The prison, which doubles up as a film set used by The Royal, Heartbeat and David Blunkett's Banged Up, takes a starring role in a new campaigning video by Amnesty International.

Launched today to coincide with a likely vote by the House of Lords to reject Government plans to allow detention without charge for 42 days, the film shows a series of Scarborough residents sleepwalking into the prison. It features music by dance group The Orb.

Narrator and former Doctor Who Christopher Eccleston states: "The UK government wants to power to lock people up for 42 days without charge. This is an attack on our basic rights. Let's not sleepwalk into it."

Amnesty will use the video to spearhead a lobbying campaign designed to persuade MPs to vote against the Government's proposals when they come
back into the Commons later this year.

But it is not just the video which has a Yorkshire connection – the group is basing its whole campaign in the region.

Tonight will see a "mass sleepwalk" around Leeds, starting at 7.15pm in City Square, before ending nearby with a screening of the film, a DJ set by The Orb and speeches by Amnesty International UK director Kate Allen and 7/7 bombing survivor Rachel North.

Local groups have already taken to the streets of Leeds, Keighley and Hebden Bridge to gather signatures for a petition which will be sent to MPs, and which is also available online at www.protectthehuman.com/42days.

And lobbyists will be concentrating their campaign on persuading a group of Yorkshire and Humber MPs – most of whom voted for 42 days' detention despite voting against the Government when it tried to introduce 90 days detention in 2005 – to switch their vote this time round.

It is thought that if most of the MPs George Mudie, Paul Treswell, Fabian Hamilton, John Battle, Mike Clapham, Ann Cryer and Austin Mitchell change their vote this time, the Government will almost certainly lose.

Sara McNeice, Amnesty campaign manager, said the region is being targeted because many of the MPs who voted for 42 days' detention are believed to have done so against their better judgment and could now be pressured into changing.

"Yorkshire has a number of MPs that opposed legislation for 90 days detention but voted for 42 days. But if they've taken a particular stance on 90 days then we hope to be able to go to them and persuade them that the new proposals are no different in principle.

"We think we have a good chance of winning this. When
it went through earlier this year it wasn't be any means a landslide.

"There's room to make our voice heard on this issue, especially now well-respected people like Ken Macdonald (former chief prosecutor), Stella Rimington (former head of MI5) and Lord Goldsmith (former Attorney General) have made clear they are opposed to the plans."

Kate Allen said: "There's a real danger that people in Britain are sleepwalking into an assault on our human rights. This film is Amnesty's wake up call: We have got to stand up for our basic freedoms.

"We can't rely on Westminster rumours that 42 days won't become law – this is too important. Hard-won liberties are at stake. Plans to extend detention without charge should be abandoned once and for all. We don't want them returning under another guise – not next month, not next year.

"Giving the authorities the power to lock someone up for a month and a half without even charging them would strip
people of human rights that protect every one of us in this country."

Wendy Guns, an activist with the Leeds branch of Amnesty, added: "People we speak to are more and more aware of
what the Government want to do and more and more angry about it.

"They know what the stakes are. If people are locked up for 42 days without charge our personal liberty will be limited. Life as we know it will change."

You can see the film at www.yorkshirepost.co.uk/video