Jamal al-Harith
Debate between Ben Wallace and Victoria Prentis(7 years, 10 months ago)
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Mr Wallace
I thank the right hon. Lady for her questions. Like her, and like my constituents, we will be outraged and disappointed by the sums of money that have been paid. As for the sums that have been paid, and that are reported to have been paid, I cannot comment on individual cases. Unlike former Home Secretaries, the Government are bound by their legal obligations—we cannot break those legal commitments—but I can say that some of the vulnerability that led us to have to pay those damages occurred when the right hon. Lady was a member of the Labour Government and when those individuals brought claims against us.
It is important that we recognise that that is why some of these claims had to be paid out and why, in response to those outrageous sums of money that have been reported, this Government and the coalition Government brought forward the consolidated guidance— David Cameron brought that forward—to make sure that our intelligence services act within the law and get the full support of the law in order to do their job. That is also why we brought forward the Justice and Security Act 2013 to introduce closed material proceedings so that in future claims brought by such people, held in Guantanamo Bay in 2004, can be challenged in court without revealing sensitive intelligence information and we can, thus, defend many of those claims. It is also why that Act brought in stronger powers for the Intelligence and Security Committee, in order that it can investigate such incidents and give confidence to this House that such events are properly investigated, with lessons learned if they need to be and allegations put to rest if they are found to be false. That happened as a result of these types of payments; that action was taken under the coalition Government of David Cameron to make sure that we minimise the risk of this ever happening again.
Victoria Prentis (Banbury) (Con)
As you are aware, Mr Speaker, before I came to this place I worked as a Government lawyer. Although I did not work on this specific case, colleagues in the department in which I worked were involved in it.
Victoria Prentis
No, it is not.
In this country, we have a proud tradition of law: law that supports not only people who are attractive to the general public, but those with whom the general public would not have sympathy. The question I wish to put to the Minister is this: to what extent has he worked and have this Government worked to enable the rule of law to be upheld and to enable the “secret courts” Act to come into effect so that we can study these cases properly?
Mr Wallace
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for her question. First, as I said earlier, by introducing consolidated guidance to guide our intelligence services when they operate abroad; by introducing the 2013 Act, which allows for closed material proceedings; and by beefing up the ISC, we have put in place a much more robust and defendable structure so that we are not the victim of people coming along and trying to sue us for actions we may or may not have taken. That is the most important part of it. It is also important to point out to the House that we will act in accordance with our inherent right of self-defence. We will always put first the defence of our citizens and our nation, and we will make sure that we do that to the best of our ability.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Ben Wallace and Victoria Prentis(7 years, 11 months ago)
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Victoria Prentis (Banbury) (Con)
Mr Wallace
The National Crime Agency’s child exploitation and online protection command received an extra £10 million this year, and in November 2015 the NCA joined up with GHCQ in a joint operations cell to ensure that we tackle some of the most complicated crimes online. Those two things are just part of the whole process, and I would be happy to brief my hon. Friend further on the whole spectrum of efforts that we take against paedophiles and online abuse. The key is that we can all contribute to that online safety—teachers, parents, law enforcement agencies and community leaders— to ensure that we are aware of how paedophiles operate, and can shut them down and put them away.