Government and Opposition MP?s alike questioned whether the Police will be able to cope with the challenge of the revolutionary PACE legislation, and whether it is tough enough to address the threat of terrorism.

John Barritt, Opposition Leader and Party Whip, told the House: ?I?m concerned that we will find that the Bermuda Police Service will in the end not be able to cope with it, even after education and training.?

He said it is his impression that the Police have become desk-bound at their stations, that they ?don?t sweat the small stuff? and only turn out of the station if ?preferably someone?s dead.?

Referring to the requirements that the new legislation will place on officers in terms of modernising the detention and evidence-collecting process, he cited concerns that some officers might find this hard.

?We used to be able to describe the friendly policeman as ?P.c. Plod? on the beat, a friendly fellow who could deal with anyone about to commit a crime or who was getting out of hand.

?P.c. Plod was able to work that way but times have changed and so has crime and what we need with this Bill is not P.c. Plod but P.c. Palm Pilot or P.c. PDA.

?Not only will his truncheon and the new pepper spray be essential but he will need his BlackBerry or Palm Pilot to make sure that he records everything. Police officers will need to be skilled in that if this legislation is going to work the way it should,? said Mr. Barritt.

He said the requirements of PACE could lead to Police officers committing ?technical breaches? of the legislation that would be exploited by defence lawyers and added: ?That?s how the public loses confidence in the criminal justice system.?

And in a later observation on the same subject, he added: ?I?m concerned that our Police force is not up to the task. I?m not trying to play political football ? I?m trying to be realistic. We need to bring the level of quality in our Police force up. We are not in the days of P.c. Plod any more and we need people who are skilled.?

Questioning whether the legislation is wide-ranging or forward thinking enough, Mr. Barritt said that the world had moved on a great deal since the Brixton riots in the UK around 25 years ago which prompted the birth of PACE there.

?We have a whole new generation of criminals, not to mention the war on terror,? he said, going on to list reforms and mooted reforms within the UK criminal justice system such as judge-alone trials in complex fraud cases and re-trials where new and compelling evidence comes to light.

?The UK has adopted a common-sense approach to the problems they face today and we don?t do that here. We overlook the bigger picture.?

Wayne Perinchief, Minister of National Drug Control and a former senior Police officer, said that PACE would require police officers to completely re-think their strategies on dealing with arrested persons if they are going to gather evidence in the correct way.

He said he believed that raw recruits who have not had time to learn bad habits will find this easier than older officers who will have to ?change their stripes.?

He said that officers like himself who had operated in the days when policing was like the ?Wild Wild West? would be considered ?dangerous dinosaurs? once PACE is implemented.

?We have to accept that the entire landscape of the criminal justice system will have to change from the moment that someone is arrested,? he said.

And citing concerns that PACE will be ?onerous? for Police officers, he said: ?I can see some of the defence lawyers seeing Policemen as fair game as the result of PACE not being followed to the letter.?

He praised the Attorney General for adding the caveat to the bill that he will decide when the various elements are rolled out in order that people working within it can keep pace.

Cole Simons of the UBP said he was concerned that although treason, murder, manslaughter and kidnap are all listed in the act as serious arrestable offences, there is no mention of terrorism despite recent events such as September 11 and the terrorist bombings in London and Madrid.

?In the UK the Police force can detain a suspected terrorist for up to 90 days but in this legislation in Bermuda it?s only 36 hours. Terrorism is a network and we need to assure ourselves that there are no terrorist cells in Bermuda. We can be seen as a transit point between London and New York and we could be a target ourselves. If terrorists want to cripple the world insurance market they need only plant a bomb in Bermudiana Road,? he said.

?I would suggest that the Minister revisits this issue and addresses terrorism as it pertains to Bermuda.?

PLP MP Ashfield DeVent said he remembered the turbulent times in the 1980s in Britain as he had been in the UK at school.

?One of the key factors that came out of this was the law commonly known as the ?suss law? ? suspicion. At the time when I attended school, and depending on where you were in London, you would come out of the night club and the paddy wagons (Police vans) would be lined up outside to take every person that came out and put them in a paddy wagon take them off and search them,? he said.

?This would happen on numerous occasions until eventually us from Bermuda would try to avoid certain areas at certain times.?

He said Bermuda also had its own turbulent times and riots in the 1960s and 1970s, and this new Bill was designed to protect the individual from any misuse of power by the Police or the State.

?I have heard members on the other side say that this is going to make Police work harder and they might be mired in paperwork and they?ll have to put more effort in, and I say good,? he said, adding he would rather see that than individuals inconvenienced and lose their time being brought to court because of ?shoddy work? by Police.

?If the police are going to have to get up quickly and learn quickly to make this happen, I say good, tough. If they have to work harder to get prepared to deal with this PACE it?s a good thing.?

Responding to the earlier questions Home Affairs Minister Randy Horton said: ?Some time earlier this year we passed a huge anti-terrorism Bill in this House and earlier I spoke about educating Police and the public.?