Full-body scanners would not have stopped Abdul Mutallab
A Conservative MP has said that the new full-body scanners that could be rolled out in U.K. airports would not have detected the type of explosives that were carried onto a Northwest Airlines jet on Christmas Day. Before entering parliament MP Ben Wallace worked at QinetiQ, a research organisation which was working on the scanners. He warned the Prime Minister that although the scanners had their uses in terms of security they were not able to detect light plastics or dangerous chemicals. He went on to point out that the only machines able to detect explosives of the type Umar Farouk Abdul Mutallab had sown into his underwear would be X-Ray machines. However these take far too long to operate and are a health risk to those passing through them.
Wallace said that he could not understand why everyone passing through an airport was subject to exactly the same security procedures as everybody else. He said that the new millimeter wave scanners could be used on crowds as well as individuals but that a far better security measure was profiling.
One Muslim MP has suggested that Muslims should be subject to more stringent security checks at airports. Labour MP Khalid Mahmood said that most of the people who had undertaken terrorist activity on aircraft recently had been Muslim. He said that he was sure people would be happy to be profiled rather than a victim of terrorism. He went on to say that this was not the same as the victimisation of a community.