Not that I want to turn into a terror bore (too late, I should imagine) but this week is shaping up into another big week for those of us interested in working out exactly what is the threat 'festering and spawning on Britain's streets'. This is, of course, because it's time for Britain's most radical ever counter-terrorist legislation to batter its way through parliament and onto the statute books.
I was happily making my way through a French airport on my way back from holiday late on Saturday night when the BBC rang to tell me that Sir John Stevens was telling the readers of the News of the World that there were as many as 200 'Osama bin Laden-trained terrorists' at liberty in the UK. My immediate reaction was a mix of incredulity and fury. First, I couldn't understand what Sir John was talking about as his own officers have told me often enough that they are concerned about a far smaller number of people.
Secondly, I couldn't work out who he was talking about. After all, if these people were trained by OBL, that meant before 2001 and the destruction of the Afghan training camp so what had they (or the police) been doing for four years? We all know that the threat now comes from untrained 'cleanskins' with no previous involvement in terrorism. And thirdly, I couldn't work out why Sir John had decided to scare the pants off the British public with poorly thought out headline grabbing menaces - until I remembered the bill that was having such difficulty in parliament.
I'm not really bothered by the niceties of the legal arguments over the bill but what does anger me is the complete failure of this government to have a sensible, informed, level-headed discussion with the public over the terror threat - or lack of threat. Hysterical talk of hundreds of potential terrorists simply does not help anyone - and does possibly irreparable damage to community relations. We are not stupid. We can understand the necessity for civil liberties to be curtailed if it is essential for our security. We can weigh evidence and judge it like adults, not like five year olds who have to be scared into doing anything by the prospect of some dreadful happening - the bogieman coming - if we are bad.
As ever we've had a lot of 'are we safe?' style analysis in recent days, and there'll be plenty more in the days to come. My answer, for what it's worth, is no, we are not safe, of course we are not safe, but we are a damned sight safer than people like Sir John Stevens would have us all believe.
And, having thoroughly sounded off, now I'll have to find something to write for the end of the week. I won't be revealing that our streets are full of potential suicide bombers. However, all alternative suggestions are welcome.
