Protecting Damian Green From Himself

Protecting Damian Green From Himself

Iain Dale 9:40 AM

What a bleedin' liberty as Catherine Tate's grandmother character might say. It seems the Met used covert recording equipment to tape anything Damian Green said from the moment of his arrest until he arrived at Belgravia Police Station two hours later. This tactic is only ever used on terror suspects, I gather. It was, according to the Met, "done with the best of intentions". Of course it was. No doubt to protect Mr Green from himself. At least, that's the excuse the Stasi would have given.

Does a suspect have no rights in this situation? If he is to be taped, surely he has a right to be told that he is being taped? Fine, if he is a terror suspect, then the rules change, I suppose, but Damian Green was not a terror suspect. The only inference which can be drawn is the the Police were covertly inviting Damian Green to incriminate himself.

As I said, what a bleedin' liberty. They must be held to account. And at the risk of provoking accusations of "helping my Tory friends" from Assistant Commander Quick, if it was he who authorised this, then he has even more music to face.

UPDATE: Paul Waugh says that the Counter Terror Unit is about to be disbanded, with it reverting to two divisions - SO12 and Anti Terror.