§ Mr. Terry Lewis accordingly presented a Bill to provide for additional powers for the police to carry out random breath tests at the roadside; And the same was read the First time; and ordered to be read a Second time upon Friday 1 February and to be printed. [Bill 62.]
§ Mr. Chris Mullin (Sunderland, South)On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. I have just come from Her Majesty's prison, Pentonville, where a constituent of mine is one of about 70 Iraqis held in conditions far worse than those in which Saddam Hussein held his hostages. He has lived in this country for nearly 10 years. He was picked up without any notice and brought to the prison in handcuffs. He is a respectable business man, who has never been involved in any political activity of any kind. He and about 70 other people are now languishing in Pentonville prison awaiting deportation to Iraq, where many of them face perhaps death.
As I cannot get any sense out of the Home Office on this subject, Mr. Speaker, I wonder whether you could use your influence with the Secretary of State for the Home Department to ask him to come to the House to make a statement. Perhaps you could remind him that we are supposed to be fighting a police state, not behaving as though we are one.
§ Mr. SpeakerThis patently is not a matter for me. The hon. Member has made his point, and I am sure that what he has said will have been heard by those on the Front Bench.