I was going to put to Ken Livingstone in Mayor’s Question Time a question on terrorism and terror laws and how the repercussions have been targeted on Muslims in London. But sadly – Ken had lost his voice, so Mayor’s Question Time was cancelled.

Here in London, we have lived through thirty years or more of fighting terrorism. That is the actual history and experience of our country – notspun, not hyped up, just the reality.

What have we learnt from thirty years of real terrorists, real bombs and real bloodshed? There are two very clear lessons from those years: firstly, internment failed. It didn’t stop terrorism. It simply created more terrorists. Secondly -despite extensive and detailed intelligence operations – we didn’t get the police saying after the bombs – ‘Hello, hello, hello – we knew that X and Y were about to plant a bomb and we’d have been able to stop the bombing if only you’d let us pop ’em away without trial’.

Two of the top policemen in the fight against terrorism were George Churchill-Coleman – head of Scotland Yard’s anti-terrorist squad in the 1980s and 1990s – and now Lord Condon, the Met’s former top policeman.

Churchill-Coleman has spoken out against Labour’s house arrest plans, saying the plans are “not practical” and “I have a horrible feeling that we are sinking into a police state, and that’s not good for anybody”. Lord Condon too has opposed the plans – and voted against them in the Lords.

So when Labour politicians tries to paint opponents of their plans as soft on terrorism – remember that they’re accusing two of the top policemen in the fight against the IRA. Hmmm … !

The reality is that at the moment we are talking about fewer terrorists in the UK, with less training, less equipment and less experience than the IRA had at their peak. So anyone claiming more measures and more powers are needed really needs to make the case against that background.

Too much of the government’s case has rested on the idea that the authorities “know” who is the terrorists are and as terrorists are bad guys, doing something about this must be a good thing.

Well, yes – the authorities say they “know.” Just as they “knew” the Guildford 4 did it, and just like they knew the Birmingham 6 did it – and like they “knew” there were WMD in Iraq. That’s the other lesson from the fight against the IRA – taking action against people because you “know” they did it doesn’t result in terrorists being caught; it results in innocent people suffering whilst the real terrorists get away with it.

One last thought about house arrest. How will it work?

Imagine the scene. Person under house arrest. Well – that won’t stay secret for long.

So you’ll have the person in the house. The police watching outside the house. The protestors around the police. More police policing the protestors protesting against the police. And a road full of TV vans.

Way to go guys!

But the serious point is the damage this does to communities and policing -and all in the name of measures which go over the top.

I don’t want to die in a terrorist attack – but the fear of terrorism shouldn’t blind us to accepting anything dressed up in the language of being tough on terrorism.