Hands Demands Action on Hamza 'Loopholes'
Local MP warns that other terror suspects could exploit system
The government has learned none of the lessons of Abu Hamza’s ten year long abuse of British hospitality, according to Hammersmith and Fulham MP Greg Hands.
In a special half-hour adjournment debate in Westminster Hall, Hands slammed government Minister Edward Balls for failing to act on a loophole which means that those accused of terrorist offences can transfer their assets into the name of family members or other third parties to escape those assets being frozen by the government.
The MP highlighted the case of Abu Hamza, the jailed Muslim Cleric and former Acton resident and Hammersmith & Fulham Council tenant who transferred his council purchased property into his son’s name, therefore preventing the government from freezing the asset worth £228,000.
Hands said that none of the lessons of Hamza's stay have been learned and called for three urgent investigations:
• To urgently close the terror finance loophole exploited by Abu Hamza. Edward Balls admitted during the debate that the loophole was still open.
• For the circumstances of Abu Hamza’s Right to Buy purchase of his Council flat in Adie Road, Hammersmith, 1998 – 2000 to be investigated. The then Labour Council accepted that the £75,000 in cash paid by Hamza was a set of “donations”, despite the fact that the Charity Commission was investigating financial irregularities at the Finsbury Park Mosque at the time.
• For the Department of Work and Pensions (DWP) to urgently re-examine Abu Hamza and his family’s benefit claims, past and present. The DWP and the then Labour Council seemed to be the only people not believing that Abu Hamza was living with his wife in Shepherds Bush, during most of the period 2000 – 2004.
Hands said “If another Abu Hamza appeared amongst us, he would likely be granted British citizenship, would likely be housed by a local authority, would likely be assessed as being entitled to thousands of pounds in benefits, would likely be entitled to buy the home from a local authority, would likely not be brought before a British court for terror offences unless the Government relented and allowed intercept evidence to be used in court, and, crucially, would not be prevented by Gordon Brown's supposedly "tough" anti-terror measures from transferring assets worth many hundreds of thousands of pounds. At a time of almost daily terror plots and scares, we need to make sure that we have learned the lessons from the terror plots of recent years.”
The MP for Hammersmith & Fulham has been following the history of Abu Hamza's stay in Britain since 1999, when, as Leader of the Conservative Opposition on Labour-controlled Hammersmith & Fulham Council, he first became aware of Hamza's status as a Hammersmith & Fulham Council tenant, living in a highly desirable street property in the heart of Brackenbury Village.
He called for the Council to investigate Hamza's financial affairs in 2001, and further called for him to be stripped of citizenship and expelled from Britain. Greg undertook a great deal of research into the purchase and sale of his Adie Road, Hammersmith, property, and called for resignations at the Council when it transpired that Abu Hamza and his family had been housed twice, by the then Labour Council.
February 2, 2007
