The new Irish

The use and implementation of anti-terror laws on the Muslim community draws disturbing parallels to the Irish community’s experiences during the Troubles.

Paul Donovan

The comments of assistant commissioner in the Metropolitan police Tarique Ghaffur about the alienation of the Muslim community by anti-terror laws raises the question as to why the police and Home Office have not learnt the lessons of the past with the Irish experience. The same approach is being adopted now - with similar alienating effects on the Muslim community - as was previously tried and failed regarding the Irish community during the Troubles.

When the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA) was introduced after the Birmingham and Guildford pub bombings in 1974, the Irish in Britain felt its full force. They were routinely stopped and interrogated at ports and airports, their houses were raided and they were held for anything from a few hours to seven days, usually to be let go without charge.

The statistics are clear: 7,052 people were detained under the Act between 1974 and 1991, and 86% of them were subsequently released without charge. So far as the Irish community was concerned the message was clear: to be Irish was to be suspect.

The use of anti-terror law and an underlying racism towards the Irish resulted in the miscarriages of justice involving the Birmingham Six, Judith Ward, the Guildford Four and the Maguire Seven. Attacks on the Irish community during this period were often not reported in the media or followed up by police.

The community shrank in on itself. In Liverpool many Irish people went absent from work the day after a bombing atrocity for fear of reprisals. Irish clubs developed as a network of havens where people could go and mix with their own. The Irish Post newspaper was established in 1970 to bring the news of the community that was not available in national or local media.

On the political front the Irish, a long-standing and strong presence in the Labour party, retreated from the scene and it was only with an end to bombing and the Northern Ireland peace process that the Irish in Britain began to emerge and assert themselves politically and culturally.

In short, the PTA caused injustice, alienated law-abiding citizens and created resentment among people whose cooperation could have been invaluable for the government and police. Worse, there can be little doubt that it increased sympathy for the IRA.

Now Muslim people say they are being treated in a similar way. They have been pulled over for questioning at airports or ferry terminals and picked on for no apparent reason other than their ethnic origin. Recently, Gerry Conlon, one of the Guildford Four, noted the resemblance to the world of the 1970s. “The only difference is that the colour and the religion has changed,” he said.

One policing method used against the Irish community and now being deployed with equal vigour against Muslims is disruption. Designed to unsettle terror cells operating within the immigrant communities, disruption involves arrests that won’t necessarily result in charges. “The wide-scale raids against members of the Muslim community are in line with the infamous national anti-terrorist strategy of disruption which had such counter-productive effects on the Irish community,” said a spokesperson for the Muslim Council of Britain. “Many Muslim leaders now believe disruption is beginning to alienate communities from the police. There is a wealth of information available bearing testimony to the way the anti-terror regime in the 80s forced the Irish community in England underground, providing a fertile ground for the cultivation of terrorism.”

There is a pattern of detaining Muslims under anti-terror law, but not charging them. Between 11 September 2001 and June 2004 there were 609 arrests under anti-terror legislation. Of those 609, only 99 were charged and only 15 convicted of anti-terror offences.

Off the record, the Home Office says it is looking at their record with the Irish community and wants to learn the lessons of the Irish experience, yet new anti-terror laws show every sign of alienating Muslims in just the way the Irish experienced in the 1970s.

When a community draws in on itself that is bad news. For the few terrorists around who may be plotting bomb outrages there is likely to be far more opportunity to hide, and the feeling of collective isolation and threat will foster sympathy where there may have been none before. When that happens both community relations and the drive to prevent terrorism are damaged.