42 days?

Since 2001 1,471 people have been arrested under anti-terror laws.

          Of whom 642  (44.32%) were charged with an offence or dealt with in another way (eg deportation, caution or detained under the Mental Health Act)        

     521 were charged with an offence  (35.4%)

                     Of whom 222 were charged with a offence under specific anti-terror laws    (15% of total arrested;  42.6% of those charged)              

                               Of whom 102 were convicted  (7% of those arrested; 19.6% of those charged with any offence and 46% of those charged with a specific terrorist offence).

     Out of the 521 charged,  118  were charged with terrorist related offences   

                                Of whom 94 were convicted

= 340 charged with terrorism and terrorist related offences (23% of those arrested), of whom  196 were convicted (13.3% of those arrested, 37.6% of those charged with any offence)

A further 181 were charged with separate offences

Time in custody:

Just under 50% of those arrested were released within 24 hrs

66% were released under two days

6 people were questioned for the maximum 28 days the law allows, of whom 3were released without charge. None of these occured in 2008, when the government tried to extend the maximum to 42 days.

See the Home Office statistics and tables here.

Note: figures are from 2001 – March 2008 and do not include those convicted for the airline bomb plots.