12 June 08

David Davis resigns as a Member of Parliament over the Government’s plans to extend pre-charge detention to 42 days. more

11 July 08

David Davis wins by-election with 70% of the vote. more

13 Oct 08

The House of Lords rejects the Government’s proposal of  42 days pre-charge detention by 309 votes to 118, forcing Gordon Brown to drop the clause from the Counter Terrorism Bill. more

5 Nov 08

The Government defeated again in the House of Lords over the Counter Terrorism Bill, this time over issue of keeping people’s DNA and fingerprint on the police national database. more

7 Nov 08

The Home Office reveals that the cost of ID cards has crept up by £50 million in the past sixth months to almost £5 billion, as it announces a pilot scheme. more

25 Nov 08

The first compulsory ID cards since the 1950s were issued this week to thousands of foreign nationals living in the country, the Home Office announced. more

28 Nov 08

Damian Green MP arrested and his home and Parliamentary Office were searched as part of a police inquiry into Home Office leaks. more

16 April 09

Charges against Damian Green were dropped by the CPS, who have said that “there was no evidence that national security had been put at risk”. Green, who was arrested in November, described the affair as “the first arrest of an opposition politician for doing his job, since Britain became a democracy”. more

29 April 09

David Blunkett calls for ID cards to be scrapped, the ‘father’ of the ID cards scheme, suggested that biometric passports could replace the controversial scheme. more

3 May 09

DNA profiles of 800,000 innocent people will be removed by the police, in response to the ECHR ruling last year. They include people who have been arrested and never charged, and those taken to court but found not guilty. more

11 June 09

Law Lords have ruled unanimously, that the use of secret evidence breached human rights legislation, dealing a major blow to the governments controversial use of control orders on terrorist suspects. more