I've no idea what Carta is, PM admits

The Prime Minister was given a light-hearted grilling on the Letterman Show on Wednesday night, where he got several questions about British history wrong.

Several were about the Magna Carta - the origin of many of today's legal freedoms, including due process of law.

The old Etonian didn't know the English translation of its name - Great Charter - and there was a long pause before he remembered that it was signed at Runnymede.

He correctly stated that it had been signed in 1215 and was able to give an account of its importance, saying it was when the king accepted that people had rights. But Mr Cameron's government is planning to erode these very rights by introducing secret trials in its Justice and Security Bill.

Reprieve executive director Clare Algar said: "A serious point lies behind David Cameron's lack of knowledge of Magna Carta.

"This document was arguably the foundation of many of the legal freedoms which we enjoy today - freedoms which are threatened by his government's dangerous proposals for secret courts. Magna Carta stated: 'To no one will we sell, to no-one deny or delay right or justice.'

"Yet the Justice and Security Bill threatens to do just this, by placing politicians above the law and shutting the citizen out of court on ministers' say-so."

paddym@peoples-press.com