Justice and Security Bill [HL]

Baroness Manningham-Buller Excerpts

Wednesday 11th July 2012 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Manningham-Buller]

My Lords, I am surprised to be compared to a regulator on the strength of the organisation to which I once belonged. I see very little parallel between the security and intelligence agencies and regulation. The conclusion that that makes them overcautious is therefore entirely spurious.

Of course, public opinion of and confidence in the judiciary is extremely important, and we do not want to do anything to damage that. Notwithstanding comments in the Daily Mail, I think that public confidence in the security and intelligence community is not helped by the fact that, in many cases, we have been unable to defend ourselves because of the problem that we are describing today. None the less, as I said at Second Reading, the support that my colleagues get from the public is extensive and perhaps greater than the noble Lord, Lord Lester, suggests.

Another point relates to secret information. We need to have the confidence of those—including many young men and women from the communities to which the noble Lord, Lord Hodgson, referred—who give information to the security and intelligence agencies at risk of their lives and in secret. That is one of the fundamental reasons for secrecy. I ask the Committee to remember that in thinking of the confidence in other regards that we want to maintain.

[Lord Thomas of Gresford]

I respect the views that the noble Baroness has just put forward, but I do not think that public confidence is improved if a closed judgment is given on closed material to the Government in a particular case. It is essential that the public know what is going on as much as is conceivably possible. The interests of national security can be invoked in only the smallest area of cases if confidence is to be maintained.