Hezbollah: Threat to the United Kingdom

Lord Godson Excerpts

Tuesday 5th November 2024 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Lord Godson]

To ask His Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the threat from Hezbollah to the United Kingdom (1) since the group was proscribed in its entirety in 2019, and (2) since the assassination of its leader, Hassan Nasrallah, on 27 September.

[Lord Godson (Con)]

My Lords, there is now an impressive consensus across all the mainstream parties in this House on the global threat of the Islamic Republic of Iran and its allies in the so-called axis of resistance. Hezbollah, which has been proscribed here in its entirety since 2019, is of course the jewel in the crown of Iranian proxy organisations. Its reach extends across south Asia, south-east Asia, North America, South America and Africa. Its part in forging its own unique version of a Shiite crescent in the Middle East under the tutelage of the regime in Tehran is well known, above all to many of the UK’s closest allies in the region.

However, my focus today is on the impact of Hezbollah on the domestic security and extremism policies of the United Kingdom. Noble Lords will be only too aware that this widespread agreement on the danger of Iran has been powerfully articulated in testimonies from the director-general of the Security Service, Ken McCallum, and the assistant commissioner for specialist operations, Matt Jukes.

How do we build on this widespread political agreement to shape more effective policy, the better to protect ourselves and our allies? The current rapid review of extremism being conducted by the new Home Secretary gives us a chance to undertake a reappraisal of counter- measures against Hezbollah, its allies and its sponsor in Tehran. In particular, the review needs to look at every aspect of the Home Office’s work, from security and policing to immigration policy. All these functions, interconnected though they are, are still too often not regarded as such.

That does not simply mean countermeasures against the use of physical force by Iran and its proxies. It also means countermeasures against violent extremism and proselytisation: as my noble friend Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton, once put it, the need to combat the spread of a grievance culture that poisons the minds of some young Muslims.

It also includes the disruption and prosecution of criminal activities by Hezbollah, described by my right honourable friend Tom Tugendhat MP, an outstanding Security Minister under the last Government, as the most prolific traffickers of drugs and children in the Middle East. Indeed, such is its criminality that the former US FBI official Matt Levitt, in his new book on Hezbollah, has described it as not so much the party of God as the party of fraud.

First, we need much more public information from the Government about the nature of the threat of the so-called axis of resistance to our society. There is a growing tendency of successive Governments of all hues—and I very much hope that the new Government will break with this approach—to take refuge in the formula that they cannot discuss basic public policy questions in this area by invoking “operational reasons”. The term “operational reasons” is thus beginning to suffer from real mission creep.

There is one other dimension to this lack of information. I noticed that in recent weeks the noble Baroness, Lady Hoey, asked two Written Questions that to my mind did not receive the Answers they deserved. First, she inquired how many convictions there had been in the past year relating to Hamas and Hezbollah. The noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede, replied that it is not possible to identify offences relating to specific groups and that it would be too expensive to examine individual court records for that. I have the greatest respect for the for the noble Lord and have enjoyed my dialogue with him, not least on the affairs of Northern Ireland, but I do not agree with that formulation in this case.

Likewise, in response the next day to the second Question from the noble Baroness, Lady Hoey, on how many had been arrested and charged for Hamas and Hezbollah offences in the last 12 months in this country, the Minister here, the noble Lord, Lord Hanson of Flint, referred her to the data in the quarterly Home Office publication, Operation of Police Powers under the Terrorism Act 2000. There is a welcome breakdown in that document by nationality but, again, not by proscribed organisation. Once more, I have the greatest respect for the noble Lord, Lord Hanson, not just for his service in Northern Ireland and his work on the Intelligence and Security Committee but for being so open and having his doors open to Members, just as he pledged he would in his maiden speech last July, but I wonder whether Ministers should start taking a harder look at the time-honoured approach of the official line—and of some of their officials—that it is simply not worth the effort to provide the requisite breakdown by proscribed organisation. The interests of officialdom are not always identical to those of the political echelon. At a minimum, surely someone in counterterrorism policing must know the figures at hand.

In this connection, under the Pursue strand of the Contest strategy, I ask the Minister how many priority investigations are currently being undertaken by the agencies on the activities of Hezbollah and the wider so-called axis of resistance? What percentage of priority investigations do these investigations into the axis of resistance comprise?

But the task for Ministers goes beyond that of focusing on the immediate threat of physical force from terrorism; it also entails countering in the ideological realm. Thus, the 2023 Independent Review of Prevent stated of the Home Office’s Research, Information and Communications Unit, RICU:

“Since early 2019, the government has proscribed both Hizbollah and Hamas in their entirety. I would have expected to see research from RICU providing an in-depth investigation on the pro-Hizbollah support network within the UK, and a commitment to do so for the more recently proscribed whole of Hamas”.


The Prevent review was accepted in full by the previous Government. Will the Minister tell us today what research into Hezbollah networks in the UK has been or is now being conducted by RICU and how many Prevent referrals relating to Hezbollah and key entities in the wider so-called axis of resistance there are?

I also ask the Minister whether we should not now consider following the example of Germany’s Office for the Protection of the Constitution—the Verfassungsschutz —and other European partners to produce regular analyses for public consumption of key ideological strains in Islamist and other very real extremist challenges. In particular, can the Minister assure us that rebuttal is being undertaken by RICU of relevant narratives emanating from some supporters of all branches of the axis of resistance?

For example, when the Houthis began attacking western shipping lanes in the Red Sea, leading to retaliatory strikes, so-called “anti-war protesters”, as we all know, chanted “Yemen, Yemen, make us proud, turn another ship around”. The threat posed by the Houthis and their patrons to our economic well-being is obvious, and the Security Service Act 1989 states that one of MI5’s statutory responsibilities is that of

“the economic well-being of the United Kingdom”.

Another area where Ministers need to keep a close eye is the interaction between the security and immigration workstreams of the department. In the last Parliament, I asked the then Conservative ministerial team at the Home Office how many minister of religion and religious worker visas had been issued to Iranian nationals. It emerged that just under 100 such visas to enter the UK had been issued since 2005. Doubtless, there will be many genuine individuals among that bunch, but we cannot be sure. Similarly, the UK has now allowed 52 Lebanese civilians to enter the country on religious worker or minister of religion visas since 2005. Again, information is not recorded in terms of the denomination or the sectarian affiliation of those Lebanese citizens who have received visas. Should they not now start to be recorded as such? Is it not time to consider giving a more detailed breakdown of those to whom we accord the significant privilege of the right to work in this country?

Indeed, when the right honourable Member for Newark, Robert Jenrick, was Immigration Minister, a review of visa policy concerning Iran was flagged prominently in the media; was that review ever conducted, let alone completed? If not, will those issues now be addressed in the rapid review of extremism policy and security policy being conducted by the present Home Secretary?

I come back to the long-term question of charitable networks and giving. Inevitably, after the events of 7 October last year and following recent events in Lebanon, there will be a rise in giving to alleviate genuine human suffering in the region. This is, of course, to be welcomed, but it inevitably poses new challenges to our overstretched system of charitable regulation when funds may go to those posing as humanitarian bodies but which have other sectarian and even terrorist agendas. How many regulatory cases or statutory inquiries does the Charity Commission have open in relation to those involving Iranian, IRGC and other Iranian proxies such as Hezbollah, bearing in mind that the Charity Commission is accountable to Parliament under the Charities Act 2011?

I end, as I began, with the point about cross-party consensus on the threat of Iran and its proxies. Considering the measure of accord here in Westminster, there is no excuse now for an absence of action. As things have worked so far with successful proscriptions, there is a suspicion that it is too often treated as a symbolic act, as a kind of glass ceiling, and too often not implemented in full. I very much hope that this will change with the outcome of the forthcoming review by the Home Secretary. If the Minister in responding today can show real progress towards addressing the global threat of the axis of resistance more effectively, bringing all the elements of national power together, both at home and abroad, then I am sure those measures will enjoy the widest possible support across this House.

King’s Speech

Lord Godson Excerpts

Wednesday 24th July 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Godson (Con)]

My Lords, I am grateful for the opportunity to respond to His Majesty’s gracious Speech and particularly to join in the pleasure of the House in welcoming my colleague and noble friend Lord Goodman, whom I have known for over 40 years. The pleasure is particularly great because he was an outstanding Member of the lower House, an outstanding constituency MP and an outstanding shadow Communities Minister. His time in that role ended all too quickly, so his advent here is a wonderful closing of the circle, not least because, as he pointed out, as MP for Wycombe he dealt with many of the issues of faith and communalism that he referenced in his remarks. We will have much need of his expertise and wisdom on those matters in the years to come.

I join in the congratulations across this House to the two newly minted Peers and Ministers, the noble Lord, Lord Hanson of Flint, in the Home Office, and the noble Lord, Lord Timpson, in the Ministry of Justice. Their track records belie the idea that politics no longer attracts people of high calibre into public service, and we wish them well in their responsibilities. They too will have to address some of the thorniest issues in our country, which my noble friend Lord Goodman of Wycombe addressed in his maiden speech.

From his period of service in the Governments of Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, the noble Lord, Lord Hanson of Flint, in particular will recall that the matters referred to by my noble friend Lord Goodman were sometimes as controversial within the Government as they were between the parties across this Floor, and indeed between the bureaucracies at hand. In this regard, noting the change a fortnight ago in the name of what was DLUHC and is now MHCLG again, I ask him how the department’s balance will work in respect of counterextremism vis-à-vis the Home Office. I understand that this is still not settled between those departments, so I would be grateful for his guidance on that tonight. It is rightly of interest to us in this Chamber.

However, what really matters to the public and what really has changed is the growing incivility of our public life, alluded to by the noble Baroness, Lady Fox of Buckley, and the noble Lord, Lord Mann, opposite. It is illustrated by the abuse that candidates from all parties, particularly women candidates, endured in the recent general election. The noble Lord, Lord Hanson of Flint, also served in the Northern Ireland Office, and the levels of physical and verbal abuse hurled at candidates, their families and supporters in this year’s campaign bore at least a family resemblance, at times, to some of the abusiveness of Northern Ireland during the worst of the Troubles. His Majesty’s Government are therefore right to carry out a rapid review of extremist intimidation and violence during the election and to mobilise the defending democracy task force, as has been described.

The Government’s investigation of extremism in the context of the general election campaign certainly has the advantage of specificity, but it is not enough on its own, as implied by the noble Lord, Lord Mann. The Government’s approach needs to encompass the wider issues of the spread of destructive ideologies and disinformation, as well as sophisticated and malign authoritarian forces from overseas trying to undermine our country.

As is well known in this House, the noble Lord, Lord Walney, the government commissioner on political violence, has rightly argued that what took place during the election was not a sudden rise in isolated acts of intimidation and harassment but rather, in his own words, a

“concerted campaign by extremists to create a hostile atmosphere for MPs within their constituencies to compel them to cave in to political demands”.

The noble Lord made a range of practical recommendations to defend our democracy against rising extremism, including the better protection of Parliament and other spaces that serve our democracy, such as constituency offices. I would therefore be grateful for the Minister’s early thoughts, in his early days in office, on the recommendations of the noble Lord, Lord Walney.

The orderly and dignified transfer of power in the recent general election is one of the great virtues of true democracies, but what happened along the way is obviously a cause for grave concern. In particular, I am concerned that the rise of explicitly communalist appeals from campaigning groups such as the so-called Muslim Voice has had too large a part in our deliberations. This was not the only such campaigning body—indeed, hardline Hindutva ideologues have also played their part in this process.

Why should we worry here? It is worth recalling that, over 50 years ago in Northern Ireland, Ian Paisley, later Lord Bannside in this place, changed the name of his political party from the Protestant Unionist Party to the Democratic Unionist Party, precisely because the sectarianism inherent in the previous name was too raw, even in those polarised circumstances in the Province. Now, however, too many candidates in this month’s general election have sought to ride this sectarian tiger. This legacy will be one of the new Government’s greatest challenges to ensure that, in Great Britain, we do not go back to old, far off and unhappy things that we thought we had seen off after the Second World War.

Security Threat to UK-based Journalists

Lord Godson Excerpts

Tuesday 21st February 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

I thank the noble Baroness for her question and, yes, we are. The security services are very alive to these threats. She could have mentioned a number of others from recent memory, such as Litvinenko, Skripal and so on. We are very aware of the scope and scale of the emerging threats that she so eloquently described. I will not comment on the operational side of this, but I am very reassured that the security services are on top of it.

[Lord Godson (Con)]

I join in the general approval of the Statement across all sections of this House. The noble Lord, Lord Coaker, referred to the Security Minister in the Commons talking about the Defending Democracy Taskforce. The Security Minister made specific reference to his instruction to the Home Office, in his words

“to lead work on countering Iranian state threats, making use of the full breadth and expertise of the Government and our extraordinary and courageous police, security and intelligence agencies.”—[Official Report, Commons, 20/2/23; col. 50.]

Would the Minister care to say a little more about that and give a little more detail about what that might entail? I am thinking particularly of a whole-of-government approach—not merely the Home Office, vital though that is—and how that can be built upon. While, as he says, he does not talk about the specifics around this particular proscription, would he care to give, in the widest policy sense, some of the general issues policy-wise and legally that might constitute barriers to entry in terms of proscribing the IRGC?

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

As to that latter point, I really cannot go any further, I am afraid. It is subject to ongoing scrutiny and I know there is a significant amount of advice currently being considered in that regard. I can say no more.

The first part of my noble friend’s question is, of course, completely right. Any activity in government has to be across agencies and across departments. Part of the reason why these threats are evolving, as the noble Baroness, Lady Kennedy, just pointed out, is because the nature of the threat is evolving and the nature of the reporting of the threats is evolving. The world is changing very rapidly. So it would be foolish for just the Home Office to be looking at this when there are obviously online aspects and Treasury aspects. These are things that we deal with in this House all the time; they come together periodically in economic crime Bills and in national security Bills. I hope noble Lords will continue to support the passage of those Bills because they will target this sort of activity.