Regulation of Investigatory Powers Bill

Part of the debate – in the Scottish Parliament at 4:04 pm on 6 April 2000.

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Photo of Tommy Sheridan Tommy Sheridan SSP 4:04, 6 April 2000

In the absence of my amendment, I shall support Roseanna Cunningham's amendment. The bill that is going through the Westminster Parliament is called the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Bill, or RIP. Many civil rights campaigners believe that we may be witnessing the RIP of civil liberties in Britain if that bill is passed in its current form.

I want to highlight one or two concerns that have already been raised by a number of organisations, including Justice, Privacy International, Statewatch, The Observer and The Sunday Herald. It is only right and proper that those concerns be brought to this chamber. The people in those organisations are concerned citizens and their points should be listened to.

There are concerns about the widespread powers, given to the police by the Home Secretary, to intercept all electronic communications. We recently discovered that the Central Intelligence Agency, via the Echelon programme, is already spying on all our communications. Now Jim Wallace tells us that we should trust Jack Straw to be vigilant over our civil liberties.

The civil liberties group Justice has made the following points. First, the presumption of innocence will be violated. Failure to comply with a decryption notice will be a criminal offence unless the person in question can prove that he or she does not have the key or does not have access to it because, for example, the password may have been forgotten. That contravenes an important element of the right to a fair trial guaranteed by article 6 of the European convention on human rights: that it is for the prosecution to prove the offence, not for the defendant to prove his or her innocence.

Secondly, the proposed legislation infringes the right not to self-incriminate. It is impossible for the police to prove by technical means that the defendant has possession of the key. The only way of proving that he or she has had the key is by way of admission by the defendant. Furthermore, disclosure of the key by the defendant may lead to the discovery of incriminating material. That contravenes a person's right to remain silent and not to contribute to incriminating himself or herself, as guaranteed under article 6 of the ECHR.

Thirdly, there are inadequate safeguards against abuse. Not all decryption notices have first to be authorised by a judge. There is no requirement that the notice be restricted to serious crime, so it could be used for low-level criminal data gathering. There are inadequate safeguards on the holding of the decryption key and any material that is thereby obtained. There is no requirement to inform the covert investigations commissioner that such notices have been served. All those requirements are necessary to safeguard privacy rights under article 8 of the European convention on human rights.

A number of organisations have pointed out that the proposed level of power and surveillance is unprecedented anywhere else in the world and that our lives could become nothing more than surveillance profiles. That is why every aspect of this bill that relates to Scotland must be studied and amended here in Scotland—so that we can be vigilant about the defence of our civil liberties.

We would not put Genghis Khan in charge of a community crèche and I would therefore not like to put Jack Straw in charge of our civil liberties.