Iran

Debate between Lord Lloyd of Berwick and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Monday 25th November 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Lloyd of Berwick (CB)]

My Lords, perhaps I might briefly ask the noble Lord to say a bit more, if he can, about the part played by our colleague, the noble Baroness, Lady Ashton, in brokering this very welcome agreement.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

My Lords, my understanding is that under a UN Security Council resolution, the noble Baroness was designated as the co-ordinator for these negotiations. This has been an EU exercise with the three largest Governments within the European Union, in effect, representing the EU. The noble Baroness has to some extent represented the interests of the other 25 member states and I know that she has put an enormous amount of effort into this as well.

Government Communications Headquarters

Debate between Lord Lloyd of Berwick and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Monday 10th June 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

I thank the noble Lord for those comments. I am not sure that in some ways we are in a more dangerous world than we were in 100 or more years ago when international anarchist groups succeeded in assassinating the heads of state of two or three European countries. However, he is absolutely right about the explosion of communications and the speed of communications. The general increase in the educated population of the world means that, when you are looking for terrorist groups, you are not able to look for a small group within each city but are looking at a much larger number of possible suspects. That is why agencies have to adapt the way they look at these sources.

[Lord Lloyd of Berwick]

I understand extremely well that the Minister cannot at this stage tell us very much, but I hope that he can at least confirm what appears to be the case—that the 197 Prism reports said to have been passed on to GCHQ last year all relate to communications data and not to the contents of any intercepted communication. If he can give us that confirmation—I hope he can and can see no reason why he should not if it be the case—it would be much less serious and would allay certain anxieties that otherwise we must all feel. If it is the case that it relates solely to communications data, will he say who gave the authorisation under Section 21 of RIPA, which is the relevant section, not Chapter 1, and whether the authorisation was specific to this case or was a general authorisation?

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

The noble and learned Lord would like me to go into specifics on specific cases, and I am going to resist that for reasons he will fully understand, while recognising the importance of the distinction made between communications data and the details of communications, which is one that we all recognise.