Lord Mandelson Humble Address: Government Response
Debate between Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent and Lord Kennedy of Southwark(1 month, 4 weeks ago)
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The Parliamentary Secretary, Cabinet Office (Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent) (Lab)
My Lords, first, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Finn, and the noble Lord, Lord Pack, for their contributions. As ever, I will endeavour to answer all their questions, but I will reflect on Hansard and write on any issues I have missed.
Before I do so, it is important for all of us to reflect on the impact this debate will yet again have on the victims of Jeffrey Epstein. Noble Lords across your Lordships’ House will be aware of the truly horrific crimes he committed against countless women and girls. As we discuss these issues again today, it is the victims of a horrendous sexual predator whom we must remember.
Moving on to the substance and process of the Government’s compliance with the ISC, for clarity and accountability, as noble Lords will have seen, the publication includes a summary of the methodology explaining how government officials undertook the disclosure process. To clarify, because doing so will be helpful for Members of your Lordships’ House, on redactions, in line with the Motion, more than 300 individual documents were referred under a process agreed between the Government and the Intelligence and Security Committee. The Government are grateful to the committee for its engagement in this process, and I am of course especially grateful to my noble friend Lord Beamish for his stewardship of the ISC and his management of this significant additional workload.
Further limited redactions have been made outside the ISC process in respect of information that relates to junior officials’ names, contact details, the personal or commercially sensitive data of third parties not relevant to the Motion and, where relevant, legal professional privilege. The Cabinet Office humble Address team, which has taken the decisions on non-ISC redactions, has taken advice from an independent KC—including reviewing the methodological approach—and officials, acting on that to inform its work. These additional targeted redactions made outside the ISC process have been made in line with precedent, built on the conventions of the Freedom of Information Act, the Ministerial Code and resolutions on ministerial accountability passed by both Houses in 1997, as my right honourable friend the Chief Secretary to the Prime Minister stated yesterday.
On the ISC’s recommendation—we thank it for such a constructive suggestion—the chair of the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee, Mr Simon Hoare MP, has reviewed our approach to third-party redactions and confirmed that we have applied the methodology set out in the document and that the redactions are sensible, reasonable and proportionate. As noble Lords will be aware, the Metropolitan Police Service has asked us to withhold some material in scope of the Motion which it considers could be prejudicial to its ongoing criminal investigation or any subsequent prosecution.
To ensure parliamentary oversight, the Government also shared this information with the chair of the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee to provide additional accountability of the Government’s actions. The Government are very grateful to Mr Hoare for his participation in that exercise. Our goal is to ensure that we neither prejudice nor undermine any police investigations, as all Members of your Lordships’ House would expect. Such information will be published at the conclusion of the investigation, or at a point when it would no longer be prejudicial to the police investigation to do so. Therefore, I am limited in what I can and will say.
I will also touch briefly on the material relating to Peter Mandelson’s national security vetting process. The UK security vetting process summary and recommendation that was put to the Foreign Office has been shared with the ISC to agree reactions so that it can be published when we are able to do so. What has not been shared is the highly sensitive personal data that formed the basis of the vetting process. If those participating in the vetting process cannot trust that the information they feed into the process is confidential, it will harm the integrity of the whole system, undermining the very basis of our national security vetting system and, in turn, our national security. We cannot and will not do that. I note that the chair of the ISC, my noble friend Lord Beamish, confirmed last night that he agrees with the Government that the larger vetting detail should not be released to the committee even though it is covered by the humble Address. I am grateful to my noble friend for saying so.
Moving to the specific points that have been raised, the noble Baroness, Lady Finn, touched on compliance with the Ministerial Code. Noble Lords will understand that I am not the judge of the Ministerial Code—that is the role of the Prime Minister, taking advice from his independent adviser as needed. As set out in the code, Ministers are personally responsible for deciding how to act and conduct themselves in light of the code, and for justifying their actions to Parliament and the public. The noble Baroness also touched on the future duty of candour law and raised the scandals that have led to us requiring a law. We have discussed in your Lordships’ House many times—be it the horrors of the infected blood scandal, of Horizon, of Windrush, of Hillsborough, or of the Manchester Arena—that there is a reason why we need to change the law. If we cannot convince people to be candid, then in order to change the culture we will need to change the law. I reassure the noble Baroness that, as I understand it, Peter Mandelson did not participate in the Shanghai speaking engagement she referenced.
On the direct ministerial guidance and change in vetting, the noble Lord, Lord Pack, raised a very important point, as he did last time, about how this is communicated. I will have to go back to officials to see if it can be included in the terms of reference, because the process is well under way. The noble Lord is aware that my colleague, the Chief Secretary to the Prime Minister, was called up on the fact that it has been slightly delayed, although it is slightly ambitious timing, so it depends on your view. However, I will see what I can do about verbal briefings and write to the noble Lord.
On the issue of the NCCCs review, I expect very shortly—imminently—to be back in front of your Lordships’ House with both the terms of reference and who is undertaking that review. We are not not doing it; we absolutely are, as my honourable friend in the other place said. But I will have to come back to him.
With regard to the fit and proper person test, the noble Lord would have read with interest, as I did, about what we are allowed to know as Members of your Lordships’ House and what we are not allowed to know. Noble Lords will be aware that there are a small number of exemptions from standard vetting requirements in place. Sir Adrian Fulford is considering the relevant policies as part of his review into national security vetting. His high-level recommendations will be published shortly, and we will act swiftly on his recommendations.
There is a general exemption from national security vetting for parliamentarians. This has been a general rule for many years, and many Members of your Lordships’ House would have experienced briefings because of it. That includes in this instance and in others those briefings that can also be made on Privy Council terms, hence the discussion. I would suggest that noble Lords actually look at the time stamps for how that discussion was done, because that was a one-day discussion—several messages but a one-day discussion—and then a decision was made.
The noble Lord, Lord Pack, also asked me about my noble friend Lord Livermore and the transparency declaration. I understand this was a personal meeting that took place away from government property. The only participants were my noble friend Lord Livermore and Peter Mandelson; no one else from Global Counsel joined in the end. As this was a meeting in a personal capacity, it was not recorded as an official meeting.
The documents before your Lordships amount to one of the largest government publications ever laid before the House. Officials work tirelessly to ensure our compliance with the wishes of the other place and over £1 million has been spent. The scale is not dissimilar to the requirements of a public inquiry, and I want to thank my officials for their extraordinary effort since the beginning of February. However, the last word should not be about process or political intrigue, but to remember who has been failed. Our thoughts must remain with the victims of Epstein today and every day.
Captain of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen-at-Arms and Chief Whip (Lord Kennedy of Southwark) (Lab Co-op)
My Lords, we now have up to 20 minutes of questions from Back-Bench Members. The first question will be from the Conservative Benches.
Supreme Court Dillon Judgment
Debate between Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent and Lord Kennedy of Southwark(2 months, 1 week ago)
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The Parliamentary Secretary, Cabinet Office (Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent) (Lab)
My Lords, I thank both the noble Lord, Lord Caine, and the noble Baroness, Lady Suttie, for their contributions. I will attempt to address their questions and concerns, considering both the time available to us and the complex nature of this judgment, which I am sure that both noble and noble and learned Lords will be taking time to digest. I will also reflect on Hansard and, if I have missed any of the specific questions raised, I will write.
I start with the final comment made by the noble Baroness, Lady Suttie, about the victims. The noble Lord, Lord Caine, advised me when I took on this role that, every time I speak at the Dispatch Box, I should check the anniversary dates. That should remind all of us of the actual consequences of what we are dealing with and why we are doing this work. On 17 May 1973, five British soldiers were killed by the Provisional IRA in Omagh. On 17 May 1974, the Dublin and Monaghan bombings by the UVF occurred, and 33 people were killed. On 15 May 1977, Captain Robert Nairac, known to Members of your Lordships’ House, was disappeared. On 19 May 1981, five British soldiers were killed at Bessbrook by the Provisional IRA. On 18 May 1984, three soldiers were murdered at Enniskillen and two soldiers were murdered at Camlough by the Provisional IRA. On 20 May 1985, four members of the RUC were murdered near Killeen by the IRA. This is within a week in the history of the Troubles.
However, there is always hope: on 22 May 1998, we had the referendum on the Belfast/Good Friday agreement, in which 71.2% of the residents of Northern Ireland voted for peace to take us forward. Everything we do has to be within the spirit of the Belfast/Good Friday agreement and of the Stormont House agreement to take us from where we were to where we are. There are Members on all sides of your Lordships’ House who lived and breathed the reality of the Troubles and, for every murder I have just referenced, dozens of people were hurt and still live with the consequences today. So, as we talk about these issues, people are still grieving every single day and do not have answers. I have been privileged in my role to meet many of the families, victims and veterans’ groups who served and are still dealing with the consequences.
I turn to some of the specific questions. I commend, as my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland did, the families who brought the case against the legacy Act. They were utterly opposed to the Act and, most notably, to the provision it made for a conditional immunity scheme, which would have offered immunity to terrorists who perpetuated horrific acts of violence against our service personnel, as well as our service personnel—an immunity that has never been put into law. The action they took resulted in the conditional immunity scheme and several other provisions of the legacy Act being found by the High Court, and then again by the Court of Appeal, to be incompatible with our obligations under Articles 2 and 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights. This Government have and are opposed to the immunity scheme. It was wrong in principle and had no support in Northern Ireland, which is why we dropped the appeal on immunity.
On the specific points raised by the noble Lord, Lord Caine, although I am not as noble and learned as my mother had always wished I might be, there was one key paragraph in the finding:
“In our view it cannot be said that the Strasbourg court has established a principle in its case law that there is a reconciliation exception to the general ban on amnesties for grave breaches of fundamental rights or that the question has not come before that court. Absent such a ruling, there is nothing to which the mirror principle can be applied by the United Kingdom courts through incremental development to the circumstances in Northern Ireland”.
As I said, I am definitely not learned, unfortunately, but my understanding, and my briefing, is that that is clear, in legal language, that amnesty would not be found to be legal.
I turn to the remedial order. This point is particularly important to note. I know that some in this House have shared the view that the Government did not have the grounds on which to bring forward the remedial order, which would finally strike the immunity provisions from the statute book. As noble Lords will be well aware, the conditions for laying an RO under the Human Rights Act are that
“an appeal brought within that time has been determined or abandoned”.
The Supreme Court recognised this, and therefore immunity was not an issue before it. However, it stated very clearly that no exemptions in case law exist to justify the granting of immunity for breaches of Articles 2 or 3 of the ECHR. As such, the Government will move forward with the remedial order as soon as parliamentary time allows, and I look forward to discussing the detail of the remedial order with Members of your Lordships’ House at that point, in what I am sure will be an interesting discussion.
I turn to Article 2 of the Windsor Framework. The Supreme Court has provided important clarity on how this should be interpreted and applied in future. It has confirmed the Government’s long-standing position that the rights protected by Article 2 of the Windsor Framework are those concerned with the cessation of the sectarian conflict in Northern Ireland, and that specifically. While reaffirming the Government’s position on this, the Supreme Court found that the relevant provisions of the legacy Act should not have been disapplied by Article 2 of the Windsor Framework. For absolute clarity, this does not equate to endorsement of the immunity scheme, as has been suggested by some.
I turn to the Troubles Bill that is before the other place. As my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland set out, the Troubles Bill is now the only viable way to generate confidence across communities, enable information sharing by the Irish authorities and put in place the necessary safeguards for our future service personnel. We have been listening to victims, families and our brave veterans and service personnel in developing this legislation. I have met numerous victims and veterans’ groups and have heard first hand of the violence—the Troubles continue to impact their lives today. It is for them we are seeking to act. This is why the Government are committed to progressing this legislation as soon as possible, while balancing that against the need to get this right.
The Government will be tabling a series of amendments to the Bill in due course, which we hope will give all communities confidence in legacy processes and ensure that our veterans are treated fairly and with the respect and dignity they deserve. In answer to the noble Baroness, Lady Suttie, yes, absolutely, I am more than happy to share them with Members of your Lordships’ House. As and when the legislation gets to our end of the building, however, I am convinced that we will be discussing specifically those parts of the legislation for many hours.
One of the other issues, and why we need the legislation to come forward, is tackling interim custody orders. That was not referenced by either the noble Lord or the noble Baroness, but we do need to deal with this issue, and we will do so within the legislation as it comes forward.
The noble Lord, Lord Caine, also touched on immigration. He is absolutely right that there are impacts of this judgment across Whitehall as well as across Northern Ireland departments. It is a very complicated judgment, so we are reflecting on what it means in the round, but the Government were successful in our appeal, so we look forward to moving forward.
On the other issues, I put on record my support for WAVE. It is an extraordinary organisation, and it is not the only one. We work closely with many others across the piece, whether they are smaller groups such as MAPS or SEFF—which is not a small group at all—or WAVE. Noble Lords who have been touched by this issue will be aware that veterans in Northern Ireland require different types of support than other members of the community do. It would it be impossible for a member of the unionist community to access certain services if they did not know who would be there too, and vice versa, so making sure that there is a range of organisations is key, and it is my privilege to get to work with them.
Captain of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen-at-Arms and Chief Whip (Lord Kennedy of Southwark) (Lab Co-op)
My Lords, we now move on to up to 20 minutes of Back-Bench questions. To get in as many questions as possible from all sides of the House, we need questions, not speeches. The first question will come from the Conservative Benches and we will then go to the Cross Benches.