Press briefing from the Prime Minister’s Official Spokesman on: Operation SINBAD, Petitions, Gun Crime, Police Inquiry and Croke Park
Operation SINBAD
Asked if there would be a Prime Ministerial statement now that Operation SINBAD had finished, the Prime Minister’s Official Spokesman (PMOS) replied that as the Prime Minister had said yesterday, SINBAD had now been completed, and it was being assessed. What we had always said was that at some stage, there would be a statement, and that was still the case. In terms of the timing, people should wait and see.
Put that reports said it would be delayed and therefore, not this month, the PMOS said that he had not seen those reports, and would not necessarily follow them but the Prime Minister and colleagues would assess them, and then decide the way forward.
Asked if the Operation was considered a successful, the PMOS said it had been, in terms of the process of getting the Iraqis in control in Basra. It had also just as importantly established infrastructure projects that were continuing and which were highly useful.
Asked if the Prime Minister believed that the Iraqis were in control in Basra, the PMOS said that they were increasingly in control in Basra, but people should wait for the Prime Minister’s statement for the full assessment, as the PMOS said he was not going to pre-empt it.
Petitions
Asked how the Prime Minister would respond to the road pricing petition, the PMOS said that what the Prime Minister had indicated was that he fully welcomed this debate, as it was a debate that the UK needed to have about congestion. People had strong opinions regardless of whether there was an e-petition process or not, therefore, what was important was that we addressed those opinions as we attempted to come up with a solution. The PMOS said that if we did not do anything, then congestion would increase, and people had even stronger opinions about that. The Prime Minister would reply to the e-petitioners with an answer on the internet.
Asked if the prime Minister would respond to any other petitions, the PMOS replied that a response did go out to the e-petitioners, and in this case, it was the Prime Minister who was replying directly via the internet. The Prime Minister had made no secret of the view that this was an issue that had to be seriously debated, but that meant not just taking account of people’s strong feelings, rather, it meant coming up with solutions. If people objected to certain solutions, then they had to come up with alternative solutions which were credible.
Gun Crime
Asked for clarification about jailing over 18 year olds for five years, the PMOS explained in terms of the legislation, it was introduced in January 2004 through the Criminal Justice Act 2003. The Act stated that unless there were exceptional circumstances, courts must impose a minimum sentence of three years for 16 to 17 year olds or five years for 18-plus year olds. However, the Court of Appeal judged in the Campbell case that the minimum sentence of five years in prison could not be imposed on 18 to 20 year olds, since to do so it said would conflict with the Powers of Criminal Court Act 2000. We were looking at that judgement, because the Prime Minister and the police’s view was that we did need to be able to apply the penalty to those in that bracket. That would be part of the consideration given at the Gun Summit, which the Prime Minister referred to yesterday and which would take place in the next few weeks.
Put that was this not basically an admission that the 2003 Act was "really badly drafted", as the Acts conflicted with earlier legislation, the PMOS replied that the only time that people could reach the sort of judgement was whenever we had finished the process of review. The PMOS said that if he commented on it, he would be getting ahead of it, therefore, what was important was that whatever we needed to do, we would do to allow the law to be applied as it was originally intended.
Put that last year, Lord Bassam told the Lords that there was a problem with the law, and that the same problem still existed, as there was a real conflict between two pieces of legislation, the PMOS said that that was why the Prime Minister had said before the recent events that he had asked the Home Secretary and the police to look at this issue.
Police Inquiry
Asked what the Prime Minister’s response was the Des Smith’s assertion he was "hung out to dry", the PMOS replied that as people knew, we had refused to give a running commentary on any aspect of this inquiry, and that remained the case.
Croke Park
Asked for further information about any act of commemoration at Croke Park next weekend, the PMOS replied that clearly, the first match at Croke Park had been special in its own right. The second match, because of the teams involved, had also a significance around it. However, first and foremost, this was a game of rugby, and that was how both the IRFU and the GAA wanted to treat it, and that was entirely how it should be. What was entirely proper was that there should have been discussions about how we should handle it, but a consensus had been reached, and we fully supported that consensus. The PMOS said that he was not going to get into processology about the discussions, but they were normal discussions that took place around any event such as this one, and they were nothing out of the ordinary.
Asked what the end result would be, the PMOS replied that this would be a rugby match which would treated like any other, and we could all begin to speculate about what the result might be, which was the important thing come this time next week! The PMOS added that he was making no predictions, as he was aware that he would be standing up in front of everyone this time next week as well!
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