National Security Bill

Chris Bryant Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 6th June 2022 Commons Chamber

[The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Priti Patel)]

I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.

The hostile threat that our country faces comes in many forms, and is ever evolving. We must not only keep pace with such threats, but stay ahead of them to make our country safe, and an even harder target for those who wish to harm us. Those who mean us harm do not stand still, and neither can we.

The terrible chemical weapons attack on Salisbury by the Russian state in March 2018 is just the most obvious of the types of threat that we now face. State threats come in multiple forms. There are physical threats to people and to life, such as assassination, poisoning, forced repatriation and harassment, and there are threats to our own way of life and our values, including sabotage, espionage and interference. Those are supplemented by less physical but equally damaging threats: cyber threats, malware, fraud, extortion, and intellectual property theft. There are threats to geostrategic interests, and sadly, as we all know only too well, we face home-grown threats as well. Last year, each and every one of us in the House was shattered by the murder of our dear colleague and friend Sir David Amess.

We know that the nature of the threats we face is changing. We must protect our country from the old challenges, but also confront the new ones. We have seen in the last year alone how quickly and profoundly the world can change—in Afghanistan, for instance, and with the conflict resulting from Putin’s terrible war on Ukraine. The House has also been reminded that some countries are only too happy to interfere with our political system.

[Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)]

Will the Home Secretary give way?

[Priti Patel]

Of course I will.

[Chris Bryant]

I am very grateful. I was waiting for that little phrase—I hoped it might come up. Some of us are very concerned about how state actors from other countries who wish us ill might seek to undermine the democratic process in the House, might seek to infiltrate Parliament, and might seek to gain intelligence through Members of Parliament. Would the Home Secretary be interested in an amendment that might seek to address what I think is still a lacuna—a gap—in the legislation that she is proposing by dealing specifically with MPs and how they might, perhaps inadvertently or perhaps deliberately or recklessly, be helping foreign state actors?

[Priti Patel]

I know from our time together in the Foreign Affairs Committee of not just the hon. Gentleman’s interest in this issue, but the significance of an issue that is growing and growing. I will say more about that later in my speech, but let me say in response to his question that we are looking into all sorts of lacunas. There are certain ways in which existing practices take place, not just in this House but across Parliament—in both Houses—and we need, collectively, to find ways of addressing that. We are naturally looking into how we can protect our political system, and I will expand on that later.

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[Chris Bryant]

The Parliamentary Security Director is particularly concerned about, for example, the all-party parliamentary groups, which, while obviously great in many respects, are often funded by other countries, some of which do not wish us well, and sometimes that funding comes indirectly. I wonder whether we need to change our practices in the House to make sure we have tidied that up as well.

[Priti Patel]

The hon. Gentleman is right to refer to what we, as a House, need to do for our country to preserve our democracy and the function of our political and democratic institutions. All-party parliamentary groups are a well-trodden path when it comes to inquiries and investigations, and various Committees, including the Select Committee on which the hon. Gentleman is represented, have also touched on this issue. These are exactly the areas in which we have to raise the bar, and I believe that others around the world will look to us, particularly through this legislation. There are areas—I will deal with them later in my speech, and I know that the House will debate them later this evening—in which we know that exposure has been significant, and we have to shut that down. The risks are very high.

Diplomacy and diplomatic engagement at every stage is the proper way in which we should work with other countries and Governments. That means not letting hack and leak operations force Governments into positions or lead to the risk exposures that colleagues have touched on and that many reports and wider work have highlighted. As for the type of threats that we are exposed to, hack and leak is just one example relating to cyber; there is also the threat from trolling and organised crime, which persists in many of the domains that we are discussing.

The UK is a leader in this, with our Five Eyes and international partners. Our commitment to NATO remains steadfast and we should never, ever lose sight of that. Those institutions and organisations are also adapting to the threats and risks that we face globally.

National Security Bill

Chris Bryant Excerpts

Report stage
Wednesday 16th November 2022 Commons Chamber

[Tom Tugendhat]

It is a pleasure to stand before the House today to introduce not just new clause 9, but many other new clauses that I and many others in this House have argued for at different times and in different places.

[Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)]

Plus a few others.

[Tom Tugendhat]

Plus a few others. So it is a great pleasure to be here today.

May I also place on record my enormous thanks to two right hon. Members—the hon. Member for Garston and Halewood (Maria Eagle) will smile as I say this—who have done so much to get us to this position today? I refer to my right hon. Friends the Members for East Hampshire (Damian Hinds) and for Stevenage (Stephen McPartland), who have been extremely generous with their time and thoughts, including in private with me as well, in making sure that I am able to answer as many of her questions as I can, although somehow she has exceeded even their magisterial intellect. I am grateful that they have got us to this place, because this Bill is essential for the future defence of our nation.

The reason for that is because, of course, the world has changed. The reality is that national security in this country has changed and evolved in recent years, and the Darwinian challenge between the hunter and the hunted has led us to a position where we need to update not just our techniques, which can be done in private, but sadly our laws, which rightly must be debated in public.

I think we all agree with the core aims of the Bill. The first is to give our law enforcement and intelligence agencies the tools they need to tackle harmful activities in the United Kingdom carried out by, or on behalf of, foreign powers. However, to do that we also need to increase the transparency around those who seek to influence the politics and institutions of the United Kingdom through the foreign influence registration scheme. That is a very welcome addition. I know that many Members here, including those who have been on the Foreign Affairs Committee for the past five years, have called for it at various different points. The Bill has, at its heart, the protection of the national security of this great country that we all serve.

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[Chris Bryant]

The Minister said that once somebody has registered on a website, we will all be able to see it. That may be true if we knew that that was where we had to look to check whether somebody coming in through the door, sending us a letter or inviting us to dinner as an MP was actually somebody who was working for a foreign power. Would it not be far more sensible, once somebody has registered, to require them to declare to any Minister, MP or Member of the House of Lords that that is what they were doing, so that there is a degree of protection for this House?

[Tom Tugendhat]

The hon. Member makes a very good point: there are many areas in which the individual concerned should certainly be doing the responsible thing and advertising it. The basis of this has to be a balance, so requiring people to register is, I think, a very good start. We need to take forward some of the recommendations that the hon. Member has made and the thoughts he has expressed, because he is absolutely right that transparency in all things is important.

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[Tom Tugendhat]

I think the hon. Lady knows me well enough to know that, having been sanctioned by three countries now, it is unlikely that I will be reticent in identifying those that I think are threats to the United Kingdom.

[Chris Bryant]

The right hon. Gentleman might not be in the job.

[Tom Tugendhat]

I am very confident that others will also be bold on His Majesty’s behalf. Whoever is fortunate enough to be representing His Majesty in the Home Office will be able to conduct those offices in the good fashion that people expect. [Interruption.] I will move on.

The core of the Bill is, of course, national security and our intelligence services, building on the work they have done to enable us to grow in confidence and prosperity. They have provided the security apparatus that allows freedom beneath and around it. That is an extraordinary luxury and a blessing that this country has been able to enjoy for many years and generations because of the courage and intellect of so many people. They require tools to conduct those tasks, and I am delighted that the Bill will sharpen some of those tools.

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[Chris Bryant]

I, too, support the Bill, but I think part 3 is a complete mess. I do not think it will survive long in the House of Lords—I hope they do a proper job of scrutinising it, because we are certainly not able to do a proper job of scrutiny this afternoon. The Minister is a lovely chap, but if he were on the Back Benches, he would be saying exactly what I am saying now. We know that Ministers do that, because only days ago, the right hon. Member for Camborne and Redruth (George Eustice), the former Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, told the whole House that the one thing he had been proclaiming to the world—that the UK deals with Australia and New Zealand were wonderful—was not what he really believed.

Of course, we need to tackle political interference by hostile states in the United Kingdom. Some of us have been arguing that point for a very long time, which is one of the reasons why I would like to see the tier 1 visa report published—I see the Minister nodding, so let us hope that he will have produced it by the end of the week. Secondly, I would like us to have the full Russia report, so that we know exactly what the Government knew about interference in British politics.

Some interference is overt, but much of it is covert, as the hon. Member for Milton Keynes North (Ben Everitt) has just referred to. Some of it comes not from embassies, but from all sorts of different people who approach MPs and Ministers and seek to influence the British political system. Some of it is online targeting through bots and trolls, which may be done from St Petersburg, Tehran or wherever, but some of it happens on our own streets. Sometimes, it happens in Parliament through all-party parliamentary groups that receive support, whether secretariat or financial, that comes directly or indirectly from a foreign power. We need to be careful about that. We on the Standards Committee have had direct advice from Parliament’s director of security that this is the Achilles heel of the British political system at the moment.

MPs and peers, of course, do not have the resources to be able to personally check whether the person who is coming through the door has legitimate bona fides; we simply do not have that intelligence resource. That is why one of the amendments I have tabled seeks to establish that, once somebody has registered that they are working for a foreign power, they should declare that when they come to see a Member of Parliament or Government Minister. In Parliament, we do not just register: we declare. That is a simple thing and I am bewildered that the Government are not prepared to accept it.

My new clause 2 would, very simply, make it a new criminal offence for an MP or peer to work for a foreign power that has been specified by the Government to be a danger to the country. Why would anybody vote against such a measure? I have no understanding of why the Government would oppose it. Without my new clause, the Government might decide that, for instance, Iran or Belarus was to be one of the countries on the list and introduce that by regulation, but an MP or Member of the House of Lords would be free to work for that foreign power—all they would have to do is register the fact that they are doing so. I am sorry, but I think that should be a criminal offence. People have talked too easily of treachery and traitors in the political domain over the last few years, but this is an open door to treachery and treason, and I think we should close it.

[Antony Higginbotham (Burnley) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to speak in this debate and to follow the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant). I agree with everything that my hon. Friend the Member for Milton Keynes North (Ben Everitt) has said. I am incredibly supportive of the Bill overall, but I do have questions that it would be helpful to get clarity on in this debate, or—what I think is more likely—when the Bill goes to the other place. I say that because the questions and issues we want clarity on are so substantial that we cannot do them justice in the limited time we have today.

For me, those issues revolve around the foreign influence registration scheme and the exemptions to that scheme. I am mindful that the scheme was introduced into the legislation after we had taken evidence in Committee, so we did not get the chance to question some of the experts on what it would look like. I will address my remarks to clause 68 and Government new schedule 2, and to amendments 15 and 16, which stand in the name of my right hon. Friend the Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Sir Iain Duncan Smith). I am particularly concerned about the legal services exemption. I do not understand why such a broad exemption is required. As my right hon. Friend said, it might be that we are just copying the US legislation, but we need a level of explanation. Removing the legal exemption is not about restricting access to legal services—we still fundamentally believe in natural justice and the rule of law—but we need transparency to prevent exactly the kind of lobbying that we have spoken about. I know that we are unlikely to vote on the amendments today, but we need that kind of transparency.

If we are trying to copy or mirror some of what the US has done, I would question the lack of any kind of exemption for academia, which the right hon. Member for North Durham (Mr Jones) spoke about. I have spoken to Universities UK, which is concerned about the enhanced tier proposed in FIRS and the impact it could have on UK R&D and on our competitiveness. The US registration scheme clearly has an exemption for

“religious, scholastic, academic, or scientific pursuits”

provided that no political activities are included.

I am saying not that there should be an exemption for academic services but that we in this House need to debate properly what exemptions, if any, should apply to the scheme. Should there be an exemption for legal services? Should there be an exemption for academic work? I do not think we have the opportunity to consider that properly today, but I look forward to following the debate in the other place. I ask the Minister to think about some of those exemptions and, if we are to proceed with them, to give a proper explanation to the House about why they might be necessary.

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[Tom Tugendhat]

This has been a very full discussion involving many people. Although I sympathise with those who have quite rightly made the point that we could always have more time for these debates, the truth is that we had a lot of time in the Bill Committee and we are going to have to do much more work on this subject as its various elements evolve with the technology and the challenge. The truth is that if we had had this debate five, 10 or 15 years ago, we would have been debating different subjects, different nations and different elements of technology that have evolved into the threat that we sadly face today. Although I recognise that many hon. Members have understandably raised the number of hours and days that we have had today and in the past few weeks, the Government have listened and adapted the Bill to many aspects that have been raised in different ways.

[Chris Bryant]

One thing that the Government have certainly had plenty of time to get ready is the tier 1 visa report, as promised by five Home Secretaries. When will the Minister publish it?

[Tom Tugendhat]

It will not surprise the hon. Gentleman to know that one of the first things I did on arrival at the Home Office was to ask for it to be prepared for publication. I will come back to him with it, I hope, urgently—I will let him know.

Many different points have been raised. I pay enormous tribute to my many right hon. and hon. Friends who have spoken and to those who have approached the Bill with the diligence and seriousness that the subject demands, particularly the hon. Members for Halifax (Holly Lynch) and for Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch East (Stuart C. McDonald), who have been extremely supportive critics and have been challenging in the right spirit. I am glad to say that those discussions have resulted in most of the Bill going through in the way that was intended, and that those challenges and changes have improved it.

I accept that there are some differences of opinion. On areas such as the Serious Crime Act and the changes to statutory requirements, I believe that the Government are right because the exercise of the functions of an officer of the state are exactly what should be the limiting functions of their powers. That is why this reform makes sense, although my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Kenilworth and Southam (Sir Jeremy Wright) raised some important points and challenges that we will have to look at.

My right hon. and learned Friend also asked about damages and whether they followed in the way that he described, and I agree that they do. The point is that we should neither make it harder or more applicable to have damages, nor prevent it where judges seek the discretion to do so. Where they have that discretion, they may continue to do it, but we are asking them to look and consider the situation in which those damages arose to make sure that they are truly applicable. It is merely a review policy, rather than a block. That is an important element of the Bill; judges may already have that power but this measure merely puts it on the statute book.

Much of the debate has focused on whistleblowers and the public interest defence, and the way in which various people could argue that they are acting in the interests of the wider polity in raising different objections. This is a hugely important area and I understand that many hon. Members have raised different points. The head of MI5, the heads of various agencies and many others who have engaged on it have been absolutely clear on this point, however, because we need to make sure that we are not introducing any defence that forces the Government to reveal the damage that has been done in order to provide a defence.

The reality is that forcing the publication of damages may indeed be further damaging to the initial offence. That is why although I take the point about the public interest defence, which is a wider question for the whole of Government and the whole country, and I take the point about whistleblowers, which is again a wider question and not specific to the Bill, I am afraid that I hold with the head of MI5 and others who have been extremely clear on this point.

National Security Bill

Chris Bryant Excerpts

Consideration of Lords amendments
Wednesday 3rd May 2023 Commons Chamber

[Sir Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)]

But earlier the Minister was praying in aid Lord Carlile, saying what a wonderful job he had done in helping the Government to bring forward wonderful amendments. This is one of his amendments, so it seems a bit odd to turn against this one.

On the point the Minister just made about permissible donors, all that has to be checked is whether the person is on the electoral register. The Elections Act 2022 has added to the register 3.5 million people who do not even live in this country. All that political parties presently have to do is check whether somebody is on the electoral register. I do not think that safeguards our elections from interference from those who would wish us ill.

[Tom Tugendhat]

The hon. Member has formerly been very kind about the work that we have done together, such as on the Foreign Affairs Committee and on other appointments. He has agreed with me on some areas and disagreed on others. It cannot be an enormous surprise to him that I agree with Lord Carlile on some areas and disagree with him on others. Frankly, that is the nature of parliamentary work, as the hon. Gentleman knows better than anyone.

As for the hon. Gentleman’s point about foreign registrations, those are of British citizens living abroad. Those are the only terms on which people are registered to vote on our electoral register. It is not right to say that those are a random 3.5 million people; that is certainly not true. They are British citizens and therefore their donations are as valid as their votes.

The Government recognise that there are risks. That is why it is already an offence to attempt to make a donation by concealing information, giving false information or knowingly facilitating the making of an impermissible donation. Where the foreign power condition is met in relation to a relevant electoral offence, as set out in schedule 1 to the Bill, clause 16 provides for a substantially increased maximum penalty: where a one-year sentence previously applied, that has been increased to four years; and two-year sentences have been increased to seven years. These relevant electoral offences include offences of undue influence, for which the maximum sentence has been increased to seven years, and making a false declaration about the source of a donation, for which the maximum sentence has been increased to four years.

Indeed, the Government have already taken action. The Elections Act 2022 tightened the law to close loopholes on foreign spending. The Electoral Commission is also being given more powers to access Companies House information, through measures under the Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Bill. That will allow the Electoral Commission to undertake the proper targeted and proportionate checks.

For absolute clarity, donations to political parties from foreign powers, made directly or indirectly, are not permissible. The amendment places new requirements on minor parties, who are not subject to any other financial reporting requirements at this time, as they can contest only local and parish elections. The amendment would therefore place huge administrative burdens on small, grassroots political campaigning and would punish grassroots democracy.

It is not clear how the proposals would work in practice. Political parties are not banks; rightly, they do not have access to individuals’ financial records. They are not His Majesty’s Revenue and Customs; they do not have access to tax records. They do have access to the electoral roll and to Companies House, which they are already obliged to check. The Electoral Commission already publishes guidance on these legal duties. Indeed, political parties must already report all larger donations to the Electoral Commission, which are then published online for public scrutiny.

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Having listened to the debate, I cannot for the life of me understand why the Government are not backing Lords amendment 22. We might come to it again at a later stage—although I am not sure whether any ping-pong will take place—but if we do not do it in this Bill, we will have to address the implementation of a risk management approach at some stage in the coming period.

[Sir Chris Bryant]

I start where my right hon. Friend the Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell) finished. I am completely perplexed about why the Minister is holding out against Lords amendment 22, not least because he told Insider last year that it was “perfectly legitimate” to criticise political parties for accepting donations “that are not clear”. He made it absolutely clear at the time that he supported the idea of legislation to require political parties to be clear about where their funding was coming from. To be fair to him, that was obviously not when he was a Government Minister, and he has now fallen among thieves. I preferred the old version of the Minister, and I hope that, in our discussions over the next few minutes, we can manage to persuade him to return to proper form.

The pedigree for Lords amendment 22 is phenomenally strong, as has been said. Not only have Lord Carlile and Lord Evans—the chair of the Committee on Standards in Public Life and a former head of MI5—called directly for such provisions, but as I understand from her comments, Baroness Manningham-Buller also supported Lords amendment 22, as did Lord West, all the members of the ISC, Spotlight on Corruption, the Committee on Standards in Public Life, and, of course, the Electoral Commission.

The Electoral Commission wrote directly to the Minister last year to say that it would surely be wrong not to change the law so that political parties can accept donations from companies that have made enough money in the UK to fund the amount of their donation. One would think that that stands to reason. One would also think that it stands to reason, as the commission also argued, that political parties should be required to check not just whether someone is a permissible donor in the sense of being on the electoral register, but whether they have enough money of their own to be able to fund the political party to the extent proposed. That is just due diligence, but there are phenomenal loopholes in the law.

The Minister is normally a very polite and generous man, but I understand that he has still not replied to the Electoral Commission on this matter, and the commission has complained about this. In this area, as he knows perfectly well from our work on the Foreign Affairs Committee, complacency serves us ill. One need only look at the sad trajectory of the tier 1 visa system—the golden visa. When the report was finally produced it showed that we had given visas to live in the UK and make their permanent residence here to people we ended up sanctioning because they were so closely related to the Putin regime. The 2020 Russia report from the ISC—it should have been the 2019 Russia report, but the then Prime Minister did not allow it to be published before the general election—made it very clear that Russia and perhaps other state actors had been intent on affecting elections and referendums in this country, and urged us not to be complacent.

There are authoritarian state actors who wish us ill. They rely on the openness of our political system, on our open system of governance in the City, on the fact that contracts can be enforced, and on our open judicial system. They rely on all of that and, I would argue, on our complacency to be able to do their nefarious work in the UK. There is a flaw in the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000: the concept of “permissible donor” is too tightly drawn. Surely any political party and any person trying to secure donations from a third party would want to ensure that the money they received was not tainted by human rights abuses in another country, by authoritarian acts from another country or, frankly, by malign influence by a third party state actor.

The position is made worse by the Elections Act 2022 adding to the registers 3.5 million overseas voters who pay, or who may pay, no tax in the UK, and who may have next to no relationship with the authorities in this country—it is necessarily very difficult to track that information down. What should a party do if it is offered a donation of, let us say, £50,000 by somebody who lives and works in Moscow today? The law says the party need not do anything, as long as the individual is on the electoral register. Surely, though, we do not think that that is right or appropriate. I want further checks to be in place. The provisions in the amendment are so minimal—absolutely the minimum that we have to do to make sure that political parties in this country do the basics.

I said there is a flaw—perhaps a fissure—in PPERA, but I am starting to worry that the Government want that loophole to exist. If they do not, I simply do not understand why the Minister is holding out on this point. I hope the Minister will change his mind on this minimal requirement and support Lords amendment 22. If we end up voting it down, I hope their lordships will throw it back to us. For more than a decade now, we have left the door wide open to political interference in our system in this country. It is time we slammed it shut.

[Tom Tugendhat]

First, I thank the hon. Member for Halifax (Holly Lynch) for the contribution she made and the spirit in which she has approached these debates. She is absolutely right to talk about Caoilfhionn Gallagher and Jimmy Lai and to highlight the many issues that she did. Such matters unite us; another is the fact that this Government, like every Member of this House, I am sure, remain absolutely committed to the UN convention against torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. There is absolutely nothing in this Bill, or in any other Bill that this Government are bringing forward, that would in any way undermine our obligations or the seriousness with which we treat torture as it is practised, sadly too frequently, around the world. Although I hear what the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr Carmichael), my right hon. Friend the Member for Haltemprice and Howden (Mr Davis) and the hon. and gallant Member for Barnsley Central (Dan Jarvis) say, there is quite literally nothing in the Bill that would give rise to the need for amendment (c) to Lords amendment.

The point made by the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland about Lord Pannick, however, was entirely fair. A letter should have gone back to him. In fact, the point was made and the answer given in the form of amendments to clause 3 that address his concern about the carve-out for lawyers. Although I agree that I should have written, the reality is that I addressed the points Lord Pannick raised in the Bill itself.

The matter of foreign donations has been raised again. The reality is that we have to treat British citizens like British citizens. The idea that we can treat British citizens differently depending on how we feel about them seems to me to be rather a bad way of making law, but that does not mean that political parties have to treat British citizens exactly alike. Surely the rule here is: just because you can does not mean you should. There are many donations, and perhaps many individuals making them, that many of us would not wish to accept. The point about politics is that it is about decisions, judgment and choices, and while the law has to apply to everyone equally, we as politicians and as political parties are not so obliged. We have to make judgments and decisions, and we have to carry our reputations and the reputations of our organisations with us when we make those calls.

On the changes to the MOU that the ISC suggested, my right hon. Friend the Member for New Forest East (Sir Julian Lewis) had the opportunity to give me the power to make those changes, but I am not the Prime Minister, so I cannot do so. The Prime Minister will have to make that decision, but I will raise the matter again with his office, because my right hon. Friend’s points were well made.

I have heard many comments about the Official Secrets Act 1989. The nature of this reform is complex and there are many and various arguments because this piece of legislation ties into so many others. I will not give my right hon. Friend the Member for Beckenham (Bob Stewart) a commitment to act in this Parliament—he will understand that more work is required. As for my ability to make commitments into the next Session, he tempts me too far.

I am glad to hear that the hon. Member for Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch East (Stuart C. McDonald) has achieved the great honour of being treasurer of the Scottish National party. I hope it comes with a caravan and that he is enjoying the touring that that affords him.

My right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Kenilworth and Southam (Sir Jeremy Wright) raises many good points. The reality is that these challenges must be addressed as a whole and require further discussion, so I am very grateful for his time.