks have significantly evolved towards “softer” targets, using less efficient technology. The wave of stabbing and vehicle attacks that took place in Europe in 2016 and 2017 could be seen as a response to the changing security environment. If Martyn’s Law ‘succeeds’ in becoming law, how will the UK ensure that it does not simply shift violence and attacks to other, less protected locations? Or will his “reasonably practicable measures” save lives?
Second, can “ordinary” citizens protect the UK from terrorism? How effective can individuals, who do not have more in-depth security and counterterrorism training, be in responding to and preparing for terrorist incidents? Proponents of Martyn’s Law point out that much can be accomplished through relatively simple measures, such as having a plan in place that all staff are informed of in the event of an incident, but critics have pointed out that other training issues. The Independent Reviewer of Counter-Terrorism Legislation has expressed concerns about the unintended consequences of Martyn’s Law.
This bill invites all kinds of members of the public to become counterterrorism specialists…if there is an attack and it is carried out by a person of a particular ethnicity, when you charge members of the public to become like counter-terrorism agents or to have In a counter-terrorism posture, there is a risk that people will start to say: “Well, I’m not going to welcome someone of that ethnic origin” or “I’m going to do some more research to find people who look like they come from that kind of background.” The police and security services have strong legal and ethical frameworks, and people like me, who oversee this, try to ensure that no one is discriminated against. But once you impose a counterterrorism duty on hundreds of thousands of citizens, the risks of unintended consequences are quite high (Hall, cited in House of Commons 2023).
Third and finally, how will the British public react to these new powers? Ultimately, much of its success will depend on how the general public perceives these measures and those responsible for their implementation. With the appointment of the Security Industry Authority (SIA) as regulator of the Bill, private security services and personnel will have an important role to play. To what extent will the public accept and approve of the entry of private security services into areas traditionally reserved for the state security apparatus? Ultimately, Protect’s success will depend on the response of those it is designed to secure: you.
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