Your job’s safe, David Cameron tells Theresa May

DAVID Cameron has backed his under-fire Home Secretary Theresa May with a vote of confidence as pressure mounts over her handling of the Abu Qatada case.

Downing Street confirmed that Mr Cameron had telephoned Ms May to tell her that her job is safe, amid fears the radical Muslim cleric may be released on bail, again, while his appeal to the European Court of Human Rights is heard.

The Home Office rearrested Qatada on Monday night believing his window to appeal to the European Court had closed, only to be told by Strasbourg that he still had 24 hours, and his lawyers made contact two hours before the deadline.

The Home Secretary refused to answer questions on the issue as she attended a Stonewall event on gay rights yesterday.

The UK government has said it will resist any applications for bail made by the cleric.

Mr Justice Mitting, the British special immigration appeals commission judge, returned Qatada to jail this week after a rapidly convened court hearing found deportation was imminent and the chance of Qatada trying to abscond had increased.

But yesterday, in his written judgment, he warned that if it is “obvious” in two or three weeks that deportation is “not imminent” he will reconsider bail.

A note sent to the House of Commons Library has appeared to back Qatada’s legal team.

It was signed by Nathalie Chene, of Secretariat of the Committee of Ministers Council of Europe.

“The Othman [Qatada] case was supposed to become final on 17 April and, according to the information provided by the European Court, the applicant requested a referral to the Grand Chamber on the 17 April,” it said.

“So I would say that it [was] just in time but of course the court may decide otherwise.”

In the House of Commons, on Thursday, Ms May was adamant that the appeal deadline had passed 24 hours earlier.

“The government is clear that Abu Qatada has no right to refer the case to the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights, since the three-month deadline to do so lapsed at midnight on Monday,” she said.

“The government has written to the European Court to make clear our case that the application should be rejected because it is out of time.”

In the Commons, Ms May accused the lawyers of using “delaying tactics” to hold up the deportation process.

She acknowledged, however, that proceedings would have to be put on hold while the Grand Chamber panel came to a decision on the admissibility of the appeal. “They are the only final arbiters of what the deadline was,” she said.

Shadow Labour’s Home Secretary Yvette Cooper accused Ms May of taking risks with national security. She said: “The idea that Abu Qatada could be back on the streets of London within weeks, if not days, as a result of the Home Secretary’s decision is shocking.

“Theresa May has told us herself how dangerous she believes this man to be, yet now her own shambles could be what gets him out of jail. The job of the Home Secretary is to keep the public safe, not take risks with national security.”