Part 1: Counter-terrorism Chapter 3: Counter-terrorism powers Section 16: Evidence obtained under port and border control powers
Schedule 7 to the 2000 Act provides for counter-terrorism port and border controls. It enables an examining officer (who may be a constable, or a designated immigration or customs officer) to stop and question, and where necessary detain and search a person travelling through a port, airport, international rail station or the border area. Such an examination is for the purpose of determining whether the person appears to be someone who is or has been concerned with the commission, preparation or instigation of acts of terrorism. An examining officer may stop, question and search individuals and goods at ports without grounds for suspicion. An examining officer may require a person to answer questions (paragraphs 2 and 3 of Schedule 7) or provide information or certain documents (paragraph 5 of Schedule 7). No period of examination may exceed six hours. Wilful obstruction or frustration of an examination is an offence under paragraph 18 of Schedule 7.
	This section amends Schedule 7 to the 2000 Act to give effect to a recommendation made by Lord Anderson, then Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation, that "there should be a statutory bar to the introduction of Schedule 7 admissions in a subsequent criminal trial".3 The bar applies to oral responses to questions by an examining officer (it remains open to prosecutors to rely on information, for example downloaded from an electronic device, obtained from a person during the course of a search conducted under Schedule 7). The bar is not however absolute; new paragraph 5A(2) enables an answer or information given orally by a person in response to a question asked as part of a Schedule 7 examination to be used in evidence in a criminal trial in the following circumstances:
	Proceedings for an offence under paragraph 18 of Schedule 7 (namely, wilful failure to comply with a duty imposed under or by virtue of Schedule 7, wilful contravention of a prohibition imposed under or by virtue of Schedule 7 and wilful obstruction or frustration of search or examination imposed under or by virtue of Schedule 7);
	On a prosecution for perjury (as defined, in the case of England and Wales and Northern Ireland, in new paragraph 5A(4));
	On a prosecution for another offence where, in giving evidence, the defendant makes a statement inconsistent with the answer or information provided by him or her in response to a Schedule 7 examination.