Data Retention and Investigatory Powers Bill

Debate between George Howarth and Roger Gale

Tuesday 15th July 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr George Howarth (Knowsley) (Lab)]

I beg to move amendment 1, page 4, line 19, at end insert—

‘(5) In section 25 (interpretation of Chapter 11), subsection (1), after “in accordance with subsection (2);”, insert— ““economic well-being of the United Kingdom” is defined as the security of critical national infrastructure, the conduct of defence contracts, the development, manufacture and design of UK defence systems, and the stability of the UK currency, banking and financial systems.”

[The Temporary Chair (Sir Roger Gale)]

With this it will be convenient to discuss clause stand part; there will be no further debate on clause stand part.

[Mr Howarth]

It was said on Second Reading, but it bears repeating that clause 3 does move things on slightly on the question of economic well-being. We keep saying that the Bill is based on the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000, but explicitly relating economic well-being to national security is progress, because the relationship was previously implicit. I accept that clause 3, even as it stands, is progress from where we stood previously.

I constructed this amendment, which is intended as a probing amendment, because I thought it was as well to have a debate about the range and scope of the term “economic well-being”. I wanted to try to work out the range of concerns that should be taken into account when it comes to that concept. In the amendment, I have effectively highlighted three areas that I think are of concern and that ought at least to be taken into account in this context. The first is critical national infrastructure, and I shall say a little more about that in a moment. The second is the conduct of defence contracts and the development, manufacture and design of UK defence systems. The third is the stability of the UK currency, banking and financial systems.

On the question of critical national infrastructure, an organisation that has some responsibility in this regard is the Centre for the Protection of National Infrastructure, which provides protective security advice aimed at reducing the vulnerability of critical national infrastructure to national security threats. It categorises national infrastructure into nine sectors: communications, emergency services, energy, financial services, food, government, health, transport and water. Not everything in that list is considered critical in nature, so the CPNI contends that within those nine sectors

“there are certain ‘critical’ elements of infrastructure, the loss or compromise of which would have a major detrimental impact on the availability or integrity of essential services, leading to severe economic or social consequences or to loss of life.”

It draws attention to broad descriptions of the types of infrastructure that would be categorised at different levels. That infrastructure can be physical, which means sites, installations or pieces of equipment, or it can be logistical, which includes information networks or systems. It is important that economic well-being takes into account critical national infrastructure, because it directly relates to the continuation of daily life that electricity, water and all the things that go with them should be available.

I do not propose to speak for long about defence, but I am aware, as I am sure others listening to the debate will be, that there have been attempts in the past by hostile nation states or individuals to compromise defence systems. There have been attempts to break into companies’ design systems and so on. Without proper controls to deal with that, there could be serious consequences for our national security. It is therefore self-evident that we should take into account defence systems and their design, manufacture and so on when we consider this matter.

The amendment also refers to

“the stability of the UK currency, banking and financial systems.”

It is interesting to look at what the Serious Organised Crime Agency has to say. It concludes by talking about cybercrime and the effects that it can have. It says:

“Financial crime can jeopardise the integrity of our financial markets and institutions.”

That is not just a question of protecting individual firms or interests. It really is related to our national security. It is interesting that the International Monetary Fund has said that

“Money laundering, terrorist financing and the related…crimes can undermine the stability of a country’s financial system or its broader economy in a number of ways and may have adverse spillover effects on global instability.”