Rwanda Treaty

Baroness Taylor of Bolton Excerpts

Friday 8th December 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

The treaty enhances the role of the independent monitoring committee. It will ensure that obligations under the treaty are adhered to in practice and will be able to take steps to prevent errors at an early stage. It will have the power to set its own priority areas for monitoring and will have unfettered access for the purposes of completing assessments and reports that will monitor the entire relocation process from the beginning, including screening, to relocation and settlement in Rwanda. It will be responsible for developing a system to enable relocated individuals and legal representatives to lodge confidential complaints direct to the committee and it will undertake real-time monitoring of the partnership for at least the first three months. There is plenty of scope in there for it to get involved in everything.

[Baroness Taylor of Bolton (Lab)]

Will the Minister acknowledge and confirm that Home Office officials insisted on a letter of direction on this matter because they did not consider that this would be value for money? Can the Minister also tell the House why the Government are not devoting resources of this size to tackling the criminal gangs that are so cruel in bringing people in in such a dangerous way?

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

On the noble Baroness’s second point, the Government are devoting considerable resources to tackling the criminal gangs, as has been well established from the Dispatch Box in many previous debates. As regards the letter that was sent yesterday, I am sure the noble Baroness will recall that the Permanent Secretary appeared before HASC and the Public Accounts Committee on 29 November and 4 December. They asked about payments that the UK had made and he explained at that point that payments in the 2023-24 financial year would be announced in our annual report and accounts next summer, for reasons of balancing the public interest. Since then, Ministers have agreed that Sir Matthew can now disclose the payments for this financial year. That is what happened.

Women’s Suffrage Centenary Fund

Baroness Taylor of Bolton Excerpts

Thursday 2nd November 2017 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

My noble friend is absolutely correct. In fact, turning to the previous question, I think that Emmeline Pankhurst was thrown out of the Free Trade Hall in Manchester and, in true Mancunian style, decided to hold a meeting in the street.

[Baroness Taylor of Bolton (Lab)]

My Lords, will the Minister make sure that working-class women, who played a very large role in this matter, get proper recognition? As a north-west person, is she aware of the campaign in Oldham for a statue for Annie Kenney?

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

I was not aware of the Oldham campaign but the noble Baroness raises a very important point about working-class women and democracy. Democracy in Parliament and local government should not be the preserve of the elite; it should be open to everybody. I know that parties across the House have made incredible efforts to attract women from all socioeconomic groups to play their part.

Euro 2016: Fan Violence

Baroness Taylor of Bolton Excerpts

Tuesday 14th June 2016 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Taylor of Bolton (Lab)]

Will the Minister recognise that what has happened has happened? We are not talking just about hypotheticals here; we have seen real, calculated violence from a group of Russian supporters. It is very serious, and is it not rather complacent of the Government to say that we will wait to see what happens?

[Lord Keen of Elie]

It is not a case of being complacent. The question posed by the noble Lord proceeded upon the basis of the suspension hanging over the Russian team becoming an actuality. It has not become an actuality, and it is only that hypothesis that I referred to.

Communications Data and Interception

Baroness Taylor of Bolton Excerpts

Thursday 10th July 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Taylor of Holbeach]

Yes. One of the factors which the noble Baroness, Lady Smith, and I welcome is that, in the Serious Crime Bill, there is a whole series of measures attaching to Northern Ireland which have support. We hope that these will enable the two law enforcement agencies on that island to work closely together in the interests of protecting the people of that island.

[Baroness Taylor of Bolton (Lab)]

My Lords, I associate myself with the comments of the noble Lord, Lord West, and the noble Lord, Lord King, whom I succeeded as chair of the Intelligence and Security Committee. Those of us who have had direct experience of the benefits of this kind of information will very much support what the Government are doing. Perhaps I may ask the Minister a practical question about data retention. By acknowledging that new legislation is required, can we assume that there is nothing that threatens the use of existing data that are held? Will the Minister continue to use examples in the way that he did today in repeating the Statement so that people outside who have concerns about the use of data recognise the productive way in which they can be used in important criminal cases?

[Lord Taylor of Holbeach]

Yes. I think that sometimes the arguments become focused on particular issues. I agree with the noble Baroness. I know that she speaks from experience and I am grateful for her support. There is an important communications exercise in making sure that people realise why we are involved in the fight against crime and the fight against sexual exploitation. These are all factors in our need to have this capability. I am grateful for the noble Baroness’s support.

Intelligence and Security Committee: Annual Report 2011-12

Baroness Taylor of Bolton Excerpts

Monday 21st January 2013 Grand Committee

[Baroness Taylor of Bolton]

My Lords, thanks to the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, I have learnt something that I had not expected to this afternoon, which is that as a former chair of the Intelligence and Security Committee, I now need to see the latest James Bond film. Also as a former chair of the committee, I hesitated and wondered whether I should hover like a ghost from the past over this debate, but I could not resist taking part because it is sometimes good to have a degree of perspective, and the committee is still relatively new, and therefore I want to say a few words.

I congratulate and thank the two noble Lords who represent us on the Intelligence and Security Committee. When I was its chair, Peter Archer—Lord Archer of Sandwell—was a diligent member of the committee; we now have two Members of your Lordships’ House serving on it and I am sure that their contribution is very highly valued. It is an extraordinary committee. While it is not a Select Committee or a committee of Parliament, it is a committee of parliamentarians and probably works harder than any other committee of this kind. Mention has been made of the number of meetings it holds, but it is the intensity of many of those meetings and the degree of responsibility held by its members that are important. I am therefore happy to pay tribute and note with interest some of the phrases that have been used in connection with the legislation we have been talking about in the recent past actually catching up with reality in terms of the information coming from the agencies about operations or other areas. It is the case that this committee has a great deal of power and that it has exercised it informally, not least because the agencies want to have the confidence of the committee. Therefore, whatever the statutory situation is, I have always felt that the ISC has a great deal of power and holds great sway with the agencies. It has been important to see that develop, and it is interesting to hear how it is to develop in the future.

I should mention a word of caution about a theme that emerges time and time again, and that is the need for transparency. We need confidence both in the committee and in our agencies. There is a limit, as has been said, to the amount of transparency that can exist. If we emphasise transparency too much, we will lead people to believe that they can be told more than is the case, and sometimes we need a reality check in that respect.

I, too, would like to say a word about the success of the Olympics and Paralympics. As we have been told, there was much concern beforehand about what might happen and what the potential for disruption and danger was. The report states that this put “unprecedented pressure” on the agencies, and I can well believe it. I am glad that the report recognises the exceptional effort made by staff, which the noble Marquess mentioned in opening the debate. We all know that many real sacrifices were made. It was an intense summer for many people who, for example, lost their holidays or had difficulties if they had children. This affected not only the agencies but MoD staff and, perhaps, more widely throughout Whitehall. Although I am sure that many of those individuals felt that it was worthwhile, there were real pressures and we should pay tribute to them.

On the other hand, the report recognises that the preparations that were made to anticipate and avoid difficulties during the Olympic period meant that risks were taken in certain other areas. This is a matter that we should not dwell on but perhaps not push to one side because there are real and serious potential problems here. Mention has been made of resources. We all know that times are difficult. We also know that no Government want to or can take risks with national security, which must always be a priority. However, I am concerned, as are many other people, about the pressures being placed on the single intelligence budget and I fear that we are potentially getting to a critical period in terms of those pressures and problems. We saw, as I mentioned, that the pressures resulting from the preparations for the Olympics meant that squeezes were made and gaps created elsewhere. The noble Lord, Lord Butler, mentioned the increasing and intensifying danger of cyber attack and how cyber security needs more attention and is more of a challenge.

We have seen how events as they are always called, such as the Arab spring or awakening, which is probably more appropriate, are a real challenge for the intelligence agencies. The report states clearly that there were gaps and problems. We are seeing it at the moment so far as Mali is concerned; again, clearly, there are problems. These are all unanticipated pressures. Who knows what the next pressure will be: something in the Pacific or somewhere else? The report expresses clear concerns about the extent of global coverage that we have. Yes, we have got to work with allies, to share intelligence and support, and to work with whoever we can whenever we can, but I think that the committee is going to have a real challenge here in finding out what the real pressures are and even perhaps in anticipating what needs to be done to make sure that those pressures do not create real problems. Recommendation S says that:

“Defence Intelligence has told us that it ‘can’t cover everything all the time in the modern world’”.

Maybe we can live with everything not being covered but, as I have just said, with Mali, the Arab awakening and whatever comes next, how much coverage can we actually afford to marginalise and put to one side while we depend on others? The recommendation goes on to say:

“Nevertheless, Strategic Defence and Security Review cuts will further decrease DI’s ability to provide global coverage with sufficient depth … We urge the Government to ensure that sufficient resources are available to allow in-depth coverage to be maintained on an ongoing basis”.

I am glad that the committee has said that and I hope that it will not pull its punches with government if it feels that such problems are not being given proper priority in the future.

There is a whole section in the report about Defence Intelligence: how it fits into the wider body of intelligence and what the structures should be. I would simply say that if anything is going to be reorganised, it has to be done with very great care, and I am sure that the committee will watch that. I am slightly worried that there is a suggestion that the profile of Defence Intelligence should be higher. I am not sure that any agencies or any intelligence services having a high profile is particularly desirable.

I want to mention one other issue, which is that of staffing problems, in particular recruitment and retention. I have particularly strong views about certain aspects of this issue, which is one that the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, also touched on. Recommendation X in the report mentions the difficulties that GCHQ has in retaining internet specialists and actually calls it,

“a matter of grave concern”.

This is an area where we have to have and be able to keep the best individuals in the field. In a very rapidly changing and challenging situation, we have to be at least one step ahead of those who would do us harm. Recession or not, we have to pay enough to recruit and retain the individuals we need. It is not just about money. I know that there are real elements of dedicated service on the part of the individuals involved, but we have to be able to recruit and retain the best.

Another issue I find extremely worrying and which has puzzled me ever since I was made chair of the ISC in 2001 is that of recruitment from ethnic minorities. Recommendation W says:

“All three Agencies apply the same nationality requirements, which are a prerequisite for security clearance. While that does hamper their recruitment of a more ethnically diverse workforce, we nevertheless consider that greater efforts can, and must, be made even within these constraints”.

I have not looked up the reports we published between 2001 and 2005, but I know for certain that very similar words were used in all of them. The Government’s response notes the committee’s conclusion and says that,

“the Agencies take seriously their responsibility to have an ethnically-diverse workforce”,

and that,

“the Government will continue to monitor the progress”.

Those words echo completely what was being said 10 years ago. I despair and remain puzzled as to why it is the case because there must be very many people who have the nationality requirements to join the agencies. The two seats that I represented in Parliament—Bolton West and Dewsbury—had many third-generation youngsters of families of Indian and Pakistani origin who were born here, educated here, went to university here, were well qualified and multilingual. I accept entirely that there must be careful vetting of all applicants—although in the past when there have been failures, they have often involved stereotypical agency employees rather than people from different backgrounds—but more could be done, more should be done and more should have been done years ago. I urge the committee to keep up pressure on this because not only do we have an agency workforce that is not as responsive or representative as it should be, but we are losing out on talent that we need. In the past, we have had shortages, for example, of Urdu speakers, and yet we have whole pools of them here who could be helpful.

I congratulate the committee very sincerely and urge it not to lose sight of the big picture on resources and to intensify its pressure in some of the areas that I have mentioned.

Justice and Security Bill [HL]

Baroness Taylor of Bolton Excerpts

Monday 19th November 2012 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Taylor of Bolton]

My Lords, I rise to speak with some hesitation because I have not been able to take part in these debates previously. However, I feel as a former chair of the Intelligence and Security Committee that I should echo some of the concerns that the noble Lord, Lord Butler, raised, particularly what he said about the Executive not being able to surrender responsibility for security.

On the other hand, I very much agree with what my noble friend Lord Campbell-Savours said about the importance of privilege for the Intelligence and Security Committee and I am not entirely convinced that this can be solved in any other way. I have a dilemma. There are conflicting things that we are all trying to do. We are trying to make the Intelligence and Security Committee as effective as possible. I am not convinced that a Select Committee would in any way be more effective. I think that the current arrangements work rather well, but I am struck by my noble friend’s desire to increase confidence on the part of the public in that committee and I know that that is what he is trying to do.

However, he has not gone into the practicalities of a Select Committee on this occasion as he has done on others. For example, every member of the House of Commons can attend a Select Committee, so the normal rules could not apply there. The practicalities of location could be met, I am sure. I am left with this dilemma because I do not think there is any way in which the Executive can give up their responsibility. I am not sure about the mechanisms that have been mentioned—for example, the Speaker giving authorisation—and I am worried about freedom of information, although I am worried about freedom of information on a raft of issues and not only on this one.

There are two groups of amendments and, in a sense, we are going on to the next group, which relates to parliamentary privilege and is absolutely essential to the issue of whether we need to go down the path of a Select Committee. My noble friend thinks however, that if there were to be a Select Committee as he envisages, with all the complications that exist, it would increase the confidence of the public. On the first occasion on which the ISC, as a Select Committee, refused to give information or agreed to redactions that people then probed and it was not able to give answers, the Select Committee would be criticised just as much as the ISC has been in the past. I hope that my noble friend will resist the temptation to raise expectations about any increase in accountability or transparency were this committee to become a Select Committee of the House because I do not think that it could function in that way.

Many of us who have been involved worry that the agencies took a little time to come round to giving information when the ISC was first established—I see the noble Lord, Lord King, who was chair at that time, nodding in agreement—and we could suffer a setback if this committee became a Select Committee. It might be recoverable, but we would have to re-establish a system of confidence once again. I hope my noble friend will not raise expectations that this would suddenly mean more accountability and transparency. The one issue that concerns me is making sure that the ISC has all the protection that it needs.

[Lord King of Bridgwater]

My Lords, the House is getting a surfeit of chairmen, members and former members of the ISC and I am delighted to follow the noble Baroness. She followed directly after me—I think that is right, if my memory is correct—and the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours was a very diligent member of the committee during part of the time when I was chairman. I would like to welcome a promising new young member of the ISC in the shape of the noble Lord, Lord Butler—who, very unusually, has sat on both sides of the fence, as one might say, and speaks with all the authority of seeing it from both sides.

I respect the approach that the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, has taken. He has the credit of holding this view continuously for a considerable number of years and has pursued it very diligently, as is clear from the speech he has made in your Lordships’ House today and the detail into which he has gone. I am on record as saying that I have seen the evolution of this committee progressively over the years. The noble Baroness, Lady Manningham-Buller, made exactly the point that it was bound to evolve, has evolved, is continuing to evolve and will evolve in the future. The question that faces your Lordships today is whether we should now take a further major step forward and recommend it that it should go straight to a Select Committee.

I am very disappointed that the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, has tabled Amendment 1 because I thought the previous feeling of the debate in Committee was that it was right to consider Amendment 2—which had previously been Amendment 1—the proposal of the noble Lord, Lord Butler, and then, in the light of what the House thought about that, to move to the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours. The noble Lord is a very astute parliamentarian and his Amendment 1, if I may say so, is entirely a device to get in at number one, because if the House was to vote for it his subsequent amendments would abolish it. If the House agreed to Amendment 3, it would delete the clause in which he had just carried Amendment 1. It would then delete all the clauses that apply to the ISC. That, of course, is the position. He is saying that nothing should be set up under statute and therefore you do not need anything in this Bill about the ISC. You pass the responsibility for creating the appropriate committee over to the authorities in the House of Commons with the support of this House. We do not have the opportunity to consider the alternative approach yet, although the noble Lord, Lord Butler, has given us a good snapshot of what the House might be interested in doing.

There was common agreement in Committee that it is absolutely vital that the committee develops, as it has progressed significantly beyond the 1994 Act which limited its powers and responsibilities simply to the Secret Intelligence Service, the Security Service and Government Communications Headquarters—GCHQ. In those first few years, we extended progressively into the assessment staff in the Cabinet Office, the JIC organisation and the Defence Intelligence Staff. I brought in the NAO to oversee the finances and produce reports on financial aspects on which we needed further advice. We also took in evidence on police activities, including in the area of serious crime, and a whole series of different things which spread its range. I would like to think that, under successive memberships of the committee, it has commanded significant public confidence. Indeed, I remind noble Lords that it has been going for 18 years and I do not think there have been any serious allegations of leaks. There might have been, if not a nod, perhaps a suggestion of one, but I have to say that over the period there have been significantly more from the intelligence agencies, which are meant to be distrustful of our ability as parliamentarians to contain secrets. On this occasion I will not go into the details of Mr Shayler and Mr Tomlinson, both people who did not give great service to our country in particularly difficult times.

I did not realise that the noble Lord, Lord Butler, was going to mention this, but there is a role for the ISC that is quite outside Parliament, in the sense of being mandated by it, on which the Government did come to the committee. The Home Secretary at the time, Jack Straw, rang me and said, “We have a problem. Some very serious allegations are being made and it is not going to be dealt with simply by us issuing denials that they are true. Will the committee undertake to investigate the allegation of a failure by the Security Service in connection with the Secret Intelligence Service to root out serious Warsaw Pact Soviet espionage?”. If people do not know what I am talking about, it got into the tabloids as the “granny who came in from the cold”. A KGB archivist, Mr Mitrokhin, provided the most amazing fund of top secret intelligence. Having been turned down by the United States—I think he went to the US embassy in Vilnius, although at the time all sorts of people were turning up at US embassies, so they said that they had too many of them—but fortunately a suitably intelligent British agent spotted the potential value of the archive. It was top secret stuff and I said that we would undertake the investigation only on the condition that we had access not as circumscribed in the Act but to any secret information that was in any way relevant to the case. We took full evidence, including from Mr Mitrokhin himself, and many noble Lords will have seen the outcome of that. The report showed that although one or two mistakes were made, the more serious allegations against the intelligence and security agencies were not justified. I like to think that that report, from an all-party committee drawn from both Houses, investigating an absolutely top secret matter, commanded considerable public confidence.

It is important that this committee commands public confidence in this country. As the Foreign Secretary says in his article in the Times today—more in connection with Part 2 of this Bill—it is important, too, for this committee to have a role in maintaining international confidence. As a country, we depend enormously on our intelligence agencies and what they produce, but also considerably on a whole network of alliances of intelligence agencies. The difficulties of the world at present are such that one cannot be sure from where the next challenge, terrorist threat or any other sort of threat, such as that from organised crime, might emerge. We must maintain international confidence that our intelligence agencies and parliamentary oversight procedures are secure to the standards that our allies would expect for information that may be extremely sensitive as far as they are concerned.

As the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, made clear, that background is such that, whatever we come out with here, it cannot be an ordinary committee. The noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, wants to abolish the ISC as it stands under statute and just create a select committee. He then, very properly, includes a whole range of extra requirements that would have to be added to a select committee for it to operate in this way. He very confidently said that all the necessary safeguards would be available. However, I do not know what authority he has for saying that, as it will be a matter for the House to decide which of those safeguards it wishes to impose. That is why the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Butler, is surely right: the Government cannot surrender or pass over responsibility for national security. The Government must maintain that responsibility; our duty in Parliament is to hold them to account for how they discharge that responsibility.

I wait to see whether the Minister can help us on the legal point made by the noble Lord, Lord Butler. We have managed to stumble along for 18 years without getting too worried about the issue of privilege, but it now seems to be becoming much more of a concern that we should have that protection, if it is necessary. Why can it not simply be put in the Bill and made quite clear what that privilege protection is? That would seem to be an entirely satisfactory way to deal with it.

A number of complications arise, whichever route we take. When the noble Lord, Lord Henley, summed up the debate in Committee on this point, he made clear that the Government would go away and reflect on the comments that had been made. We were privileged at that time to have the noble Lord, Lord Carlile, here, who, as your Lordships will know, of course has considerable experience in the security field with the responsibility that he had. He said that he respected and welcomed what the noble Lord, Lord Henley, had said and that he would wait to hear the Minister’s conclusions when he came back—we welcome the noble Lord, Lord Taylor, who has now taken over that responsibility—but he did not actually, as the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, knows, support the Select Committee route. I do not support it at this stage either but do support the steps that need to be taken. I think the noble Baroness and I are pretty much in step on this: we should ensure that the committee is recognised to have as parliamentary a status as is possible, while retaining for the Executive the overall responsibility for national security and ensuring that the ISC—which I would like to think has made a reasonably promising start—can continue to evolve and serve the nation as it has sought to do in the past.