Dealing with terrorism...

Much of the Scottish media has been dominated for more than a week with the dispute about the "agreement" with Libya, because of its possible implications for the al-Megrahi case. I've had a close look at all the relevant documents, and it's pretty clear to me that the UK government has done nothing which undermines the authority of the Scottish Executive and Parliament. The "Memorandum of Understanding" between the UK and Libya makes it clear that nothing in it affecting Scotland will go ahead without the approval of the Scottish Executive, and that's undoubtedly right, as it's only the Scottish legal authorities that could agree to any proposal to return any prisoner back to their home country to serve their sentence.

Having said that, it's also pretty clear to me that given the obvious sensitivity of this issue, the Scottish Executive should have been involved in discussions about it at an earlier date. Whether your view is that Alex Salmond was standing up for Scottish interests, or alternatively he was stirring it (you can take your pick!), the fact is that he was able to score in an open goal. That shouldn't have happened, and clearly there's got to be a good look at the channels of communication between Westminster and Holyrood (both within government and within the political parties), and how they are operating, to minimise the chances of this type of dispute happening again. (I don't doubt that the SNP administration will choose issues to highlight differences and disputes - but there's no need to make it easy for them!).

All this concentration on the Libyan agreement meant there was very little media coverage of what was the biggest announcement over the last week from Westminster, namely a review of the counter-terrorism legislation. Whatever your views as to the reasons behind terrorism (something I've spoken on in Parliament before), and how to tackle them, events like the 7/7 bombings in London in 2005 underline the threat is a reality in the UK. What is important is that measures to tackle this threat are both effective and proportionate, and recognise the concerns about civil liberties and the effects on minority communities. Some of the proposals from John Reid made are controversial, but what was important was the way in which he emphasised he would be seeking a consensus both inside Parliament and outside on the way forward before any changes were proposed in the law. I welcome that approach, because of course I didn't like the previous proposal for 90-day detention, and didn't support it; and that was a proposal which clearly didn't have broad support in Parliament.