Another example has come to light on how the Terrorism Act is used for political purposes by the British state unconnected to any objective notion of terrorism and against the purposes for which it was passed.

Those arrested under S7 can be strip-searched and have all their devices confiscated. Under this section, it is an offence to refuse to cooperate, such as by refusing to answer questions or not providing passwords. A magistrate in a recent case of refusal declared “reasonable suspicion” was neither justified or required (see below).

The latest malefactor is a radical leftist Frenchman, not the sort to evoke sympathy in the average Briton. His crime, he was told, was being an opponent of Macron in the recent French protests.

We originally saw this used politically in the case of the Canadian female, Lauren Southern. She was held by our Border Control in France when trying to reenter Britain, then arrested under Schedule 7 and had all her devices seized. This gave the Home Office some thinking time for finding the right justification to ban her. She had recently generated media headlines for asking "Was Allah Gay" at a tabletop in Luton and this was used to justify a lifetime ban from the country for 'racism'. The Terrorism Reviewer Max Hill, QC saw nothing wrong with this tactic. 

Later it was used again after Britain First leader, Paul Golding returned from giving a speech to the Russian Parliament. He refused to divulge the passwords to his devices and was successfully prosecuted. Chief Magistrate Emma Arbuthnot said that “reasonable suspicion” was not needed by this part of the act. You are obliged to answer any question and provide full access to any device or object they desire.

The problem here, beyond our individual views on the individuals in these cases, is that when they are applied in a manner that the vast majority would consider inappropriate, then it brings into disrepute the terms of the act itself. 

19 Islamic terrorists that we know of have come across the Channel. It's vital that such laws as we have are appropriately applied to retain the general confidence of the public.

Yet in many workings out of the Terrorism Act, such as in Section 58, which the state often uses to target right-wing children for downloading perfectly legal titles like the 'Anarchist's Cookbook', we can see it has strayed far from its intended purposes. Autistic youths, such as Oliver Bel a Cambridge maths graduate can be ambushed by deeply subversive groups like Hope Not Hate and have their life chances severely diminished, just for owning something the state finds useful to inflate White terror statistics.  

As this Frenchman has refused to cooperate, we will have to await and see whether he is charged by the state, or whether his devices are sufficient for our security services to crack and pass back the data back to their French alliés.