Removal of Foreign National Offenders and EU Prisoners

Alistair Carmichael Excerpts

Monday 6th June 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

I entirely agree with my right hon. Friend, who has experience of these issues from his time as the Immigration Minister. Membership of the European Union gives us access to information sharing and instruments that help increase our ability to deal with foreign national offenders and criminals. Crucially, as I indicated earlier to my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Rushcliffe (Mr Clarke), the prisoner transfer framework decision gives us the ability to return people on a compulsory basis, rather than requiring the prisoner themselves to agree to that return.

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

Does the Home Secretary recall that when her right hon. Friend the now Leader of the House served as the Secretary of State for Justice, he told the Home Affairs Committee that it was

“very obvious to me that it is…in our national interest to be part of”

the EU prison transfer agreement. Does she agree with that statement, as I do, and does she happen to know whether her right hon. Friend still holds that view?

[Mrs May]

I agree with the view about the transfer decision, and as for the views of my right hon. Friend, I suggest that the right hon. Gentleman asks him himself.

Investigatory Powers Bill

Alistair Carmichael Excerpts

Report: 1st sitting: House of Commons
Monday 6th June 2016 Commons Chamber

[Joanna Cherry]

I have unashamedly tabled a lot of amendments to the Bill, including to part 8, and the Scottish National party will also support amendments tabled by others.

I pay tribute to the hon. and learned Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Keir Starmer), with whom I worked closely in Committee. There are areas of divergence between the SNP and Labour on the Bill, but it was a pleasure to work with him and I hope that there will be other occasions on which Labour and the SNP can work together harmoniously.

I recognise that the Government have made significant concessions on part 1 of the Bill. I welcome their attempt in new clause 5 to introduce an overarching privacy requirement. Their belated conversion to the central recommendation of the Intelligence and Security Committee is a tribute to the arguments advanced by Opposition Members in Committee. I have to say, however, that I prefer new clause 21, tabled by the Labour party, which trenchantly states that regard must be given to the Human Rights Act 1998. For reasons that other hon. Members have already given, that is important. It is encouraging to see the Government making reference in their own amendments to the Human Rights Act. That gives me hope that they might have retreated from their plan to repeal the Act even further than we had hoped. That could be one of the little bits of good news to come out of this exercise.

I am also happy to welcome Government new clause 6, and I thank the Minister for Security for acknowledging that it reflects an amendment that was tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire North (Gavin Newlands) and me. It is quite an historic occasion when the Government accept an amendment tabled by the SNP, and I should like to mark it. I just wish that they would look at more of my amendments, but I fear that they will not do so. We are, however, pleased that the Government have seen fit to respond to a number of the concerns raised in Committee. That said, I want to be clear that they will have to go an awful lot further before the Scottish National Party can contemplate giving the Bill our support.

As I said on Second Reading, we would like to be able to support some aspects of the Bill, because they are necessary for law enforcement across these islands and reflect some powers that are already in force in Scotland. It is also a good idea to consolidate the powers and to have a modern, comprehensive law. However, we remain concerned about the legality of some of the powers that are still on the face of the Bill and the fact that they significantly exceed, such as with the retention of internet connection records, what is authorised in other western democracies. We continue to have severe concerns about the bulk powers enabled by parts 6 and 7 of the Bill. We are pleased that the Government have conceded that there should be a properly independent review of the bulk powers, which was argued for by both Labour and SNP Members in Committee, but we are yet to see confirmation of the review’s remit. I want to associate myself with what the hon. and learned Member for Holborn and St Pancras said about the review needing to look not at whether the bulk powers are useful, but at whether they are necessary. We look forward to the publication of the correspondence between the Government and the Labour party, so that we can see what is being proposed. My hon. Friends the Members for Paisley and Renfrewshire North and for Glasgow North East (Anne McLaughlin) will address bulk powers and internet connection records in more detail tomorrow.

I led for the SNP in Committee, where we tabled numerous amendments to try to get the principle of suspicion-based surveillance to run throughout the Bill. We support the idea that warrants should be focused and specific and that oversight should be robust and meaningful. Nearly all our amendments were opposed or ignored by the Government, which is why we cannot give the Bill our support at this stage.

On Second Reading, the right hon. and learned Member for Rushcliffe (Mr Clarke) sought to mock me for making what he described as

“combative and partisan speeches in support of an abstention”.—[Official Report, 15 March 2016; Vol. 607, c. 847.]

He expressed a degree of confidence in a shared consensus across this House about the principles that we should be adopting. I am afraid that my experience in Committee has shown his confidence to be misplaced. The amendments tabled by the Government for debate today are only a partial response to our legitimate concerns. The Government need to pay more than lip service to the importance of privacy and to the principles of necessity and proportionality.

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

I am grateful to the hon. and learned Lady for giving way, because I agree with what she is saying. May I suggest that there is one means by which the Government could demonstrate good faith? In order to get to a vote on new clause 21, we will first have to vote down new clause 5. If the Government are serious about listening to the House, could they not withdraw new clause 5 to allow us to have a vote on new clause 21?

[Joanna Cherry]

That is an excellent suggestion that the Government should consider carefully.

I also mentioned on Second Reading that the United Nations special rapporteur had expressed concern about the Bill’s provisions, especially the bulk powers. That is why it remains the SNP’s position that until such time as a case has been made for the necessity of bulk powers, they should be removed from the Bill.

I make no apology for tabling numerous amendments, because this is a constitutionally important Bill. Their purpose is to try to bring the Bill into line with international human rights norms and to make it properly lawful. If the Bill is passed in its current form, there is a real risk that it will be the subject of challenge. Many of the threads running through it, such as the retention of data and bulk powers, have already been the subject of successful challenges or are awaiting the outcome of decisions. We need to be careful about passing powers into law when their legality has already been questioned by the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg, the European Court of Justice in Luxembourg, and a court in England.

In reality, I know that our amendments will not be accepted because we are already running out of time. We simply have not had enough time to consider the Bill. We have two days for Report, which I know is unusual, but we have short periods of time to speak about important parts of the Bill. I am only at the stage of making some introductory remarks and will have to curtail what I say about part 8 in the interest of other Members getting the right to speak. That will happen as we go through each part of programme motion.

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[Stephen McPartland]

I certainly do not take any credit for being good at drafting new clauses. New clause 16 may not mention “error”, but I think it is mentioned in amendments 189 to 195, with which it should be considered. In “A Question of Trust”, David Anderson, QC, recommended that the judicial commissioners be given the power to report errors to individuals. I appreciate that the Minister has moved towards my point of view.

In conclusion, the Joint Committee made two recommendations. The first was that referral to the Investigatory Powers Tribunal was unnecessary and cumbersome and created a brake on the notification of errors. The second was that the error-reporting threshold should be reviewed so that it was more specific and defined.

[Mr Alistair Carmichael]

New clause 1 stands in my name and is supported by Scottish National party Members. It is remarkably similar to new clause 16, to which the hon. Member for Stevenage (Stephen McPartland) has just spoken. He says that his is a probing amendment; I regard mine as more than that, but I shall wait to hear what the Minister has to say when he replies to the debate.

I will preface my remarks on new clause 1 by highlighting some more general concerns. I absolutely agree with the hon. and learned Member for Edinburgh South West (Joanna Cherry) that the way in which today’s proceedings are being conducted is highly unsatisfactory. The time allowed is clearly insufficient. The Government have done themselves no favours, because all they do by insisting on conducting proceedings in this way is throw a bone to those in the other place and allow them to justify the greater degree of scrutiny that they will inevitably give to the Bill. It has already been referred to as a constitutional Bill that countenances the most egregious interference with individual liberty by the state. Such scrutiny ought to be done by this elected Chamber.

The fact that the Government are still taking on board amendments after the draft Bill, the report by David Anderson, QC, and the debate in Committee indicates an unsatisfactory attitude on their part. It shows that they are not yet putting privacy at the heart of the Bill, and that they are being dragged kicking and screaming to that position. On new clauses 5 and 21, it is unsatisfactory that the best provision has been proposed by the hon. and learned Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Keir Starmer), who speaks for the Opposition, and that we will not get to that unless we first vote down an inferior proposal that, while adequate and an improvement, is not as good as that proposed by the official Opposition. I reiterate a point that I made in an intervention on the hon. and learned Member for Edinburgh South West: the Government will still have the opportunity, if they are minded to take it, to insist on their version in the other place at a later stage, but this House should be empowered to express a view on new clause 21, which for reasons of procedure it is not able to do at present.

The thinking behind new clause 1 is that sunlight is the best disinfectant. The question of whether the Government will accept the approach suggested by us and the hon. Member for Stevenage relates to the question of whether privacy is at the heart of the Bill. As things stand, an individual will be able to find out whether they have been the subject of intrusion under the Bill’s powers only through a whistleblower or public interest litigation. It is a question of happenstance. If the Government are sincere and prepared meaningfully to protect our liberties and individual rights, they should not object to a process with all the necessary safeguards, as outlined in new clause 1. There should be no objection to notifying those who have been the subject of surveillance once the surveillance has concluded. As the hon. Gentleman has pointed out, that idea is not novel. It happens in a number of jurisdictions and has already been the subject of judicial approval and, indeed, instruction from the European Court of Human Rights in two cases, namely Klass v. Germany in 1978, and Weber and Saravia v. Germany in 2006.

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[Andy Burnham]

I will indeed pay tribute to Unite, GMB and UCATT, which, in the past couple of months, have reached out-of-court settlements on blacklisting—a major and historic victory on their part. I will come on to explain the prime concern behind the Opposition’s amendment, and the case that most justifies our bringing it forward.

In the past, the actions of some in senior positions in politics and in the police have unfairly tarnished the reputation of today’s services and today’s policemen and women. That is precisely why it is crucial that we continue to open up on the past. Transparency is the best way of preventing lingering suspicions about past conduct from contaminating trust in today’s services, and it will help us to create a modern legal framework that better protects our essential freedoms, human rights and privacy.

One such freedom essential to the health of our democracy is trade union activity. Historically, trade unions have played a crucial role in protecting ordinary people from the abuses of Governments and mighty corporations. It is that crucial role, and the freedom of every citizen in this land to benefit from that protection, that amendment 262 seeks to enshrine in law. There will be those who claim that it is unnecessary and the product of conspiracy theorists, but I have received confirmation from the security services that, in the past—under Governments of both colours, it has to be said—trade unions have indeed been monitored. In the cold war, there may well have been grounds for fears that British trade unions were being infiltrated by foreign powers trying to subvert our democracy. That helps to explain the wariness of many Labour Members about legislation of this kind. Outside the security services, it seems that some activity went way beyond that. There is clear evidence that such monitoring was used for unjustified political and commercial reasons, breaching privacy and basic human rights. I mentioned the case of the Shrewsbury 24 on Second Reading, and I remain of the view that that is an outstanding injustice that needs to be settled.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Walton (Steve Rotheram) anticipated, however, I want tonight to focus on the blacklisting of construction workers, which clearly illustrates the necessity of the amendment we have tabled. We have seen the settlement of claims, as I have mentioned, against companies such as Carillion, Balfour Beatty, Costain, Keir, Laing O’Rourke, Sir Robert McAlpine, Skanska UK and Vinci. It has now been proven that those companies subscribed to central lists of workers that contained information on their political views and trade union activities. Those lists were used to vet people and deny them work. That affected the livelihoods of hundreds of people, and it was an outrageous denial of their basic human rights.

By seeking an out-of-court settlement, it would seem that the companies concerned are trying to limit reputational damage, but I do not think that the matter can be allowed to rest there. We need to understand how covertly gained police information came into the hands of a shady organisation called the Consulting Association, which compiled and managed the blacklist.

[Mr Alistair Carmichael]

Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that the remit of the Pitchford inquiry, which has been set up to look into the use of undercover policing, really needs to be extended to cover what went on in Scotland and other parts of the United Kingdom or we will never get the full truth of this?

[Andy Burnham]

That is certainly one way of addressing the concerns that I am putting on record tonight, but another would be to have a separate inquiry into blacklisting per se. Not only was it outrageous, but it is still largely not known about. Most people outside trade union circles do not know that it happened. That is why, by one means or another, there needs to be a process of inquiry about it.

We would not know about the practice were it not for the outstanding work of the Blacklist Support Group and individuals such as Dave Smith who have exposed how much of the information held on individuals appeared to emanate from police sources. For instance, the files hold detailed descriptions of the movements of a number of people at the June 1999 demonstration “Carnival Against Capital”. As a Guardian article by Dave Smith and Phil Chamberlain pointed out, it seems highly unlikely that that intelligence was the product of a site manager who just happened to be passing through London on that day.

The Blacklist Support Group referred the matter to the Independent Police Complaints Commission in 2012. I want to put on record what it found, because it is pretty shocking. Having looked into the concerns, the IPCC wrote in a letter to the Blacklist Support Group:

“The scoping also identified that it was likely that all Special Branches were involved in providing information about potential employees who were suspected of being involved in subversive activity.”

All special branches were likely to have given information that was used to compile the blacklist.

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[Mr Grieve]

The right hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. The consequence of damaging national infrastructure would be to cause a severe economic shock to the United Kingdom. At the end of the day, the most persuasive argument of the lot was that listing economic wellbeing separately added transparency as to the purposes for which an investigatory power was being sought. We came to the conclusion that it would probably assist the judicial commissioners in their consideration of the necessity and proportionality of the warrant, precisely because it highlighted that it fell within a category in which economic wellbeing was present; it was therefore in practice likely to be subject to very detailed scrutiny. For all those reasons, we did not table a further amendment on that point.

[Mr Alistair Carmichael]

Given the lateness of the hour and the number of right hon. and hon. Members still wishing to catch your eye, Mr Speaker, I hope to confine my remarks principally to those amendments that stand in my name, but I would also like to pick up on one or two more general points.

Brain Family: Deportation

Alistair Carmichael Excerpts

Thursday 26th May 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

The Brain family enjoys support throughout the highlands and islands. I have heard of many similar cases over my years as a Member of Parliament. The Minister is absolutely right to say that we must have a system that works for the whole of the United Kingdom, but the truth of the matter is that the current system does not work for communities such as those in the highlands and islands, the rural north-west of England, Cornwall or mid-Wales. Will he look again at the way in which the rules operate and understand that the immigration needs of Aberdeen, Edinburgh and Glasgow are very different from those of the highlands and islands, which again are different from those in other regions of England and Wales?

[James Brokenshire]

The point that the right hon. Gentleman makes is one that a number of hon. Members have made this morning, and I have already said that there is recognition of that within the immigration rules. Some have asked whether there should be separate salary thresholds for different parts of the United Kingdom. Again, I say that they should be careful what they wish for, because on the median-level salaries, that might lead to an increase in the salary thresholds for Scotland as contrasted with where the national salary limits actually sit at present. I have been very clear on the fact that we have listened carefully on this specific case, and I will continue to do so.

Immigration Bill

Alistair Carmichael Excerpts

Ping Pong: House of Commons
Monday 9th May 2016 Commons Chamber

[James Brokenshire]

Obviously, existing funding is provided for unaccompanied asylum seeking children; the Home Office funds local authorities in that way. We are carefully considering this in the context of the existing arrangements and will be discussing it with colleagues across government, as well as with local authorities. I would like to reassure the House that we intend to be flexible in our interpretation and approach when implementing this amendment, to ensure that it is practical and supports the most vulnerable children, as intended. We believe the amendment, as currently drafted, enables us to do that. The use of the term “refugee” can be interpreted to include certain asylum seekers and avoid the requirement of a child having to go through a full refugee determination process before being admitted to the UK. Our Syrian resettlement scheme already operates in a not dissimilar way, and we do not believe any clarifications are necessary.

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

Does the Minister accept, however, that vulnerability does not necessarily end on a child’s 18th birthday? We have already deported about 3,000 children to a number of countries, including Libya and Syria, since 2005. Will he assure us that the children who are allowed in will be allowed to stay here?

[James Brokenshire]

I do not want to conflate, as the right hon. Gentleman seems to be doing, those who claim asylum in this country and are then determined not to have a valid asylum claim—we would therefore seek to remove them on their 18th birthday—with the arrangements we are contemplating and which I am setting out to the House this evening. Obviously, we are looking carefully at the nature of the leave that will be granted. It is important to understand and recognise that where we are seeking to reunite children with parents here, the Dublin arrangements would normally mean that they would have the same leave as the person who was here. Equally, if we are looking at resettlement, different leaves may be involved. We are looking at this carefully with UNHCR and others.

I hope that colleagues will agree that accepting the amendment is the right thing to do. No country has done more than Britain when it comes to help for Syrian refugees. Accepting this amendment demonstrates the Government’s approach of doing more for refugee children across the globe while upholding the principle that we should not be encouraging vulnerable people to make that perilous journey. We remain of the view that we can have the biggest impact by supporting refugees in affected regions and the countries hosting them. Those we resettle here are the exceptions and the vulnerable whom the UNHCR advise need to be resettled in a country such as the UK. That has always been the cornerstone of our policy and that should remain the case, but we recognise our duties, both in the EU and beyond.

Dublin System: Asylum

Alistair Carmichael Excerpts

Wednesday 4th May 2016 Commons Chamber

[James Brokenshire]

It is about practical implementation, and that is why I made the point about the 75 experts we are sending out to Greece. Other European countries are doing the same, to see that the practical measure of taking fingerprints is upheld at the frontline. I think that practical support will make the difference.

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

Does the Minister accept that the Dublin regulation should put a floor on what we do, not a ceiling? With that in mind, will he look again at the treatment of those who claim asylum having previously helped our armed forces in Afghanistan as interpreters? If they had treated us as we now treat them, the lives of many of our servicemen would have been put at risk or lost.

[James Brokenshire]

I will look carefully at what the right hon. Gentleman says about how those who have supported the British armed forces in Afghanistan are analysed and treated in our asylum system. Many right hon. and hon. Members have raised that issue, and I can assure him that I am giving it close attention.

Immigration Bill

Alistair Carmichael Excerpts

Monday 25th April 2016 Commons Chamber

[James Brokenshire]

It is important to recognise that the majority of people in our immigration removal centres are not asylum seekers; some people will claim asylum when they have been taken into an IRC. The point the hon. Lady makes about vulnerability is powerful and important, which was why we commissioned Stephen Shaw to make the recommendations he did on these matters of vulnerability. I hope she will see when we publish the adults at risk strategy and those various points that weigh the relevant factors that we are taking precisely those elements into account and that the presumption should not be to detain unless there are overwhelming factors that support detention and mean it is appropriate. I ask her to hold fire perhaps until she sees that policy, and I look forward to engaging with her further once she has had that opportunity.

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

Stephen Shaw considered these matters and, I recall, concluded that there should be no detention of pregnant women. If the Minister is determined to go against that recommendation, surely he must have decided where those women will be detained. When will he tell that to the House?

[James Brokenshire]

The feedback we have received from a range of different organisations is that the facilities and support at Yarl’s Wood, and its links with the health service in Bedfordshire, provide an effective join-up to ensure that those needs are best met, but obviously we keep such matters under close and careful review. The right hon. Gentleman will recall our debates in the previous Parliament on the detention of children. The coalition Government were proud to introduce measures that pragmatically and practically ended the general detention of children, and we are using precisely that model and approach for pregnant women. We are learning from our experiences regarding the detention of children, but we recognise that there may be limited circumstances in which detention might be necessary, either to facilitate removal, or because a young person has been met at the border and the time during which they are held is still technically detention.

[Mr Carmichael]

I remember those debates well. They started from the presumption that Yarl’s Wood was not an appropriate place to detain children any more than Dungavel would be. Why are the Government now taking a different position?

[James Brokenshire]

The right hon. Gentleman will probably know that Yarl’s Wood is the only immigration removal centre that specifically detains women, so when we review it we must ensure that the best facilities for pregnant women are in place. This is not just about what happens in the centre; it is about how that links up to the broader health service. That is why we judge Yarl’s Wood to be the most appropriate place, but we keep such issues under careful review, including the continuing improvements that we want to see.

I promised that I would return to the point raised earlier about assessments. The family removals process operates removal plans for children, and as I said, we are taking a new approach to the use of detention, with focus on a removal plan. Therefore, when anyone goes into detention, that removal plan will need to be considered. As that work develops, there will be detailed consideration of the appropriateness of detention as part of a removal plan, and we are now implementing a number of reforms to detention.

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[James Brokenshire]

I attended last week’s Justice and Home Affairs Council meeting in Luxembourg and I spoke to the Greek Minister. He has welcomed the offer of support that I have just set out, in terms of its practical operationalisation to help make things happen at the front end—in the Greek islands and in Greece. I have highlighted the financial and other support we are giving Greece and others to deal with some of these difficult and challenging issues, and we are playing our absolute part to address this issue and to see that the parts of the EU-Turkey deal happen and have the effect we would all want them to.

[Mr Alistair Carmichael]

The Minister stands there and says we are playing our absolute part, but he told us two minutes ago that we have in fact offered only 75 members of staff, when the Commission itself tells us it needs 4,000. How is that doing our absolute part?

[James Brokenshire]

The contribution we are making stands in very positive terms compared with what other European partners are doing. This is about identifying the right people to deploy so that we have the best effect, and that is precisely what we are doing.

I am conscious that I have spoken for an extended period, and I want other right hon. and hon. Members to get into the debate. For the reasons I have given, the approach proposed in amendment 87 is not the right one. As the selection of amendments notes, the amendment engages financial privilege, and the Speaker identified some of the issues that that raises in terms of the reasons we give the House of Lords.

Under amendment 87, we could end up relieving pressure on developed countries in Europe that have the means to support children, instead of helping developing countries that are under real pressure and that do not have the capacity to support them. The best answer is upstream intervention before children at risk try to come to Europe.

The Government are committed to making a full contribution to the global refugee crisis, particularly by helping children at risk. We strongly believe that our approach of resettling children at risk and their families directly from the region will have most impact on safeguarding vulnerable children. The significant aid package in Europe, and our practical and logistical assistance to front-line member states to ensure vulnerable children are properly protected wherever they are in Europe, is the correct way to approach this issue.

The UK can be proud of the contribution we are making, which stands comparison with any. We are doing everything we said we would to provide aid and to resettle vulnerable refugees. We are already making a real difference to hundreds of thousands of lives.

I recognise the sincere feelings of those who support amendment 87. We share the objective of identifying and protecting children at risk, but I firmly believe that the approach I have set out provides the best way to support our European partners, help vulnerable refugee children and provide the biggest impact for the contribution this country can make.

Child Refugees: Calais

Alistair Carmichael Excerpts

Monday 29th February 2016 Commons Chamber

[James Brokenshire]

I cannot comment on the operations of the French Government, but I can say that we stand ready to support them in joint efforts to see that children and other refugees are appropriately housed and supported. We are providing funding to identify vulnerable children and ensure that the necessary facilities are there. We have given and will continue to give the French Government that support.

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

As the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton) said, if these were British children, the test that would have to be applied to the Government’s actions would be that of the best interests of the child. The Minister is describing colluding with the French Government in a process that will push these children into the hands of people traffickers. Is he really saying that we apply such a different standard to the children of refugees compared with our own?

[James Brokenshire]

I utterly reject the right hon. Gentleman’s assertion. The joint working that our enforcement agencies are engaged in in confronting the people traffickers, going after the gangs and seeing that there is not such exploitation is part of the joint agreement that was signed last August. We are supporting the French Government to identify the vulnerable and see that they are given support, and we will continue to do so.

Asylum Seekers: Middlesbrough

Alistair Carmichael Excerpts

Wednesday 20th January 2016 Commons Chamber

[James Brokenshire]

We need to look at this issue very closely and carefully, which is precisely what we have committed to do. As to G4S and the properties it provides in the north-east, we examined about 84 properties where inspections were successfully completed. Where defects were identified, action was taken. According to our assessment, there were no key performance indicator failures in respect of Middlesbrough. That is precisely what the audit will examine further, taking into account the state and condition of the properties. This House has telegraphed its message very clearly today, in standing against hate crime and discrimination and ensuring that those who are here and who have sought lawfully to claim asylum are given a fair and appropriate welcome by this country, as we would all expect.

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

It is my understanding that concerns about this practice of painting doors red were first raised in 2012 by my Liberal Democrat colleague and then Middlesbrough councillor, Suzanne Fletcher. She has pursued the issue doggedly ever since, and it is largely due to her efforts that the matter has now come to light today. She was told by G4S that it had received no complaints, so there was no need to take any action. That could manifestly not be the case, and does it not raise in the Minister’s mind at least a suspicion that an audit is somewhat less than what is required? Yet again G4S has come to public attention for all the wrong reasons, and yet again it has been found wanting.

[James Brokenshire]

I discussed with the chief executive this morning the issue of complaints and when the matter was first made known to G4S. It is a matter that he has committed to examine further to get to the bottom of how G4S handled the issue for its own satisfaction. It is a question of doing the audit I have commissioned urgently to see the situation on the ground and understand how the inspection and audit regime has been conducted thus far. I will obviously want to reflect on what that tells me.

draft Regulation of Investigatory Powers (Interception of Communications: code of practice) order 2015 Draft Equipment Interference (Code of Practice) Order 2015

Alistair Carmichael Excerpts

Thursday 7th January 2016 General Committees

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

I will not detain the Committee particularly long. As others have said, we welcome the introduction of these codes. Debates of this sort are always welcome, because legislation and regulation in the area have evolved over the years without the necessary element of public debate. This debate, although fairly small in scale, is a welcome first step. We should expect to return to the issue when the Joint Committee, which is currently scrutinising the draft Bill, reports. Thereafter, we will hopefully have a Bill proper, which will presumably go through Parliament during the next Session. That is when we need to have a debate; it is when scrutiny will be of real significance.

The Minister has discussed the various virtues that he identifies in the Government’s introduction of the codes. However, it means that this debate is largely academic, because if the draft Bill is a meaningful draft, surely everything that we are discussing here is up for debate once it has been through this House and the other place. Can he therefore assure me, welcome though the introduction of any code of conduct and transparency in the regulation of such interception most certainly is, that the codes will be revisited in the light of the debate on the draft Bill and then the Bill once it has been through both Houses?

Finally, in the interests of completeness, I should place on record that I agree broadly with the hon. and learned Member for Holborn and St Pancras about the distinction in the codes of practice between legal and journalistic privilege. The codes require a lot more work to be done on that; as he himself conceded, the point is not straightforward or clear, but it is in everybody’s interests that we come up with a solution that is somewhat more elegant and fit for purpose than the current one.

Counter-terrorism

Alistair Carmichael Excerpts

Tuesday 5th January 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

The House will understand and accept the Home Secretary’s concerns about interfering in a live police investigation, but she must surely accept that the information that is already in the public domain risks undermining public confidence in the police bail system. She or somebody in the police service today or some other time will have to give the information to the public to assure that there is no risk as a result of the operation of that system. The videos that we are concerned with today are—it is almost trite to say it—abhorrent and horrific, but they are merely the symptom of the wider disease of radicalisation. It is believed by many people that the radicalisation process is funded from sources in Saudi Arabia. Will the Home Secretary undertake today to investigate whether that is the case and, if it is, will she undertake to do what is necessary to shut off that source of funding?

[Mrs May]

The right hon. Gentleman raises an important point about looking at the source of funding for extremism and terrorism here in the United Kingdom. There is a specific piece of work that we will be undertaking, which the Prime Minister referred to when he gave his statement to the House in November in relation to Syria. That will be done through the extremism analysis unit that has been set up in the Home Office, looking specifically at the funding of the extremism here in the United Kingdom.