Crime (Overseas Production Orders) Bill [Lords]

Ed Davey Excerpts

2nd reading: House of Commons
Monday 3rd December 2018 Commons Chamber

[Nick Thomas-Symonds]

I doubt that even I could match the rates of the Attorney General.

As the Minister has explained, the purpose of the Bill is to permit a court in this country to require a person or company located overseas, such as an overseas service provider, to produce stored electronic information, as a court could if the information were located or controlled in the United Kingdom. That will be done via the overseas production order for which clause 1 provides. An order can be operative only if the UK signs a treaty enabling it to be exercised. UK law enforcement authorities will be able to apply for an order that requires the production of electronic evidence for the purpose of investigating or prosecuting crimes such as terrorism offences. At present, if UK law enforcement requires electronic data from another country, it must go via a mutual legal assistance treaty, but that process can be slow to complete.

I very much appreciate and accept that electronic information is crucially important for the investigation and prosecution of criminal offences, and indeed is gaining in importance. The Minister set out the case of Dr Matthew Falder and some of the horrific child sex abuse images found on various websites, and it is clear that having a smooth, fast, efficient process to obtain this information is important, which is why the Opposition support the aim of this Bill; we do need a faster system.

I should also point out that I recognise the particular importance of the United States, first because this is the country where so much of the data is held and so many communication services providers—CSPs—are based, and, secondly, because the UK has been negotiating a bilateral data-sharing agreement with the United States since 2015.

The Minister knows that the Opposition are always happy to work with him in trying to reach consensus on matters, but there are aspects of this Bill about which I and my colleagues in the other place have concerns. First, I say to the Minister that we will be looking in Committee to pursue issues such as bulk data, confidential personal records and non-disclosure requirements.

There are also two other specific points of controversy that I will draw to the Minister’s attention now. The first of them relates to assurances on the use of the death penalty in cases where this country hands over data. The Bill is reciprocal, which allows countries with which a treaty is negotiated to seek a court order for electronic data stored in the UK to be transferred to another country. The current treaty is being negotiated with the US, and US law enforcement could apply via its courts for electronic data in the UK to be used as evidence in a particular case. There are currently 30 states in America that retain the death penalty.

I appreciate the Minister’s efforts to make this a more transparent process than has previously been the case, when Home Secretaries could, in private, make decisions in individual cases that are capital cases about handing over information. My right hon. Friend the shadow Home Secretary asked an urgent question on one issue in this House in July, which was due to a leaked letter from the Home Secretary to the then US Attorney General, Jeff Sessions. In the letter, the Home Secretary stated:

“I am of the view that there are strong reasons for not requiring a death penalty assurance in this specific case, so no such assurances will be sought.”

The Minister responding to my right hon. Friend stated at the Dispatch Box:

“I can reassure the House that our long-standing position on the use of the death penalty has not changed.”—[Official Report, House of Lords, 24 July 2018; Vol. 792, c. 1612.]

While I accept that the Government cannot control whether another Government provide assurances that are asked for, they can control, where assurances are not forthcoming, whether information will be handed over, and that includes information which could lead to evidence being gathered for use in a court, as well as evidence itself.

My noble Labour colleagues in the other place tabled a strong amendment in this regard which passed by 208 votes to 185 and was added to the Bill. The effect of it is to prevent such handing over of information unless there are assurances that the death penalty will not be imposed. This is important for those of us on these Benches who oppose the death penalty in all its forms and are passionate about human rights here and around the world. Furthermore, while we are, quite rightly, focused on the United States for the reasons I have set out, this Bill could be used, alongside a treaty, as the basis for reciprocal information exchange with other countries around the world where the rule of law is not respected by the regimes in power there, making the need for safeguards in this Bill even more pressing.

Secondly, there is a concern regarding the protection of journalists’ confidential information.

[Sir Edward Davey (Kingston and Surbiton) (LD)]

I agree very much with what the hon. Gentleman has said on the death penalty reassurance point. He will note that the Minister said in his speech that the amendment was somehow defective. Does he agree that if that is so the Minister needs to make his case in detail and put forward another amendment so he can ensure that these death penalty assurances can be given?

[Nick Thomas-Symonds]

The right hon. Gentleman puts his finger on a crucial point. The amendment passed the other place with a comfortable majority, and if it is to be argued that there is, perhaps, a technicality that renders it defective, the Minister must identify it in Committee so the House can on Report at least take a firm view on it.

On the protection of journalists’ confidential information, while the Government have argued that provisions in the Bill match those of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984, there are specific instances where it does not quite match PACE, and I will give a few examples, which no doubt can be explored in Committee.

Under PACE, notice is required in all applications for journalistic material, and there are two types: confidential or “excluded material” and non-confidential or “special procedure material”. However, under clause 12(1) of the Bill, provision is made to notify organisations only when the material is confidential journalistic material:

“An application for an overseas production order must be made on notice if there are reasonable grounds for believing that the electronic data specified or described in the application consists of or includes journalistic data that is confidential journalistic data.”

An application for non-confidential material—for example, where a journalist made a documentary and had some notes—often facilitates a negotiation process about what data is appropriate to provide to the authorities and offers the right of the media organisation concerned to oppose it formally. The Bill’s failure to make provision for a notification to request non-confidential journalistic material is a concern.

Conditions must be met for the court to grant a production order for special procedure material under PACE, including the following: there are reasonable grounds for believing the material is likely to be of substantial value to the investigation; disclosure is in the public interest; and there are reasonable grounds for believing that the material is likely to be relevant evidence. While clause 4(5) and (6) include both public interest and “substantial value” tests, they do not include a “relevant evidence” test. That is again a matter we will look to pursue in Committee.

Adopting a threshold of what data is “relevant” to an investigation is both necessary and proportionate; as well as helping to enable clarity and consistency in cases, it is in line with human rights principles. Judges considering these applications will be familiar with the application of these recognised legal standards, and it would be a simple and sensible safeguard to bring these provisions in line with those under PACE.

Under PACE, tests are only limited to “investigations”, while the Bill is worded in such a way that the tests could be applied to include investigations and proceedings. It is not clear why this should be required right up to trial.

There is a further concern with regard to protection for “excluded material”, or journalistic material that is held subject to a duty of confidence. Under PACE, “excluded material” has a different set of conditions that need to be met. Why should that be different in this Bill?

Journalists play a fundamental role in holding those in power to account, and we must ensure that this legislation does not in any way suppress investigative journalism or the exposure of public interest matters. Thus while the Opposition do not oppose the Bill’s purpose and welcome measures for the speedy exchange of electronic data, we will be looking to put safeguards into the Bill on handing over information, to protect the clear will of the other place with regard to the death penalty assurances and to protect the long-cherished principle of confidentiality of journalists’ sources.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sir Edward Davey (Kingston and Surbiton) (LD)]

I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Chelmsford (Vicky Ford). I think the Internet Watch Foundation does a fantastic job, and it is already saving lives, so everyone involved in the organisation deserves our thanks and gratitude. It is in that spirit that I rise to support this Bill and to say that the Minister was absolutely right to make his argument in the way that he did. The legislation goes beyond defeating the people involved in child sexual exploitation, and others committing horrendous nasty, violent crimes will also be caught by these important measures. Beyond that, the Bill will act against terrorism and so on, so the Government are absolutely right to pursue it.

All that is part of the way that we in this House need to support international co-operation against crime. Although this Bill will help to speed up the work that needs to be done via the courts to enable the investigatory bodies to get these criminals and hopefully stop such activities, I gently point out that the European Union already has many successful tools and instruments, and it is a shame that it looks like we are reducing our ability to use them.

However, in totally supporting the thrust of the Bill, I associate the Liberal Democrats with the gentle criticisms of the Labour and SNP Front-Bench spokesmen, who made important points about death penalty assurances and journalistic freedom that must be considered and put right in Committee and on Report. On the death penalty assurances, joint efforts between Labour and Liberal Democrat Lords secured that amendment, and it will take some proof to convince us that it is defective. Indeed, the Liberal Democrats would like to go further. Although the amendment was welcome, the fact that it relates to section 52 of the Investigatory Powers Act 2016 means that there may well be other treaties involving the sharing of collected electronic data to which it may not apply. Given the significance of that, it is important that we go as far as we possibly can. The UK must oppose the death penalty in all circumstances, and we need an assurance from the Government that the law is extremely tight.

[Mr Wallace]

Will the right hon. Gentleman therefore clarify his party’s position if we were in a negotiation with another country and the other country said, “Look, we cannot give you the death penalty assurances.”? Some 99.9% of the data requests under this Bill will be concerned with crimes of paedophilia or the other crimes that I described earlier. Should the death penalty become a bar, is the right hon. Gentleman saying that the UK should not enter into an agreement because of the rare occasions on which an offence may involve the death penalty? Would he sacrifice the 99.9% for that?

[Sir Edward Davey]

The Minister is being slightly sneaky. It is quite possible to take the two issues separately and deal with them separately. It is quite easy to see how one would ensure that the welcome measures in this Bill apply to the cases to which we all want them to apply while ensuring that the death penalty assurance, which ought to unite the House, is also dealt with properly.

I am sure that the Minister understands that Opposition Members in the other place and in this place are using this point to try to ensure that the Government move on this point. He will be aware of the cases of Alexanda Kotey and El Shafee Elsheikh from earlier this year, in which the Home Secretary—I acknowledge that this was revealed in a leaked letter—assisted the US to prosecute them without seeking death penalty assurances. That shocked people on both sides of this House, and the Minister is absolutely aware of that concern, so it is incumbent on those on the Treasury Bench to explain to and reassure this House that that cannot reoccur and that we will find ways through such issues.

[Mr Wallace]

I fully understand the right hon. Gentleman’s point. He talks about “our wish”, but he cannot speak for the other country that may be involved in forming an international agreement. They may say, “That’s fine. We know what you want, but we are not prepared to do that.” In that case, the decision becomes whether we want to use this legislation for the urgent and speedy data requests that happen 99.9% of the time for offences that are egregious and horrible but do not warrant the death penalty. He cannot speak for another country, so would he sacrifice the whole Bill?

[Sir Edward Davey]

I am afraid that the Minister is still trying to split hairs. I am sure that no one in this House wants to get in the way of measures that will ensure that we can work with other countries to tackle criminals. Equally, however, it is incumbent on the Government to find a way to ensure that what we heard from the Home Secretary earlier this year does not happen again. The Minister is in the Government and has the officials to come forward with proposals to be able to manage both those issues.

It does not seem beyond the wit of man and the clever officials in the Home Office to produce such proposals. If he is saying that the amendment made in the other House is defective because it has the problem he is raising with me, let Home Office Ministers come to the House in Committee or on Report to show that and to produce an alternative that deals with the matter, about which I am sure he shares my concern.

[Mr Wallace]

My point is that the moment for the House to look at that is not when considering this Bill but when whatever treaty or international arrangement we make with whatever country we need to make it with comes before the House for scrutiny. Then we can have a debate about whether the international treaty we have sought to give effect to this order is right for the balance of risk, but the generic primary legislation that allows an order to be made is not the right vehicle.

[Sir Edward Davey]

What the Opposition parties are saying very clearly to the Minister is that he has to make that case in Committee, just as the hon. Member for Torfaen (Nick Thomas-Symonds), the Labour party’s Front-Bench spokesman, made clear when I intervened on this very point. The Minister should make the case, but he should also explain how the Government will deal with the problem, which has arisen because of the actions of the Home Secretary not because of the actions of the Opposition.

We are concerned about the potential for this Bill to undermine protections for the freedom of the press. To be generous to the Government, what I think has happened is that, in pursuing a laudable aim that we all support, they went to the statute book and said, “Which statutes can we copy and paste to enable us to meet our objectives?” Rather than looking carefully at how, in domestic law, the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 has carefully nuanced the use of the Terrorism Act 2000, Home Office officials, possibly because of the culture in the Home Office, just cut and pasted mainly from the Terrorism Act. That may have been a mistake, and there may have been no deliberate intention for it to have the consequences that now appear before us, so I gently say that I hope the Minister will go away and think about this. I invite him to meet right hon. and hon. Opposition Members, as well as representatives of the media to hear in detail the genuine concerns not just of BBC lawyers but of lawyers representing other media organisations.

We have heard from other Members about the relevant evidence test, which is in our domestic law and has been carefully developed over a period of years, but that test will not be applied to protect journalists with respect to material that comes from their investigations abroad. That is quite worrying if one looks at the practical examples. Take the case of Mark Duggan, for example. He was shot by the police in Tottenham in 2011, and the BBC obtained mobile phone footage of the aftermath from a witness. The BBC was ordered to turn over the footage and, because it was relevant evidence, the footage was handed over. Then an application was made for information that would reveal the identity of the source of that footage. The person who had shot the footage was understandably concerned for their safety, and the BBC successfully opposed the application by pointing to the relevant evidence test in the Police and Criminal Evidence Act. That test is not in the Bill, so there is a clear example that, by not being as subtle in this legislation as we are in our domestic legislation, there is a danger that journalistic freedom, as exercised abroad, will be curtailed.

The point about the notices is relevant, and it should worry the Minister because the way that notices work under domestic legislation is very helpful not just to journalists but to the police. Sometimes when the police put a notice to a journalistic organisation, that organisation will go back to the police and say, “You are asking for a huge amount, and we don’t really think it is necessary for your investigation. Let us enter a dialogue with you to narrow down your search so you can get information that will really help you, and therefore you will not have to waste so much time.” The notice actually turns out to be helpful in speeding up investigations. Given that that is the whole purpose of this Bill, the Minister should go away and look at that.

Moreover, it is not just about thinking of the police’s point of view in speeding things up; it is also about making sure the police know whether the evidence exists. The way some notices work at the moment is that the police go on a fishing trip. There is the example from Durham police, they applied to the BBC without notice. Durham police were eventually told that they could not do that and that, if they had submitted a notice, they would have learned that the material no longer existed. Again, the BBC was trying to save police time.

Some of the carefully constructed domestic law needs to be put into this internationally applying legislation in order to help the police and security services, not just journalists. I am sure this is just an unintended consequence, and I am sure there is no malice, so I hope this is the sort of issue that can be settled by a few meetings and a few amendments that garner support from both sides of the House. That is how scrutiny should operate in this Parliament, and I hope the Minister, with his usual generosity, will be open-minded to that approach.

Oral Answers to Questions

Ed Davey Excerpts

Monday 3rd December 2018 Commons Chamber

[Sajid Javid]

I very much agree with hon. Gentleman’s sentiments about the importance of immigration. We are a much stronger country because of immigration and immigrants have contributed to every part of British life—not just our economy, but our families and communities. We should always be looking for opportunities to celebrate just that.

[Sir Edward Davey (Kingston and Surbiton) (LD)]

The Prime Minister is selling her Brexit deal by telling the country that it ends free movement of labour. Does the Home Secretary realise that it is completely unacceptable to have the meaningful vote without the White Paper having been published?

[Sajid Javid]

The right hon. Gentleman will know that, deal or no deal, there will be an end to free movement of labour.

Offensive Weapons Bill

Ed Davey Excerpts

3rd reading: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons
Wednesday 28th November 2018 Commons Chamber

Let me finish by asking this: is there a greater national emergency? I know Brexit dominates, but this Parliament should be discussing, almost every week, serious violence and why it is happening. We should be having a huge debate on it. For goodness’ sake, given the number of young people being killed, and the number of knife crimes offences and other offensive weapons crimes that there are, surely we, as a Parliament, need to wake up and debate it with the priority people in this country would expect.

[Sir Edward Davey (Kingston and Surbiton) (LD)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Gedling (Vernon Coaker) on his excellent speech and I associate myself with his sentiments. The Bill makes some welcome improvements to how the police and courts tackle threats to the public from offensive weapons. Given the violence and the deaths we are seeing now, it is vital that we act. I welcome some of the amendments, particularly those tabled by Labour colleagues, including new clauses 1 and 6. However, a number of details in this Bill would prove counterproductive in the fight against crime—things that are not based on evidence—so I have tabled a range of amendments. I will speak only briefly to some of them now, given the time available and the fact that other Members wish to get in.

Amendments 12 and 13 would in essence replace short-term prison sentences with community sentences. As the Bill stands, the new offence in clause 1 of selling corrosive products to under-18s is punishable by up to 51 weeks in prison. We are puzzled by this, because it directly contradicts Government policy as articulated at the Dispatch Box. The Secretary of State for Justice himself has said that short-term prison sentences do not work. He said that they should be used only “as a last resort.” Amendments 12 and 13 therefore appear to be in line with Government policy and would ensure that the offence set out in clause 1 is punishable by an effective community sentence and/or fine, instead of by an ineffective short-term prison sentence.

Amendment 14 would amend the welcome new offence of possession of corrosives by adding to clause 6 the words “with intent to cause injury”. I assume that the current wording is the result of a drafting error.

Finally, amendments 15 and 16 would remove mandatory prison sentences for a second offence of possession of corrosive substances. In other words, they would prevent this House from yet again trespassing on judicial discretion. I have never understood why Governments and colleagues think that they are capable of second-guessing the facts of a case that has not yet happened, or why this House should pretend that it makes any sense at all to bind the hands of judges, who see and hear the real facts of the case, are trained to assess the facts and are experienced in sentencing.

The House may remember when, back in 2014, a Conservative Back-Bench new clause was passed to create mandatory prison sentences for a second offence of possession of a knife. My party voted against that new clause on the principle that mandatory sentences tie judges’ hands, put more pressure on already overburdened prisons and mean that more people, especially young people, end up with ineffective short-term prison sentences. Regrettably, that new clause was passed, thanks to some Labour MPs supporting it, the Conservative Front-Bench team abstaining and Conservative Back Benchers voting for it.

To be fair, there were Labour MPs who voted with those of us who opposed the tying of judges’ hands. One Labour MP in particular made a fine speech, and said:

“There is a principle at stake here. There is a Sentencing Council and legislation on what is and is not a crime, but surely it must be for the courts to determine what is appropriate for the prisoner in front of them, rather than to have that laid down by statute.”—[Official Report, 17 June 2014; Vol. 582, c. 1041-1042.]

That MP was the right hon. Member for Islington North (Jeremy Corbyn), so I hope that the Labour Front-Bench team will support our amendments to get rid of mandatory prison sentences.

Back in 2014, when the House debated similar proposals in respect of knife crimes, the supporters of tying judges’ hands said that it would send a message to the people, and that that message would reduce knife crime. That was a rather odd argument, which seemed to assume that young people especially tuned into our proceedings with enthusiasm. It had no basis in fact at the time. We now have the benefit of seeing how four years of limiting judicial discretion over knife crime has worked—how the message that Parliament apparently sent was heard.

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I am listening intently to the right hon. Gentleman, as always, and in a friendly way I express the confident hope that he is approaching his peroration.

[Sir Edward Davey]

Mr Speaker, you are right to be confident because I am.

There may now be more people behind bars to whom the judges might have given, on the evidence, community sentences. We may now as a society pay more in taxes to keep locked up people whom it would be better not to lock up, so we may not be able to use the money that is currently spent on prisons in other ways, such as for spending on police or youth services.

All that does not look like a good outcome from the message sent by mandatory sentences, so why are we repeating the mistake? What evidence are Ministers using to introduce more mandatory sentences? What happens if the person was coming home from the shops and he or she was holding his mum or dad’s shopping bags when stopped and searched? Surely it is for judges to act on the basis of fact, not for Parliament to second-guess it. We do not think that mandatory sentences are the right approach, and I hope that the other place will deal with the matter.

[Stephen Timms]

Given the constraints on time, I will speak only to new clause 23, from among the six new clauses that I have tabled, which deals with a particularly important subject.

It might come as a surprise to the House, as it did to me, to learn that weapons that cannot lawfully be purchased in the UK can be purchased online without anyone committing an offence. That cannot be right. The aim of new clause 23 is to plug that gap. It differs from the proposal that we debated in Committee as it allows for a defence if the website removes the offending advertisement for an illegal weapon within 24 hours of being informed of it. That reflects some recent helpful discussions that I have had with eBay about the practicalities of implementing the change that I propose.

The background is that the Criminal Justice Act 1988 introduced a list of weapons that are illegal to sell in the UK, which was expanded in 2002 to include disguised knives. A disguised knife is

“any knife which has a concealed blade or concealed sharp point and is designed to appear to be an everyday object of a kind commonly carried on the person”.

It is now illegal to sell that kind of weapon in the UK.

I have been speaking to Mr Raheel Butt, who runs an organisation in the borough of Newham called Community and Rehabilitation Solutions. He is from a gang background and has served a prison term, but since he left prison in 2012, he has made it his mission to stop others making the mistakes that he made. He has pointed out to me that a lot of the weapons being used to kill young people on the streets of our cities, as my hon. Friend the Member for Gedling (Vernon Coaker) pointed out, are being bought online, a lot of them from eBay.

I should say that since I raised these points in Committee, disguised knives have been removed from eBay, although they can still be freely found on other websites. Mr Butt tells me that it is on those sites that those who are killing young people are getting their weapons. However, is it illegal for a website with a UK domain name to advertise weapons that are illegal to buy in the UK? Surely the answer ought to be yes, yet there is some uncertainty about that. If I understood her correctly, the Minister advised us in Committee that she thought that it was unlawful for an illegal weapon to be sold in that way, but then she wrote to us and said, “Actually, no. There is a defence available, because these are simply platforms.” My argument is that selling a weapon on a UK website that it is illegal to purchase in the UK should be illegal. That is the aim of my new clause 23.

Stop and Search

Ed Davey Excerpts

Monday 12th November 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hurd]

I fully understand the point that my hon. Friend makes and he knows from our conversations that I have a lot of sympathy with it. The steps I took last year with the funding settlement have resulted in almost every single police force in England and Wales beginning to recruit again. I also welcome the steps taken by the police leadership to create a more consistent model of neighbourhood policing across the country. That is what the public we serve want to see, and—as I have said—I hope to take further steps in the 2019-20 funding settlement in early December.

[Sir Edward Davey (Kingston and Surbiton) (LD)]

I welcome the Minister’s clear statement that the Government will not remove the requirement of reasonable grounds for stop and search. The Minister talked about future reforms: can he make a commitment to the House today that any reforms will be based on evidence, and that that evidence will be published to the House?

Police Pension Liabilities

Ed Davey Excerpts

Tuesday 6th November 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hurd]

My hon. Friend makes a serious point. Across the police system, reserves have grown by hundreds of millions of pounds since 2011, at a time when all the public were hearing from the police system was, “We need more money.” One of the things we have done is to say, “Yes, you need reserves, but you need to account for how big those reserves are and what you intend to do with them.” That goes for the West Midlands police and crime commissioner, who has, I think, increased reserves by £20 million.

[Sir Edward Davey (Kingston and Surbiton) (LD)]

Police chiefs say that filling this pension deficit could cost up to 10,000 police officers. Does the Minister agree?

[Mr Hurd]

No, I do not. I think the number is exaggerated, which is not unusual for the police. I recognise that there is an unbudgeted cost, and I have given an undertaking to work very closely with the Treasury and with the Home Secretary to find a solution to both this and the additional resources and capacity needed to meet the very real demand pressures on the police.

Leaving the EU: Rights of EU Citizens

Ed Davey Excerpts

Monday 5th November 2018 Commons Chamber

[Caroline Nokes]

My right hon. Friend and constituency neighbour makes an important point. At every opportunity, Ministers raise both with the EU and our counterparts in the EU27 the important factor of UK citizens lawfully residing in other EU member states. There is of course huge concern that we have made a generous offer to EU citizens, and let me be clear that we want them to stay here and that we regard them as part of our community. It is time for the EU to step up to the plate and say what it is doing for British citizens.

[Sir Edward Davey (Kingston and Surbiton) (LD)]

How will the Minister tell an EU citizen wanting to come here in the next few years whether and when free movement of labour has finished?

[Caroline Nokes]

As I have said, the parliamentary timetable for the immigration Bill will be coming forward in the next few weeks. Our White Paper will set out the future skills-based immigration system, as the Prime Minister indicated at the recent Conservative party conference, which will be based on people’s ability and what they can offer to our country, not on where they come from.

Oral Answers to Questions

Ed Davey Excerpts

Monday 29th October 2018 Commons Chamber

[Sajid Javid]

The Government are supporting all those EU citizens who wish to stay in our country. As I said, we actually want them to stay, not just because of the economic benefits they bring but because they are part of our society and part of many of our families. So we want them to stay, and as we have made clear, whether there is a deal or not, they will still be welcome to stay. Our new immigration system will continue to welcome talent from across the world.

[Sir Edward Davey (Kingston and Surbiton) (LD)]

How does the Home Secretary propose to honour his promises to EU citizens living in the UK and to British citizens in the EU in the event of no deal? Will he now seek to negotiate and ratify a citizens’ rights agreement with the EU that would come into force if there were no wider deal?

[Sajid Javid]

We have made it clear that if there is no deal—which we do not expect, but we need to plan for all eventualities—all 3.5 million EU citizens in the UK will be allowed to stay and welcome to stay.

Immigration: DNA Tests

Ed Davey Excerpts

1st reading: House of Commons
Thursday 25th October 2018 Commons Chamber

[Sajid Javid]

My right hon. Friend makes a very important point. It is good to remind the House that my statement was about the wrongful mandatory use of DNA evidence; as he says, DNA evidence can be a very helpful tool when it is completely voluntary. I understand that the Home Office has, in some cases, helped individuals to do that on an absolutely voluntary basis, because the provision of such evidence can help people, especially if they are in particularly distressing or difficult situations or they are otherwise vulnerable. I think it is helpful to point out that when someone chooses to provide DNA evidence, and it is purely their choice, that should be taken into account.

[Sir Edward Davey (Kingston and Surbiton) (LD)]

I thank the Home Secretary for his statement, and particularly for his tone and apology. Is it not the case, however, that the DNA scandal suggests that the Home Office’s hostile environment policy pushed officials to break the law? Will his structure review consider a root-and-branch reform of this nasty culture and consider giving the processing of immigration and asylum applications to a new unit that is independent from the Home Office—a unit that can ignore political pressures and simply work efficiently, fairly and lawfully?

[Sajid Javid]

I think the right hon. Gentleman meant to refer to a compliant environment. That is an environment in which we make sure, on behalf of British citizens, that we have a robust immigration policy that is fair to people, but that enables us to be strong on those who set out to abuse our immigration system and enter or settle in our country illegally—for example, in fraudulent cases—not least to be fair to those who use legal routes for migration to or settlement in the UK.

It is worth reminding the right hon. Gentleman that for five years he was part of a Government that worked on compliant environment policies, which began many years before that with previous Governments. He now appears to have a problem with some of those policies, but I do not remember him raising them when I sat alongside him in Cabinet. That said, there absolutely are lessons to learn from this. We must conduct the right review, with independent oversight, and learn those lessons.

Asylum Accommodation Contracts

Ed Davey Excerpts

Wednesday 10th October 2018 Westminster Hall

[Sir Edward Davey (Kingston and Surbiton) (LD)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Stockton North (Alex Cunningham) on securing the debate. I thank him for the work he has done with my friend, Suzanne Fletcher, from Citizens UK and Tees Valley of Sanctuary. She brought him one of the duvets that were provided, which were so thin that the health of the people who used them was hit—their limbs were affected and their general health deteriorated. That is one of the shocking examples of how poor service, and the failure to comply with basic human standards, are undermining the health of these people. We have already heard some graphic stories.

As I do not have much time, I will focus on asking the Minister about the contracts. We do not know an awful lot about them, although some local authorities have seen the statements of requirement, but they will be signed in the next few weeks—by the end of the year—and they are worth £4 billion over the next 10 years. This debate is timely because it gives the House a chance to scrutinise them and to ask what the Government are doing before they sign the contracts.

First, have local authorities been offered the contracts? It seems that they might be able to do a lot better with £4 billion over the next 10 years. I would not be surprised if they could do it for less, and it would be of higher quality. They could lock it in to their overall local housing strategy. Has there been any discussion with the Local Government Association, the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities or other local authority organisations about whether they could provide the services? If not, why not?

Secondly, we have heard a bit about sharing bedrooms from the hon. Member for Stockton North. There is no doubt that some of the most vulnerable people living in our country not only are being given some of the most shocking accommodation, but are being asked to share rooms, which is causing their mental health to deteriorate, as we heard in the graphic example from the hon. Member for Glasgow South West (Chris Stephens). We hear about people who left a country because they were afraid of another group of people in that country or a neighbouring country, and who, in this country, are being asked to share a room with people whom they tried to escape from or who are from a group they tried to escape from. The lack of sensitivity and understanding of the mental health needs of such people is extraordinary, so my second question is, can we go beyond just protecting an undefined group of vulnerable people? Can we not get to a point where people simply do not have to share bedrooms? It does not seem too unreasonable a question to ask or too unreasonable a criterion to have in the new contracts.

On monitoring quality, if local authorities had the contracts, there would be a group of people in the local authorities who could help monitor them. What reassurance can the Minister give us today that the contracts will be properly monitored, whether that is to do with duvets, quality of housing, advice or other aspects of the contracts that will be let?

I have not had a chance to read the statement of requirements. Why has that not been shared with Members of Parliament? Can aspects of the contract not be shared with Members of Parliament—perhaps the Home Affairs Committee—beforehand on whatever terms are needed? If Members can see the contracts, can the Minister tell us today whether there really will be minimum standards? A statement of requirements seems too wishy-washy. We need to know that legally enforceable minimum standards will be provided in the contracts so that people who are not getting them might have recourse to the law. That is the only way we can ensure that people will be treated properly. It is absolutely right that the contracts should have legal safeguards.

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[Caroline Nokes]

The hon. Gentleman makes an important point. Glasgow City Council will of course not seek to provide accommodation for the whole of Scotland, and perhaps there is a very good case for breaking contracts down further, which might increase engagement from local authorities. I have to say that I am never averse to the greater engagement and involvement of local authorities. We all know that, first, local authorities are very good at providing services and, secondly, people in a crisis often turn to the local authority first.

[Sir Edward Davey]

Have the Minister or her officials talked to different local authorities to see what sort of contract they would be able to bid for? It is clearly not an argument that local authorities cannot bid for contracts because of the European process; they do that every day. It is a question of whether the Home Office is willing to design the contracts in a way that would be achievable for local authorities.

Salisbury Incident

Ed Davey Excerpts

Wednesday 12th September 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Wallace]

The hon. Gentleman makes a fair point. I am trying to be as pragmatic and as accurate as possible about my view. I made it clear what my view was of the particular statement by the Leader of the Opposition. I have also said that I do not characterise that as the collective view of the Labour party. We will see what the statements are, and they may be different from the response that we heard last week. But I want to move on. I said that that was the only political point I was going to make, because it was important, but I want to move on now to where we have got with the investigation.

Following the work of the police and the intelligence services, which identified these individuals, the Crown Prosecution Service concluded that there was sufficient basis on which to bring charges against the two men for the attempted murder of Sergei and Yulia Skripal in Salisbury on that day. The two men identified by police are also the prime suspects in the poisoning of Dawn Sturgess and Charlie Rowley. Our world-class experts at the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory at Porton Down and the OPCW have confirmed that the exact same chemical nerve agent was used in both cases. The two incidents now form a single investigation, and there is no other line of inquiry.

The security and intelligence agencies have carried out their own investigations into the organisation behind the attack. Based on that work, the Government have concluded that the two individuals named by the police and the CPS are officers from the Russian military intelligence service, also known as the GRU, which is a highly disciplined organisation with a clear and effective chain of command.

This was not a rogue operation. The attack was almost certainly approved outside the GRU at a senior level of the Russian state. Although I cannot go into operational detail about the work of our security and intelligence agencies, I can say that this conclusion is based on a clear body of intelligence.

This was a despicable act in which a deadly and illegal nerve agent known as Novichok was used on the streets of Britain. I know the whole House will join me in recognising the remarkable resilience shown by the people of Salisbury in the face of this act. The Government stand ready to assist Salisbury in getting back to normal. We have released £7.5 million to support business and tourism in the town and a further £5 million to support the cost of policing. I know that, throughout this process, my hon. Friend the Member for Salisbury (John Glen) has been keenly and eagerly active in making sure that Salisbury, along with the county council, gets the resource and support it needs to deal with this.

[Sir Edward Davey (Kingston and Surbiton) (LD)]

I want to take the Minister back to how we counter the Russian threat to security in this country and elsewhere. As Secretary of State for Energy in March 2015, I used powers never used before to force the sale by LetterOne of its North sea oil assets. This was in the context of Ukraine-related sanctions against Russia. Following the terrorist outrage in Salisbury, are the Government looking at using powers such as unexplained wealth orders to investigate the cronies of Putin whose presence here brings our country into disrepute and does not help the fight against Russian aggression?

[Mr Wallace]

I will get to my response later on, but the right hon. Gentleman makes the point that we have to deal with Russian state aggression across a wide front. We have said that we will use all legal powers within the rule of law to push back the malign action of the Russian state. The Criminal Finances Act 2017, which had cross-party support, gives us tools to deal with illicit finance. It is a fact that some of the two biggest flows of illicit finance into this country come from Russia and China. Therefore, it is obvious that we will be looking in those areas and making sure that we deal with such illicit activity, but we also look elsewhere. I cannot comment on individual investigations, but where we see a break in the law, whether it be illicit finance or any other type of malign activity, we will act using those powers and push it back.

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[Mr Wallace]

We have made it very clear that we will use the powers set out in the Act. I am not going to say that we are about to fire a starting gun or say, “Here’s the list.” That will be for the Foreign Secretary and the Government collectively. We now have the power to act through our sanctions Act. We will not hesitate to use it, and there is more to come. I am trying to ensure that the legislation coming before the House over the next few months will include serious crime as a factor for laying a sanction, because it is important to see what the Americans have done around cyber-crime and serious organised criminals in that space.

[Sir Edward Davey]

Will the Minister give way?

[Stephen Kinnock]

Will the Minister give way?

[Mr Wallace]

No, I am going to move on.

We introduced many provisions in the Criminal Finances Act 2017. They included asset-freezing orders, of which we have used many, and unexplained wealth orders, which we used within six weeks against what I shall describe as an overseas individual—obviously the court decides how much I can tell hon. Members about individuals—and there are more in the pipeline. I know that Members are impatient to know why we cannot just issue lots of unexplained wealth orders. The simple reason is that the provision became law at the beginning of this year. We used it very quickly and we have to work it through the judiciary. At the high end, the oligarchs and their type use lawyers, and lots of them, to test these things. The wheels grind and there are more orders in the pipeline, but we have to ensure that this is tested, that the judiciary gets used to it and that we learn from the first use—which, by the way, has gone well to date.

[Sir Edward Davey]

The Minister is absolutely right; I found that the legal issues around the use of such orders requires a little bit of time, and I have sympathy with him on that point. However, can he at least reassure the House that the Government are absolutely determined to use unexplained wealth orders and other powers to chase down dirty money and stop Britain being used as a haven for it?

[Mr Wallace]

There is a reason why my title has changed from Minister of State for Security to Minister for Security and Economic Crime. The Prime Minister said not so long ago in a speech that she is determined to step up the response to illicit finance in this country and target those individuals. We have put some resource behind that. We have put in place the National Economic Crime Centre, and we are absolutely targeting and driving investigations in that area in a much more aggressive way than in the past. I have been very clear with the National Crime Agency and the other agencies that this is about targeted cases and sending messages, but it is also about going after facilitators—those who allow those crooks to enjoy their money in London. We must ensure that we deal with them all—not just the far-distant crime baron, but the smart, perhaps sharp-suited individuals who think they are just helping and not really engaged, but who in fact are absolutely corrupting our system, littering our streets with dirty money and then allowing those crooks to enjoy it.

[Mr Wallace]

Tempting as my hon. Friend’s suggestion is, vilifying people who carry out the role of defending plaintiffs is not how we do business in this country. We are not Russia. Reputation is clearly important to some of those companies, and no doubt they will bear that in mind. However, everyone has a right to a defence. It is up to us to make sure that the law is in the right place to deal with this.

I fully expect that in some of these cases we will be successful, while in others we will probably try but not be successful. That is partly because of the myriad facilitators, shell companies, foreign jurisdictions and corrupt jurisdictions that this money comes through. One challenge is that in some cases the money is already cleaned when it comes here. It is not being washed here; it is cleaned, has come into the system, and has bought nice houses and everything else. That is why we squeeze at one end with the unexplained wealth orders and the asset-cleaning orders, which have also been used quite successfully recently, and then, at the other end, we have better regulation through the use of the suspicious activity reports regime. That regime has, for far too long, been in need of reform to make sure that people are making those reports when they see suspicious activities. I see some horrendous stories where people have handed over hundreds of thousands of pounds in cash and people have not thought that it is remotely suspicious, so have not made any report. People have bought houses with cash, and somehow some estate agents have not thought that that is remotely suspicious. There is an obligation—a legal obligation—on them to report these issues. Funnily enough, when we follow up on those cash purchases, they are, more often than not, a dodgy purchase.

[Sir Edward Davey]

The Minister is describing a situation where the people who wish to do our country harm are very creative and have very expensive advisers to quickly get round the rules. Can he assure this House that the economic crime unit that he described in a previous answer to me will, within the law, be as creative as possible to chase down these people?

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[Mr Wallace]

It is just good energy policy for any country not to be dependent on one single source, either because of political exposure or just because of differences on energy. It is really important that we always make sure that our energy policy is diverse. Obviously, our European partners have tried to do the same, and I would urge them to continue with that.

[Sir Edward Davey]

As Secretary of State for Energy, working at the EU Energy Council, I helped the European Commission to draft Europe’s energy security strategy, which is very much aimed at reducing Europe’s dependence on imports of Russian fossil fuels. That is good for climate change and good for security. Can the Minister assure the House that after Brexit, that level of influence on Europe’s energy policy will be there in some other way, because by being at the table we were able to hit Putin in the pocket very effectively?

[Mr Wallace]

I think that, in the middle of the negotiations, that is what we are trying to do. Our relationship with Europe post Brexit is not just about taking or giving—it is still going to be a partnership. Our security will be a partnership. Our relationships with NATO and many of the countries in NATO will be a partnership. On strategic issues like energy, it is in the interests of both the European continent, as it will be then, and us to have that strategic dialogue. We will need each other for energy policy whether we are in or out of the European Union. I would certainly share the right hon. Gentleman’s view that we must continue to work at delivering that.

This was a chemical weapons attack that left four people fighting for their lives and one innocent woman dead. I know that the thoughts of the House will be with the friends and family of Dawn Sturgess, in particular. We will never stop pursuing justice for Dawn Sturgess and other victims, nor will we ever stop pursuing the people responsible for this malign attack. As the Prime Minister told this House last week, were the two suspects within our jurisdiction, there would be a clear basis in law for their arrest for murder.