Equipment Theft (Prevention) Bill

Holly Lynch Excerpts

Committee stage
Wednesday 1st February 2023 Public Bill Committees

I congratulate my hon. Friend on the progress of the Bill. Having taken a private Member’s Bill through Parliament, I know that it entails an awful lot of hard work, determination and bringing everybody together, particularly for Committee. The Bill will undoubtedly bring benefits to his constituents, my constituents and constituents across the country.

[Holly Lynch (Halifax) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Bone, for the second time in two days. I will keep this brief, but I join others in congratulating the hon. Member for Buckingham on securing so much cross-party support for his private Member’s Bill and on getting it to Committee. We very much hope that the Bill will successfully play a part in clamping down on ATV and quad bike theft.

As other Members have outlined, this issue has long been prevalent in rural communities, afflicting those involved in agricultural work in particular, but as we have heard, the impact is felt in all our constituencies across the country in different ways. According to NFU Mutual, around 900 to 1,200 quad bikes are stolen every year. NFU Mutual’s most recent crime report, published in August 2022, found that rural theft had risen by 40% from the previous year, with the overall cost to the UK economy estimated at £40.5 million.

Quad bikes are predominantly manufactured by just two companies, with little technological development to the same basic key system they have had for over 35 years. I am reliably informed that it is possible to start up one of the most common makes and models of quad bike with just a screwdriver, and a quick Google search provides detailed instructions as to how to start these quad bikes without a key.

The theft of ATVs has a significant financial impact on both customers and insurers. As well as the financial impact, quad bike theft perpetuates further and wider criminal activity. On Second Reading, I spoke of a recent spate of quad bike theft-related crimes in my own constituency of Halifax. That includes their use in antisocial behaviour and vandalism. A number of hon. Members from all parties have made the point about vehicles, after their theft, being used in a variety of types of vandalism and antisocial behaviour afflicting communities, whether they are rural or urban.

As outlined, the Bill seeks to mandate the fitting of an immobiliser and forensic markings on all quad bikes and all-terrain vehicles sold in the UK. The Bill is relatively tight in scope, which is often the winning formula for a successful private Member’s Bill. However, it will also allow for the enactment of secondary legislation that could expand the Bill’s remit to cover other agricultural and construction equipment. Again, on Second Reading I spoke of the problem of theft from commercial vans—a point made by the right hon. Member for Chelmsford and others. According to research carried out by Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles in 2021, 27% of van drivers had fallen victim to tool theft in the previous 12 months. The total cost of all lost tools and equipment is estimated to be about £15 million a year. Volkswagen estimates that the associated downtime for drivers who must replace those tools costs £550 a day per van.

In conclusion, we very much welcome the opportunity to support the Bill through its passage on to the statute book. We hope that it makes the difference that we would all like to see, and we very much hope that there is a further opportunity to consider and evaluate its impact with regard to what other types of kit it might be appropriate to extend these protections to.

[The Minister for Crime, Policing and Fire (Chris Philp)]

It is a pleasure once again to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Bone. Let me start by expressing my very warm congratulations to my hon. Friend the Member for Buckingham on the work that he has done in developing and bringing forward this Bill with a great deal of conscientiousness, perseverance and, most important of all, charm. That is a quality not universally present, I have to say—[Hon. Members: “Oh!”] But it is certainly well represented by my hon. Friend the Member for Buckingham. He has done a very good job of talking the Committee through the operative provisions of the Bill, so I do not propose to repeat what he has already said so eloquently, other than to make it clear that the Government very strongly support these measures, for the reasons that hon. Members on both sides of the Committee have eloquently and powerfully set out. Clearly, agricultural communities the length and breadth of the United Kingdom are affected by ATV theft, and the provisions in the Bill will help us to combat that.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Buckingham said, the operative provisions of the Bill will be enacted via secondary legislation, so the principal thing that I would like to say is that work on preparing those regulations is happening at the moment. It is happening in parallel with the preparation of the Bill, so, as quickly as possible after commencement of the Bill, we will be able to bring forward the relevant statutory instruments to enact the provisions that we have been debating. That work is happening.

What I would mostly like to say, however, is that I have certainly heard the powerful opinions expressed on Second Reading, and again this morning in Committee, about a strong desire on both sides of the House to consider expanding the scope of the statutory instruments beyond just all-terrain vehicles to look at other agricultural equipment and also tradespeople’s tools. We have all had reports of often quite valuable tools being stolen from tradespeople’s vans. As hon. Members have said, that is not just a financial loss; it prevents tradespeople from working, sometimes for a number of days, which disrupts building projects and causes loss of earnings at a time when people obviously are struggling to make ends meet, so I am very powerfully seized of the need to look at that. I have asked Home Office officials to work on developing the statutory instruments to address it as well as doing the work on ATVs. That work is ongoing; they are doing the technical work to look at it at the moment, so I cannot make an absolute commitment that it will be done at the same time, but my starting position is that if we are going to bring forward statutory instruments under the Bill to deal with ATVs, why not do the other tools at the same time?

There may be some technical reason that I am not aware of why that is very difficult, but my starting position is that we should do both of them, or all of them, at the same time, later on this calendar year, so I will do whatever I can, as Minister, to try to make sure we do all of that. As I said, I am due to get some further advice on it, so there may be some technical elements that I am not aware of or some other arguments that get brought forward, but that is my intention, and it sounds like it has support on both sides of the House.

Draft Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 (Codes of Practice) (Revision of Code H) Order 2023

Holly Lynch Excerpts

Tuesday 31st January 2023 General Committees

[Holly Lynch (Halifax) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under you as Chair, Mr Bone. I thank the Minister for his detailed opening speech.

The Minister has outlined the purpose of the order, and that proposed change is a result of the independent review by the Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation, Jonathan Hall KC, of MAPPA used to supervise terrorist and terrorist-risk offenders on licence. That piece of work was commissioned by the then Home Secretary in 2019 following the horrendous Fishmongers’ Hall attack in which Saskia Jones and Jack Merritt, both talented young people, had their lives cruelly taken.

The Opposition support the order and understand the necessity to ensure that counter-terrorism officers are able to quickly and effectively respond to potential terrorist threats. We welcome the corresponding changes to PACE code H to provide clarity on how those powers should be exercised. The Minister went into some detail about that, so I will not repeat it. He will appreciate, however, that we have looked again at the findings following the review of the attack, which have resulted in the changes contained in the order.

The Minister will be aware that the coroner at the inquest made 22 recommendations in his prevention of future deaths report for the Fishmongers’ Hall attack. Notably, Judge Mark Lucraft stated in his report:

“A very unsatisfactory situation arose whereby there was a strand of intelligence received shortly prior to Usman Khan’s release from prison that he intended to carry out an attack, but the MAPPA panel participants were in the main entirely ignorant of that intelligence.”

The powers set out in the order are welcome, but I am sure that the Minister will acknowledge that a number of failings were outlined, particularly related to the sharing of intelligence. With that in mind, I hope that the Minister can provide a broader progress report on the 22 recommendations—I am happy to receive it in writing. Those recommendations must sit alongside the changes outlined in the order if we are to truly manage offenders robustly and protect the public.

I hope that the Minister can also confirm that the use of those powers will be recorded and published with the quarterly Home Office report on the use of terrorism powers, so that ongoing consideration and scrutiny of their use can be considered.

We welcome the measures and do not seek to detain the Committee.

Oral Answers to Questions

Holly Lynch Excerpts

Monday 19th December 2022 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call the shadow Minister.

[Holly Lynch (Halifax) (Lab)]

We very much welcome the Protect duty legislation, which we have heard more about today, and look forward to seeing it. I join the Home Secretary in paying tribute to the families who have worked so hard to get us to this point.

The annual threat update from the director general of MI5 was explicit about the seriousness of the threat from Iran to some UK residents, yet there are still those in religious roles working and living here in the UK who are appointed directly by the Supreme Leader himself. There are also key players within the draconian Iranian regime who have business interests and assets here in the UK. What are the Government doing to make it explicit that the UK will have no part in being a haven, either for individuals or for money linked to—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. You know the game: the game is short questions in topicals. Please do not take advantage of the situation, because all the Back Benchers want to get in as well.

Draft Investigatory Powers (Communications Data) (Relevant Public Authorities and Designated Senior Officers) Regulations 2022

Holly Lynch Excerpts

Tuesday 13th December 2022 General Committees

[Holly Lynch (Halifax) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Bardell. I thank the Minister for his opening remarks. He has outlined what the statutory instrument does, and we are very aware that these changes come as a result of the High Court ruling in June this year in the case of Liberty v. the Secretary of State for the Home Department and the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs. The SI will now allow for the internal authorisation of the acquisition of communications data solely for serious crime purposes in urgent situations, as prescribed by section 61A of the Investigatory Powers Act 2016.

I understand that parts of the wider case were dismissed, however the High Court ruled in favour of Liberty on a key point, deeming it to be unlawful for the security services to obtain individuals’ communications data from telecom providers without having prior independent authorisation in certain circumstances. We welcome the weight of the ruling of the High Court and, therefore, the Government’s corrective action with this statutory instrument. In an ever-changing world, it is crucial we get the investigatory powers available to our security services right in order to deal properly with the modern threats we face, including from serious and organised crime. However, that must always be prudently balanced against civil liberties.

I see that there was a period of consultation on these changes with the agencies most affected, and while I am curious to know what their response was, I know from my work in the area that a great deal will not be able to be shared with the Committee or more widely. I welcome the fact that the consultation took place. I also welcome the letter the Minister promised to my right hon. Friend the Member for Leeds Central, and I would be grateful for a copy.

[Tom Tugendhat]

I would be delighted.

[Holly Lynch]

I will not detain the Committee any longer, and we will not divide on the regulations.

Draft Immigration (Persons Designated under Sanctions Regulations) (EU Exit) (Amendment) Regulations 2022

Holly Lynch Excerpts

Monday 12th December 2022 General Committees

[Holly Lynch (Halifax) (Lab)]

It is, as always, a pleasure to serve under you in the Chair, Mr Hollobone. I do not think we will be detaining the Committee quite that long.

I thank the Minister for her comprehensive explanation of the regulations’ purpose, which is to correct what might best be described as a glitch in the operation of immigration sanctions or travel bans in respect of individuals based within the UK. The Home Office has identified that discrepancy, which has led to the entirely perverse situation in which people subject to a travel ban have more rights than those who are awaiting a decision on a human rights or protection claim and are not subject to sanctions.

The roots of the issue date back to the passage of the 2018 Act and regulations under that Act that were made in 2020, so it took the Government quite some time to become aware of the problem, which begs the question how and why the discrepancy first came to Ministers’ attention. The Government point out that in most cases, people subject to travel bans are not in the UK and do not have any significant connection to the UK. The number of people likely to be affected by these regulations is therefore small. The intention of the regulations is to rectify the error, and the hope is that in doing so, they will also help to strengthen the operation of UK sanctions regimes in the future. I am sure we can all support that. On that basis, the Opposition support this statutory instrument.

Draft Proceeds of Crime (Money Laundering) (Threshold Amount) Order 2022

Holly Lynch Excerpts

Monday 12th December 2022 General Committees

[Holly Lynch (Halifax) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under you as Chair this afternoon, Mrs Murray, and I thank the Minister for his opening contribution. As he has said, the regulations will increase the threshold amount specified in section 339A of the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 from £250 to £1,000. In practice, this will increase the value of transactions that a bank or similar firm can carry out in operating an account for a customer without committing one of the main money laundering offences laid out in POCA. By doing so, the Government seek to reduce the number of ineffective defence against money laundering suspicious activity reports, while also improving the effectiveness of the anti-money laundering system and enabling law enforcement to focus on—as the explanatory memorandum says—

“opportunities that lead to asset seizure”.

We are keen to support these measures, which seek to enhance the quality of suspicious activity reports coming from the private sector and hasten their utilisation by law enforcement. However, I am keen to probe whether we are satisfied that that is what the regulations will do in practice. We appreciate that increasing the threshold will hopefully lessen the burden on the NCA’s UK Financial Intelligence Unit, but is the Minister not concerned that these measures will inadvertently increase the prevalence of so-called smurfing among criminals, a potential problem raised with us by the Royal United Services Institute? Through that practice, money laundering payments are broken down into smaller amounts under the threshold, specifically to evade law enforcement.

Moreover, reducing the reporting burden on businesses for low-value money laundering will not necessarily mean that businesses are somehow mandated to redirect their resources towards detecting or reporting on high-value suspicious and criminal activity. The main argument for the change seems to be an attempt to prevent the Financial Intelligence Unit from being overwhelmed, rather than there being no intelligence or criminality below that threshold. I understand that in recent years, there has been an exponential increase in the number of reports that the UKFIU has had to deal with. It now receives over 400,000 reports per annum, which we can appreciate is a massive challenge for a unit with only 200 members of staff.

In its 2020 report, the UKFIU recorded a 20% increase in the total number of SARs, and an 80% increase in defence against money laundering SARs from the previous year. The explanatory memorandum states that only 2% were refused consent in 2019-20,

“of which only 1,062 progressed towards asset denial.”

Of that 2%, how many of those would have no longer been captured under the changes?

In its May 2022 follow-up report into the UK’s mutual evaluation report, the Financial Action Task Force noted continued concerns about the under-resourcing and IT constraints of the financial intelligence unit, including its failures to meet the target of 200 staff that the task force recommended more than 15 years ago.

Our noble friends in the other place have already considered these regulations, and Lord Sharpe of Epsom told Members, who asked him about resourcing of law enforcement on this crime type, that 75 additional officers were being recruited to the UKFIU, which we welcome. He told the Committee that 45 of those officers were already in post, and the milestone for recruiting the remaining 30 is at the end of this financial year, 2022-23. That was on 24 November, so can the Minister update us on whether any further progress has been made?

I will make the point again that we recognise these changes will tighten up the information being provided to the FIU, but we are not entirely convinced that the changes amount to an overall enhancement of the money laundering framework that we must have in place if we are to drive this out of our economy.

Equipment Theft (Prevention) Bill

Holly Lynch Excerpts

2nd reading
Friday 2nd December 2022 Commons Chamber

[Holly Lynch (Halifax) (Lab)]

It is a genuine pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Milton Keynes North (Ben Everitt), who has shared some of his insight and expertise, having clearly spent a great deal of time working on a farm in a previous life—I am curious about the notion of Fabergé egg farms and the potential for expansion there. In all sincerity, I congratulate the hon. Member for Buckingham (Greg Smith) on bringing forward this private Member’s Bill and on comprehensively and convincingly setting out the case for it today.

Having considered the hon. Gentleman’s Bill and having listened carefully to his arguments, the Opposition are inclined to agree that his proposals would have a strong impact on mitigating against quad bike and all-terrain vehicle theft. That form of criminality has blighted rural and more urban communities for too long, either because of the initial theft or the illicit and antisocial use of such vehicles thereafter in constituencies across the UK.

As outlined, the Bill seeks to mandate the fitting of forensic markings and an immobiliser on all quad bikes and all-terrain vehicles sold in the UK, which would solve a specific problem. If enacted, the Bill provides the scope for those measures to be expanded further. It would be a welcome tool to support the police in deterring such thefts, finding stolen goods and supporting agricultural and land workers who need that kit to do their jobs and undertake the incredibly valued work that has been discussed.

Rural crime has been a priority. My hon. Friend the Member for Croydon Central (Sarah Jones), who is a fellow shadow Home Affairs Minister with responsibility for policing, has visited a number of rural crime initiatives, such as Operation Hawkeye in Northumberland, where efforts to disrupt poaching recovered £850,000-worth of property and arrested 65 people. From my experience of my Halifax constituency, which takes in urban and rural areas, quad bike and all-terrain vehicle theft and subsequent misuse is a massive and sustained challenge.

Last month, I was frustrated to hear that Todmorden junior football club, just down the Calder valley, was subject to a serious act of vandalism. One of its pitches was left badly scarred and unplayable by someone repeatedly driving a quad bike over it. Louise Leeming, the club’s welfare officer, said:

“They’ve completely trashed it, you can’t play on it. The council spent an absolute fortune repairing it and they”—

the vandals—

have just destroyed it.”

At a time when council funding is, frankly, being decimated, it is reprehensible that an individual would flagrantly seek to damage a much-needed facility for local children.

That is just the tip of the iceberg, however. Locally, in October, as part of Operation Heelfield, officers executed a section 26 warrant to arrest a Halifax man on suspicion of burglary after a recently stolen Yamaha Kodiak quad bike was found in his garage. In March, two quad bikes were seized by police after two males, who had been involved in using them antisocially, had abandoned them. That formed part of Operation Hedgeson, which was carried out by the Halifax neighbourhood policing team to pursue, catch and convict those responsible for causing a nuisance in our communities through their antisocial and dangerous behaviour on and off the roads with such quad bikes and ATVs.

Unfortunately, such stories are not surprising and occur far too often. According to statistics released by NFU Mutual, in 2021, West Yorkshire had the third-largest number of quad bike thefts in the country. As the hon. Gentleman said, estimates suggest that nationwide, between 900 and 1,200 quad bikes are stolen every year, and many end up circulating back on to the market in some way. An NFU Mutual crime report estimated that in 2021, rural theft cost the UK £40.5 million.

I am sure that hon. Members will join me in paying tribute to our local policing teams, who work incredibly hard to try to get ahead of the criminals in getting a grip on and tackling this problem, but they simply do not have the requisite resources or toolkit to completely clamp down on such crime. The Bill, if introduced, would be a formidable starting point, but there are no two ways about it: the underfunding and under-resourcing of our police forces have undermined their capabilities for more than a decade. Analysis carried out by the Labour party, which studied the budgets of all 43 police forces in England and Wales, found that, in 2021, police budgets were £1.6 billion down in real terms on when the Conservatives came to power in 2010. In August this year, the National Police Chiefs’ Council said in a statement that crime detection and charge rates had dropped following austerity measures and a fall in police numbers since 2010. Its spokesperson said:

“Detection and charge rates for a range of crimes have fallen over the past five years.”

[The Minister for Crime, Policing and Fire (Chris Philp)]

The shadow Minister is talking about policing figures and theft. Would she like to join me in welcoming the fact that, since March 2010—when Labour left office—theft figures have fallen by 46%, according to the crime survey for England and Wales, from 4.99 million theft offences to 2.69 million?

[Holly Lynch]

I would be really interested to see the details of those figures. I am sorry to say that detection rates, charge rates and prosecution rates are all going in the wrong direction under this Government. I gave a quote from the National Police Chiefs’ Council. If the Minister wants to take that up with the council, he can certainly do that. Its spokesperson said:

“Detection and charge rates for a range of crimes have fallen over the past five years…This has been impacted by austerity and the loss of thousands of police officers and staff, increasing complexity of policing and crime, growing demand related to mental ill health and impact of backlogs in the court system.”

[Chris Philp]

I am grateful to the shadow Minister for giving way again. I suppose she will not get many interventions from her own side, looking at the empty Opposition Benches, so I am happy to fill the gap. She mentioned police officer numbers. Would she like to join me in welcoming the fact that, come March next year—just four months’ time—when the police uplift programme is completed and 20,000 extra officers have been recruited, we will have about 149,000 police officers, which is more than at any time in the country’s history?

--- Later in debate ---

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

Order. Can I just ensure that colleagues know it is important to address the Bill and not go too much wider?

[Holly Lynch]

I will get back to the detail of the Bill, Madam Deputy Speaker, but I quickly make the point that the Government cut 21,000 police officers. I will not be giving them a pat on the back for replacing 20,000, having recognised the detrimental impact that has had on the safety of our communities. Those pressures hit rural communities particularly hard. Interestingly, just last month, BBC analysis found that suspects are almost 25% more likely to be charged for crimes in urban areas than in the countryside. In 2021, there was a charge rate of 6.89% in rural areas compared with 8.55% in urban areas. I am sure that the policing Minister will want to have a close look at that stark difference.

I return to the detail of the Bill. I particularly welcome its provision to allow, through secondary legislation, the Secretary of State the power to expand the remit of the Bill’s requirements to other types of equipment and machinery commonly used in the agricultural and construction sectors. We hope that, if enacted, secondary legislation will expand the Bill to cover a multitude of other agricultural and construction equipment. I know that chainsaws and nail guns are the types of tools and kit that are too regularly stolen from properties, or the backs of vans and other vehicles, costing hundreds of thousands of pounds each year.

Given the expertise of the hon. Member for Buckingham in this area and his contributions on the topic in the Chamber today and previously, I know that he is all too aware of the problem of theft from vans. According to research carried out by Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles, in 2021, 27% of van drivers had fallen victim to tool theft in the previous 12 months. The total cost of all lost tools and equipment is estimated to be about £15 million a year. Volkswagen estimates that the associated downtime for drivers who must replace those tools costs £550 a day per van. The Bill presents an opportunity to sharpen the tools available in the fight against this type of crime. When resources are down and geographically stretched in some rural areas, the more we can use technology to design out crime, the better.

We are satisfied that the Bill will make some progress towards that, helping to suppress theft and the antisocial use of quad bikes that is often a consequence. I again commend the hon. Member for Buckingham. We hope that the Government will allow the Bill to progress to Committee stage where Members can consider the detail, in the hope that it makes a difference when tackling this type of criminality, which blights far too many communities.

Draft Investigatory Powers Commissioner (Oversight Functions) Regulations 2022 Draft Investigatory Powers (Covert Human Intelligence Sources and Interception: Codes of Practice) Regulations 2022

Holly Lynch Excerpts

Wednesday 23rd November 2022 General Committees

[Holly Lynch (Halifax) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship this morning, Sir Robert. I thank the Minister for his opening contribution.

On the draft Investigatory Powers Commissioner (Oversight Functions) Regulations 2022, as the Minister has said the new regulations stipulate that the oversight functions of the commissioner include keeping under review, by way of audit, inspection and investigation the exercise of GCHQ processes relating to determining whether information about vulnerabilities in technology should be disclosed. Furthermore, the statutory instrument provides the commissioner with oversight of compliance by members and civilian staff of the Metropolitan police force in relation to counter-terrorism legislation and officers of the National Crime Agency with the guidance referred to as “The Principles relating to the detention and interviewing of detainees overseas and the passing and receipt of intelligence relating to detainees”.

We interrogated those principles for the purposes of the National Security Bill. It is worth being clear and on the record that the principles are explicit that:

“The UK Government does not participate in, solicit, encourage or condone unlawful killing, the use of torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment (“CIDT”), or extraordinary rendition. In no circumstance will UK personnel ever take action amounting to torture, unlawful killing, extraordinary rendition, or CIDT.”

As the Minister knows, we are always very supportive of independent commissioners and reviewers of legislation. I thank Sir Brian Leveson and his team for the valuable work that they do in ensuring that our security services are as accountable and transparent as they are able to be. I am also grateful to the Investigatory Powers Commissioner’s Office for its feedback when I approached the office about these provisions. On that basis, we welcome this further extension of the oversight powers allocated to the commissioner to consider the conduct of these additional agencies.

We sought a legal opinion on some of the provisions. One thing that was not clear in relation to the oversight of GCHQ and the disclosure of technological vulnerabilities is whether the commissioner will only have powers to consider GCHQ’s decision-making processes on whether to disclose such vulnerabilities or not disclose, or if he will have the power to intervene and compel a disclosure should he warrant that necessary.

The second statutory instrument will bring into force the revised code of practice prepared under section 71 of the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000, providing guidance on the authorisation for the conduct or use of covert human intelligence sources by public authorities. Under section 72 of that Act, a person must, in so far as applicable, have regard to a code of practice when exercising any powers or duties to which the code relates.

Labour recognises the fundamental importance of covert intelligence and the role it plays in keeping our country safe. As an example, in 2018 alone, covert human intelligence sources helped to disrupt more than 30 threats to life, leading to the arrest of numerous serious organised criminals and the seizure of more than 3,000 kg of class A drugs, while taking more than 50 firearms off the street. Given the inherent nature of what covert intelligence entails, it is vital that proper safeguards and the processes for accountability and proportionality are introduced and used exhaustively.

We welcome that this statutory instrument will update the code of practice following the Government consultation that ran for eight weeks, from December 2021 to February of this year. I note however that at least one organisation who made a submission to the consultation felt that eight weeks over the Christmas period and at the height of the prevalence of the omicron variant put a strain on stakeholders to respond.

Colleagues led on the Covert Human Intelligence Sources (Criminal Conduct) Act 2021 during its passage. We agreed it was a marked improvement on the status quo, but Labour raised concerns around the number of public agencies approved. The powers granted by that Bill are incredibly serious and must only be conferred to public agencies where the use of such powers is vital for their work. We pushed for more real-time involvement of the Investigatory Powers Commissioner, and we argued extensively for the most comprehensive protection of children and vulnerable adults in this space.

I note that most of the consultation responses had a focus on protecting children and vulnerable adults, and I can see that the Government have reflected on those submissions. While we remain and will always be very uncomfortable about those with vulnerabilities, be they age-related or otherwise, being involved in this line of work, the updated guidance is an improvement on the guidance that predates it, and it benefits from the consultation submissions. The standardisation of the use of the word “child” or “children” rather than “juvenile” is welcome, and we hold the Government to their statement in the response to the consultation that

“Children are only authorised as CHIS in exceptional circumstances and the duty of care that is owed to children in this context is taken extremely seriously.”

I look to the Minister for assurances that, in these circumstances, every other possible means of gathering intelligence is explored and exhausted first.

The Minister will be aware of the distressing case earlier this year of a person acting as a CHIS for our intelligence services who had used that status to abuse his former partner. I cannot see that the code reflects the potential for abuse of the status by a CHIS, and I hope the Minister can provide assurances to the Committee that that situation is being investigated and that processes are being revised accordingly, so that we close down opportunities for anyone acting as a CHIS to use the status to abuse others.

I note that the explanatory memorandum states:

“A person must have regard to the Code when exercising powers and any function to which this Code relates.”

However, it goes on to say:

“Failure to comply with the Code does not render that person liable in any criminal or civil proceedings.”

It says that

“the Code is admissible in evidence in criminal and civil proceedings”,

but given the seriousness of these powers and the fact that we all want and need to see the guidance adhered to in the strictest sense, what assurances can the Minister provide that there will be consequences of a failure to comply with the code?

We will continue to follow closely the work of the Investigatory Powers Commissioner in his ongoing assessment under these statutory instruments, and we renew our commitment to always engage with Government constructively, to find the right balance between keeping people safe and upholding the personal freedoms we hold dear.

National Security Bill

Holly Lynch Excerpts

Report stage
Wednesday 16th November 2022 Commons Chamber

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

Order. We have already had four points of order, and we have limited time, so I ask Members to please be mindful of the length of their contributions so that we can get as many people in as we possibly can.

[Holly Lynch (Halifax) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to be back in the Chamber at the Report stage of this hugely important piece of legislation. Bill Committee colleagues will join me in saying that it was not straightforward, for all the reasons that were highlighted in the multiple points of order. The Committee had no less than four Ministers and three Government Whips, and was forced to adjourn twice. Since Second Reading, the Bill has been the responsibility of three different Home Secretaries in—remarkably—the Governments of three different Prime Ministers.

We got off to a shaky start on the first day of the Bill Committee when the Whip, the hon. Member for North Cornwall (Scott Mann), who I am pleased has joined us this afternoon, was asked to act up as a Minister only minutes before the start. On one day, the Committee had to be adjourned because the second Minister was missing in action—the circumstances are still a mystery to this day. It was something of a relief, then, when the current Minister took office and we could turn to the serious detail of scrutinising and delivering long overdue and incredibly necessary national security legislation.

As we have said before, many of the new measures in the Bill have been born out of recommendations in the Intelligence and Security Committee’s 2020 Russia report and in the Law Commission’s “Protection of Official Data” report. With those solid foundations, we have been keen to work with Government to move the legislation forward and close the gaps in our defences. That could not be more timely in the light of stark warnings given by the director general of MI5 today, including about the fact that there have been at least 10 attempts to kidnap or even kill UK-based critics of the Iranian regime since January of this year.

That is not to say that we do not have some outstanding concerns about the detail of the provisions. In speaking to all the amendments grouped with new clause 9, I turn first to amendment 14, which was tabled by the right hon. Member for Haltemprice and Howden (Mr Davis) and my hon. Friend the Member for Barnsley Central (Dan Jarvis). I will spend some time discussing the detail of this amendment, because it is so important.

The original clause 23—now clause 27—was a big focus for hon. Members on both sides of the House on Second Reading. Crucially, it did not have the support of Opposition members of the Intelligence and Security Committee, which has statutory responsibility for oversight of the UK intelligence community. We will always look to work with the intelligence services to find solutions to any barriers they face in undertaking their invaluable work to keep the UK safe. As things stand, however, we have been unable to get an operational understanding of why the clause is necessary.

The security services have told me directly why they believe that they need clause 27. They say that schedule 4 to the Serious Crime Act 2007 allows for a risk of liability to individuals conducting their proper functions on behalf of the UK intelligence community, and that an offence can arise when support—for example, intelligence shared in good faith—later makes a small or indirect contribution to unlawful activity by an international partner. The security services are keen to convey that their caution in this regard is having an operational impact, which requires resolution. We are sympathetic to that view; we recognise that for perhaps quite junior members of staff to face that burden of potential liability when carrying out their proper functions under instruction does not feel quite right. However, we have sought throughout the process to find a way through that does not involve what feels like gold-plating of exemptions for the security services, which could erode entirely appropriate safeguards and due diligence when considering the risks and consequences of sharing information with partners.

As the Minister knows, there is a reasonableness defence under section 50 of the Serious Crime Act, which recognises that there may be occasions when it can be shown that an individual’s actions were justified in the circumstances. Of course, a prosecution would also have to be deemed to be in the public interest. On further probing of these defences, it seems that it is not the case that the reasonableness defence is not strong enough; rather, it is untested, as no such case has been brought. We do not believe that the fact that an apparently robust defence is untested makes a strong enough case for the proposals in clause 27. We hope that properly authorised activity to protect national security should and would be interpreted as reasonable.

We have sought legal advice, including from a King’s counsel who undertakes a great deal of work in the Investigatory Powers Tribunal, and engaged with a range of stakeholders who feel genuinely involved in this space. Given that we already have section 7 of the Intelligence Services Act 1994, which allows the Secretary of State to give immunity from civil or criminal liability for pre-authorised crimes abroad, why do we need the changes proposed in clause 27? Crucially, the existing scheme requires the UK intelligence community to secure permission in advance from the Secretary of State, requiring the Secretary of State’s personal approval, with safeguards in the decision-making process and oversight by the Investigatory Powers Commissioner, who is a senior judge. None of those safeguards are present in clause 27; it simply removes the relevant criminal liability. There would be no need to go to a Minister for approval; there would be no warrant for the Investigatory Powers Commissioner to consider.

Thirdly—the Minister and I have debated this—the Bill as drafted diminishes the role of a Minister in decision-making and accountability structures. Ministers will no longer need to make the difficult judgement, reviewed by the Investigatory Powers Commissioner, of whether to grant an authorisation under section 7 of the Intelligence Services Act. The Government have been keen to stress their commitment to the Fulford principles—“The Principles relating to the detention and interviewing of detainees overseas and the passing and receipt of intelligence relating to detainees”, making it clear that:

“The UK Government does not participate in, solicit, encourage or condone unlawful killing, the use of torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment…or extraordinary rendition. In no circumstance will UK personnel ever take action amounting to torture, unlawful killing, extraordinary rendition, or CIDT.”

However, those commitments are not on the face of the Bill.

With the understanding that there will be operational elements to these provisions, the details of which have not been and cannot be shared, we have pushed for engagement with the ISC, which is entirely the right place for those operational examples to be considered further. Were ISC members to be convinced of the case for clause 27, we might be in a different place. On that basis, we cannot support clause 27 and will vote for it to be deleted by amendment 14.

On a similar point, although we welcome much of the Bill, it is right that any provisions that include new and substantial powers are constantly evaluated for their efficacy and proportionality. Clause 53 recognises that.

[Sir John Hayes]

Efficacy and proportionality are the twin guarantees that underpin all security legislation and activity, as the hon. Lady is aware, but if anything, clause 13, for example, should go further than it currently does. She will know that that clause is built on the idea of intention—that people must intend to do harm—but people should know that they are likely to do harm if they act recklessly, and the Bill could be expanded in that direction. There is an unholy trinity of anarchists, liberals and Bolsheviks who oppose all legislation of this kind, but if anything, this legislation should be warmly welcomed and go further than it does.

[Holly Lynch]

I am grateful for the intervention. The points that I am about to make about the value and role of an independent reviewer of this legislation relate to how, if some of the thresholds are not in the right place, such a reviewer can not only be both a check and a balance on the powers but make recommendations for going further in the legislation if we find that there is an operational case for doing so. That is the sensible and constructive point that the right hon. Gentleman knows I am making.

Clause 53 recognises the need for evaluation but deems only part 2 of the Bill to be necessary for review by an independent reviewer and fails to be explicit about who that independent reviewer will be. The Minister has been unable to confirm who will perform this oversight function, which we believe is integral to finding the appropriate balance of powers and freedoms. The scrutiny of terrorism legislation provided by Jonathan Hall KC has been invaluable. The independent reviewer of terrorism legislation function has identified weaknesses in terrorism legislation and highlighted areas where stronger safeguards are needed, as well as providing crucial and checks and balances on the powers.

When he gave evidence to the Bill Committee, I asked Jonathan Hall whether there is a logic to his office taking on the additional responsibilities and whether he had the capacity to undertake that work. He said:

“My answer is that I think it actually is quite a good fit for the reviewer’s job, and I think it probably is right that the person who does the independent review of terrorism legislation should also do the state threats legislation.”––[Official Report, National Security Public Bill Committee, 7 July 2022; c. 6, Q4.].

With the highest regard for Jonathan Hall, we recognise the merit in adding to his remit the responsibilities created by clause 53. We can see the benefit of a coherent, joined-up approach to assessing both counter-terrorism and state threat legislation.

That said, were the Minister to make a case for the creation of a brand-new position, exclusively for the independent review of laws concerning state threats, we would certainly be open to that. We are, though, now reaching the Bill’s final Commons stages, and we are very much overdue an agreement that the role will begin immediately once the Bill is enacted, clarity on who will undertake the work, and a commitment that all the new provisions in the Bill will be considered in an annual review. Successive Ministers have understood the point and committed to sorting the situation out, but here we are with no progress and nothing to show for it on the face of the Bill, so we are keen to push new clause 3 to a vote.

In Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Yardley (Jess Phillips) made a powerful case for the provisions in amendment 6, which sits alongside paving amendments 5 and 7. We made clear our concerns about part 4 of the Bill in the Committee. The restrictions on access to civil legal aid stand to do more harm than good if we do not recognise the problems in such an approach.

Let us consider the types of civil cases that legal aid might be needed for. People find themselves in civil and family court proceedings and in need of legal aid support for a multitude of reasons, including housing issues, debt problems and domestic abuse. For example, a victim of domestic abuse might need legal aid to help her to seek an injunction against her abuser. Non-molestation orders protect a victim or their child from being harmed or threatened by their abuser, while occupation orders decide who can live in a family home or enter the surrounding area. Such injunctions protect victims and children in particular. They save women’s lives. They are legal measures that protect women from violence.

My hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Yardley made the powerful point in Committee, based on her years of working in the sector, that it is easy to say that someone who has engaged in that type of criminality is not deserving of legal aid, but what if a woman’s abuser is a terrorist? The nature of terrorist offenders means that that is too often the case.

[Mr Kevan Jones]

My hon. Friend is right that we discussed the issue in detail in Committee. Clearly, the only reason is seen to be that someone has been involved in terrorism. Does she agree, however, that there are many other people, such as rapists, paedophiles and murderers, of whom we also have a low opinion? The logical conclusion is surely that, if we restrict it in one area, we should restrict it for everyone.

[Holly Lynch]

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for making that powerful point. He is absolutely right that there is a distinct lack of consistency. If we are singling out specific criminal offences that we do not like, there is more that we could do to ensure that there is some consistency in that approach. There will be vulnerable people here who we want to check are not falling through the gaps, which would make the situation worse for us all.

What if a woman’s abuser is a terrorist? As I said, the nature of terrorist offenders means that that is often the case. For some of the lower-level offences covered by clauses 84 to 85—for example, that someone made a phone call on behalf of an abuser—it is easy for somebody to say, “I wouldn’t do that, because I’m not a terrorist,” but we all might if we were living in a household where we were terrorised. The danger is that more women in such cases will end up stuck with a terrorist making them be a terrorist, rather than being able to escape them. That is why we feel strongly that the Government should adopt amendment 6.

On some other changes that we would like to see, we have tabled new clauses 5 and 6. They were drafted in the wake of the revelations that the right hon. Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip (Boris Johnson), when he was the Foreign Secretary, met former KGB officer Alexander Lebedev without officials or security at the height of the Salisbury poisoning case in 2018. That was immediately after the then Foreign Secretary had attended a meeting of NATO Foreign Ministers at NATO headquarters in Brussels to discuss the collective response to Russia’s use of Novichok on UK soil. We still have a series of questions about that encounter, not least who his guest was at that party and why we have not taken steps to sanction Alexander Lebedev, given the assessment of our Five Eyes partner Canada, which has sanctioned him.

Having made the case in Committee for new clauses 5 and 6, which both seek to put safeguards in place to prevent that type of security breach ever happening again, the Minister was keen to stress that he was not going to seek to defend the Administration of the right hon. Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip, as if that time had passed and there was no need for any further changes to the law in this regard. When that exchange happened on the Tuesday, little did the Minister or I know that by the Thursday, remarkably, the right hon. Gentleman would be launching his campaign to come back as Prime Minister. None of us could have foreseen that, which is one more reason why I stress that the clauses would complement the Bill.

I appreciate that new clause 8, tabled by my right hon. Friend the Member for North Durham (Mr Jones), has been deemed to be out of scope of today’s debate, but I remind the Minister of the remarks of the then Home Secretary, the right hon. Member for Witham (Priti Patel), on Second Reading:

“We are not shy of the issue and are certainly not ignoring it, but it is important that we focus on ensuring that individuals can make disclosures safely, which means protecting them through safeguards and proper routes. That work is still under way, and we need to go through it in the right way.”—[Official Report, 6 June 2022; Vol. 715, c. 571.]

We understand that the Home Office has engaged with trusted partners on what options look like in this space. Once again, we are all waiting for further detail on that front.

I now turn to the plethora of Government amendments. Frankly, late in the day additions to the Bill have plagued its scrutiny and Report stage is no different, as many right hon. and hon. Members have already said. I am pleased that the Government heard our concerns about places of detention and have clarified that only places

“owned or controlled by a police force”

can be used as places of detention, which ensures that they will be subject to proper inspection regimes. We are satisfied that the Government have listened, so our amendment 4 is no longer necessary; Government amendment 54 brings those places within the scope of an existing inspection regime.

As the Minister knows, there are still outstanding concerns about the broad nature of clauses 79 to 83 in part 4. We welcome Government amendment 51, however, which seeks to tighten the definition of those in scope of clauses 79 to 83 to those involved in “terrorist wrongdoing”, but that will warrant further exploration in the other place.

On Government amendment 60, like a number of modern slavery charities—the point has already been made by the right hon. Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Sir Iain Duncan Smith)—we are really concerned about the lateness of this addition to the Bill and the scrutiny that has been avoided by adding it to the Bill at the final Commons stages. Justice and Care, which does outstanding work in placing victim navigators within police forces up and down the country, was keen to stress that there has not been any consultation with modern slavery charities concerned that they, like us, have had insufficient time to fully consider the possible impact on modern slavery victims. I could have asked the Independent Anti-Slavery Commissioner for their views, except there isn’t one. The Government have failed to appoint a new commissioner since Dame Sara left office in April, so I take this opportunity to suggest that the Government address that now as an urgent priority. I have to ask the Minister to outline the rationale for this move, and I want to be clear just how unhappy we are with this provision at such a late stage.

I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant), who is so often my partner in crime fighting, for his amendments. I know he has a great deal of understanding in this area that has shaped the detail of his amendments, so I hope the Government are reflecting carefully on those.

Once again, we have sought at every stage and with every Minister to engage on the Bill constructively. We know that our police forces and security services need the provisions in the Bill to be able to keep us safe from the hostile state threats that are increasingly testing the UK’s resilience. I hope the Minister, who to his credit had to pick up the Bill in the final stages of the Bill Committee, hears our outstanding concerns today, recognises the spirit in which we strive to find solutions and continues to work with us towards a robust and proportionate Bill we can all have confidence in.

[Mr David Davis (Haltemprice and Howden) (Con)]

I welcome the Minister to his post. He is very much a round peg in a round hole—despite my historic critique of the Home Office, that is meant as a compliment. I thank him for seeing me and my colleague, the hon. Member for Barnsley Central (Dan Jarvis), on the amendment the other day. He will be unsurprised that he did not persuade me, but I thank him for the time in any event. In view of the short time, I will focus mostly on amendment 14, which I hope we will press to a vote. It is in my name and that of the hon. and gallant Member for Bromley—not Bromley, but Barnsley Central; not quite Bromley. That amendment strikes out clause 27.

A decade and a half ago, the British public were shocked to hear stories of British complicity in American and other countries’ acts of kidnap, rendition, torture and assassination, typically but not always by drone strikes, with the collateral damage that that entailed. Collateral damage in this context is a euphemism for the deaths of innocent women and children who happen to be standing near the original target. I use this stark language to make plain the potential consequences of what might seem like bland legalistic language in the Bill.

The legal basis of those actions—I almost said atrocities, but of those actions—was the Intelligence Services Act 1994, when we first recognised the operation of the Secret Intelligence Service. Most notably, it inserted the melodramatically named “007 clause”—section 7—which empowered Ministers to authorise criminal behaviour overseas. I was one of the Ministers who took that Bill through the House. We Ministers were briefed very firmly that, in practice, that section would authorise bugging, burglary and blackmail—the normal behaviour of intelligence agencies seeking to penetrate enemy states and organisations—not kidnap, not torture and most certainly not a licence to kill.

We the Ministers on that Bill gave our word to the House that that was what it was for, but a decade later section 7 was used to authorise the enabling of rendition, torture and quite possibly assassination as well. We know the names of several victims of UK complicity: Binyam Mohamed, Abdel Hakim Belhaj, Fatima Boudchar, his wife, and Rangzieb Ahmed, to name just a few.

--- Later in debate ---

[Holly Lynch]

I rise to confirm that the Labour party supports the Third Reading of this Bill.

It is the first job of every Government to defend our national security from hostile states that wish to do our country harm, and from malign actors and extremists who want to undermine our democracy and everything we stand for. That is not a principle that divides us along party lines; it unites every Member of this House. It is why throughout the Bill’s passage we have worked with the Government to get the detail right and to defend our shared interests, and why we will continue to do so.

Our world-leading intelligence and security agencies do incredible and unseen work, day in, day out, to keep us safe. We pay tribute to them and thank our brave officers and staff for their service. I also thank those in policing, the Home Office and the intelligence community for the way they have engaged with me and other hon. and right hon. Members involved in scrutiny of the Bill.

The threat posed by hostile states is on the rise. The annual threat update given today by Ken McCallum, the director general of MI5, was a daunting assessment of the breadth and nature of the threats facing the UK. However, we remain concerned about clause 27 in particular and some of the details of the Bill, and we will continue to work with the Government and all those in the other place to find resolutions to those outstanding issues.

Labour supports the Bill because we could not take national security more seriously. We know that our democracy can be defended only when our agencies are equipped with the powers and tools they need, and when we can all have confidence in the procedures and oversight that accompany them.

Oral Answers to Questions

Holly Lynch Excerpts

Monday 14th November 2022 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call the shadow Minister, Holly Lynch.

[Holly Lynch (Halifax) (Lab)]

In contrast to family, spouse and visitor visas, golden visas were available until February 2022 to all who could afford them, including the world’s super-rich, with next to no background checks. Spotlight on Corruption has found that, of all the golden visas issued, around half—that is more than 6,000—have been reviewed for possible national security risks. When he was Chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee, the Minister for Security called for the 2018 review of golden visas to be published. Can the Government confirm when we will finally see that review?

[Robert Jenrick]

My right hon. Friend the Minister for Security has been clear that we will publish that report at the earliest available opportunity, but I would add that this is the Government who brought an end to golden visas and who led the world in economic sanctions in support of the people of Ukraine.