Why Britain will stand firm against terror
A direct attack on democracy
OUR THOUGHTS and prayers are with families mourning loved ones killed in the carnage which unfolded with terrifying speed in the shadow of the Palace of Westminster; those innocent bystanders who suffered catastrophic injuries and all those who came to the assistance of the dying and maimed whose number included an unarmed police officer heroically killed in the line of duty while protecting Parliament. Exactly one year after the devastating jihadist attacks in Brussels, this was a long feared assault on Britain’s democracy that the Prime Minister condemned as “sick and depraved”.
Though it is important not to jump to conclusions about the motives, or possible affiliation, of the cowardly perpetrator who Theresa May labelled as a “terrorist” in her emotive Downing Street statement, the fact that an assailant, thought to be a so-called ‘lone wolf ’, can plough a car into pedestrians on Westminster Bridge, murder an officer outside Parliament and bring the beating heart of Britain’s democracy to a standstill is a stark reminder of the thankless task which confronts the security services every day.
Their job has never been more invidious. Though they have thwarted 13 terror attacks in the UK since 2013, Mark Rowley, Britain’s most senior counter-terrorism officer, disclosed earlier this month that more than 500 investigations are active at present and a major contingency exercise took place on the river Thames in London as recently as last Sunday. The police have to be successful every time; terrorists, as the IRA taunted the UK for so long, only need to succeed once.
As is customary after such indiscriminate incidents, Britain is again in the debt of the emergency services whose professionalism – at a moment of maximum danger – prevented even greater loss of life. They include prominent figures like the blood-spattered counter-terrorism minister Tobias Ellwood who was credited with trying to save the life of the fallen police officer. A former soldier who is now an MP, it’s a painful irony that his brother was among those killed in the Bali bombings.
It would also be remiss not to acknowledge those police officers and security staff – constantly on high alert – who are physically tasked with protecting the public and terrorist targets like the Houses of Parliament, one of the world’s most iconic buildings.
They continued their work in the grim knowledge that a friend and colleague had paid the ultimate price and that other officers were being treated for serious injuries. However their reflex response – as Mrs May was whisked away by armed police and a meticulously planned emergency drill carefully honed to contain marauding terrorist incidents went into action – prevented an even more serious security breach.
Its seriousness was illustrated by the almost unprecedented decision to suspend Parliamentary proceedings – a vote was taking place as the attacker wreaked havoc – as Westminster, and Downing Street, went into ‘lockdown’ mode. Prophetically, the issue discussed in the preceding hour was enhanced aviation security. One MP spoke for all when they said: “We’re not fearful. We have every confidence in the police.”
With the Palace of Westminster’s precincts becoming a crime scene, and groups of visibly shaken schoolchildren trapped for several hours before being ushered to safety shortly before 6pm, the Scottish Parliament’s decision, too, to suspend its divisive debate on a second independence referendum was welcome on one of those dark days, now tragically all too frequent, when national security supersedes domestic politics.
Yet, as the criminal investigation accelerates and world leaders offer their unflinching support and solidarity, the trail of destruction – and chilling reminders of last year’s atrocities in Brussels, Nice and Berlin – will prompt searching questions of the intelligence community, a wider debate about equipping even more police with firearms and whether security at Westminster’s main access point needs to be tightened still further. Desperately difficult dilemmas, the omnipresent risk of such incidents is the painful price that countries, like Britain, pay for an open democracy in which seats of power – like the Houses of Parliament – are vulnerable because of their very public accessibility.
Indeed, it is this delicate balance between security and access – cruelly illustrated by the execution of Batley & Spen MP Jo Cox outside a constituency surgery last June – that needs to be cherished. Britain must, and will, never surrender to those extremists whose views are incompatible with a country that prides itself on being a shining beacon of democracy, liberty and freedom of speech that is respected around the world.
As Parliamentarians meets “as normal” this morning, and Londoners go about their daily business, the Prime Minister spoke for the whole nation when she vowed: “We will all move forward together, never giving in to terror and never allowing the voices of hate and evil to drive us apart.”