Data Retention and Investigatory Powers Bill

Part of Bills Presented – in the House of Commons at 3:26 pm on 15 July 2014.

Alert me about debates like this

Photo of Keith Vaz Keith Vaz Chair, Home Affairs Committee, Chair, Home Affairs Committee 3:26, 15 July 2014

It is a huge pleasure to follow Mr Davis, who has an unrivalled knowledge of these issues. He is right that we should be cautious in dealing with legislation of this kind. The latest figures we have are that the number of tweets being issued every year is 150 billion, the number of mobile phone contracts has reached 82 million, the number of landlines is 24 million, and the number of broadband connections is 21.7 million. So a lot of data is flowing about. That is why it is extremely important that we consider these matters very carefully. I for one associate myself with the wish of all those who have spoken, including the Home Secretary, that we had longer to scrutinise this legislation so that we could raise the kind of issues that have been raised so far but in much greater detail.

Yesterday, the Home Affairs Committee took evidence from the Home Secretary, who was subjected to quite robust questioning from members of the Committee on this issue. In particular, Dr Huppert, who is something of the expert in these matters, was able to raise a number of points that Members had concerning the speed of the legislation going through the House and its detail. Of course it is not satisfactory that we had only one session. We would have liked to have had more sessions. We would have liked to have had the Minister for Security and Immigration before us, but that was not possible given the time scale.

The Committee wrote to the Home Secretary supporting the Government’s view. My hon. Friend Mr Winnick is right: he did not support the letter being sent, nor its contents, but every other member of the Committee did, representing every other major party in the House. As he knows, he often finds himself in a minority of one on issues that are voted upon in the Committee. That in no way means that we do not take his view seriously. Of course we do. He is a very distinguished Member of the House. But that was the view of the Committee, as I correctly reported to the Home Secretary in my letter last night. It echoed what the Prime Minister said to me and other Select Committee Chairs when he said that this was not a land-grab; that this was existing legislation and not about additional powers. I and the Committee support this on the basis of the assurances given by the Prime Minister to me at Downing street, and to other Select

Committee Chairs, and to members of the Committee only yesterday by the Home Secretary, that no additional powers are being sought by the Government. I think that that is the basis upon which the shadow Home Secretary and the official Opposition also support the Government.

There are two issues that I hope the Minister will take on board in Committee. The first, of course, is the need to ensure that the scrutiny process is as robust as possible. The Home Affairs Committee recently published a report on counter-terrorism. Its conclusions—I will not go through them all because they are too long—talked about enhancing the role of Parliament and the various commissioners. We felt that it was unacceptable that at least one of the commissioners was part time, with a part-time secretary to deal with these very important issues. We felt that some of the commissioners should be amalgamated to produce full-time people who are able to scrutinise the work of the security services.

The second issue is that the Committee felt that David Anderson should be given additional resources. A feature of our reports over the past few years has been that we have praised the role of the counter-terrorism assessor and asked that he—only men have occupied the post—be given additional support in order to do his job effectively. We rate David Anderson’s work, but we think that he could do much better if he had more resources. He has not asked the Committee for more resources; it is our view, having looked at the evidence and heard from various parties.

That is why it is extremely important that we have a privacy and civil liberties board that is widely representative of those with an interest—all the stakeholders. I urge the Government to consult widely, including with the Select Committee and others outside Parliament, before the names of the board members are announced so that they can work with the independent assessor and do a job that is robust, fair and has the confidence not only of this place, but of the British public.

Reluctantly, given the time scale, we support the Government, accept the assurances that have been given and hope that they will return to Parliament frequently to inform us of any additional information or powers they seek so that there can be proper and appropriate scrutiny, which we have recommended should be conducted by our successor Committee once it is formed in the next Parliament.