Investigatory Powers Bill

Debate between Jacob Rees-Mogg and Diane Abbott

Ping Pong: House of Commons
Tuesday 15th November 2016 Commons Chamber

[Ms Diane Abbott (Hackney North and Stoke Newington) (Lab)]

I am glad to rise in support, once again, of these very important amendments. I believe that any member of the public who just heard the Solicitor General’s speech will be puzzled about the Government’s resistance to implementing an aspect of Leveson that they agreed to in principle some time ago.

Labour fully supports the Lords amendments and has consistently and genuinely called for the Leveson recommendations to be implemented in full. A new system of independent self-regulation was agreed by the three main political parties in 2013, following extensive consultation with victims of press intrusion, and Labour believes that the promises made to them should be honoured. If the best that the Government can come up with is that hoary old doctrine of unripe time—“It’s a good idea but not now”—they must be a little desperate. It is disappointing that we have to speak to the amendments yet again to get the Government to honour their agreements. It is a breach of the cross-party agreement, and breaks promises made by the House to the victims.

Lords amendment 15B would not be necessary had the Government fulfilled their stated commitment to implement section 40 of the Crime and Courts Act 2013, which they have promised to do innumerable times. Happily, the amendment goes further than section 40 and would not require ministerial approval, meaning that it would automatically implement section 40 in relation to phone hacking claims. This would restate the clear intention of Parliament as previously expressed in 2013. Ministers have talked about riding roughshod. The Society of Editors, the National Union of Journalists, with the backing of the TUC, and many others concerned with the freedom of the press, have said that there is the potential to ride roughshod over freedoms.

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

Will the hon. Lady explain one point about the amendment? Why should the press be punished if it is not in fact guilty of phone hacking?

[Ms Abbott]

If the hon. Gentleman will forgive me, I will complete my next paragraph and then address his point.

The ability of journalists to protect their sources is a vital part of a functioning democracy. It means whistleblowers, important sources and others can divulge matters sometimes of the utmost public interest—there is a host of whistleblowers in the NHS, to take just one example, and there have been important whistleblowers in almost every area of public life. However, we have to once again flag up the powers in the Bill—although it is a Bill we support—and say that simply being able to identify internet records without ever examining the content would potentially allow the identification of whistleblowers in many cases. This represents a potential infringement of civil liberties, a riding roughshod over civil liberties and a riding roughshod over the freedom that ultimately benefits us all.

As for the point raised by the hon. Member for North East Somerset (Mr Rees-Mogg), if the Government do not want to implement this aspect of Leveson and if they do not think it necessary, why have they on so many occasions, including to the victims themselves, promised to do so?

The claim that these measures will impinge on the freedom of the press is factually inaccurate. Instead, they would allow for a low-cost and timely mechanism for redress on behalf of those who have been or believe themselves to have been mistreated or maligned by the press. I repeat the point that was made earlier: this is not about celebrities, but about ordinary people who through no fault of their own get caught up in the maw of the tabloid press and have to put up with seeing their picture appearing on the front page of tabloid newspapers day after day—often on the basis of misinterpreted tips from the police force. These people need to be able to get redress. That is why we support the amendments.

This amendment 15B, which the Government intend to vote down, was proposed and improved in the House of Lords by the Cross Bencher Baroness Hollins and overwhelmingly passed. It would implement the same provisions as are contained in section 40 of the Crime and Courts Act 2013 in respect of claims against media organisations over phone hacking and other unlawful interception of communications. While there is a free-for-all by ignoring Leveson and a failure to implement section 40, the most irresponsible practices of the press, which can ruin the lives of ordinary people, will go unchecked without any recourse—except for celebrities and the ultra-rich, who can afford libel lawyers.

It was always envisaged that as soon as pending legal proceedings were complete, we would see the second phase of the Leveson inquiry. The Minister had a lot to say about the consultation. Does he remember that Leveson lasted over two years and cost £5.4 million in total? Having spent so much money and so much time—and particularly the time of so many distinguished lawyers—why on earth do we need another consultation? Opposition Members believe that this is merely a stalling mechanism, and we think that the Government’s continuing to stall on this issue is disrespectful of, and inappropriate for, the ordinary victims of phone hacking.

Investigatory Powers Bill

Debate between Jacob Rees-Mogg and Diane Abbott

Tuesday 1st November 2016 Commons Chamber

[Ms Abbott]

We are not attempting to hold up the Bill; all the Government have to do is accept the amendments.

Section 40 of the Crime and Courts Act remains unimplemented, despite widespread support in principle from Members on both sides of the House, including Front Benchers. The amendment, which the Government want to vote down, was tabled in the Lords by a Cross Bencher, Baroness Hollins, and overwhelmingly passed by 282 votes to 180. That is one of the reasons that I am shocked that the Minister regards it as blackmail. It would implement, as my colleagues have said, the same provisions as those contained in section 40 of the Crime and Courts Act in relation to claims against media organisations over phone hacking and other unlawful interception.

The amendment goes further. Unlike section 40, it would not require ministerial approval, which we regard as an improvement, so it would automatically implement section 40 in relation to phone hacking claims. That would restate the very clear intention of Parliament, as previously expressed in 2013. I repeat that the amendment would not be necessary if the Government had fulfilled their stated commitment to implementing section 40.

Part 2 of the Leveson inquiry sought to investigate the original police investigation and corrupt payments to police officers and to consider the implications for the relationships between journalists, politicians and the police. We are therefore going to have to undergo further weeks of consultation. Previously, Ministers had said that part 2 would begin after the criminal cases relating to phone hacking had concluded. Then they said that they would make a decision on whether it would begin once all the criminal cases had concluded.

If we look at the provisions affecting journalists and the press in this Bill, we will see that there is no protection of journalistic sources. Law Officers may act on their own cognisance to access data, collect and retain them for 12 months, and share them with other bodies, including overseas agencies. It would be a simple matter to establish the identity of a whistleblower in any public or other body by trawling the journalist’s internet history. That would be detrimental to all of society and to fundamental press freedoms. The contradiction here is that there is a free-for-all in ignoring the thinking behind Leveson, and yet there is a failure to implement section 40. Some of the most irresponsible practices of the press go unchecked, and there is no recourse for anyone except the ultra-rich and those who can afford libel lawyers.

To function properly, the press should be able to hold all who are in power to account and unearth important wrongdoing. That is wholly in the public interest. But the Government stand accused of allowing muck-raking, savage attacks on the vulnerable and the defamation of those who cannot afford to defend themselves legally, while proper journalism in the public interest—holding the powerful to account, giving an outlet to whistleblowers and investigating matters in the public interest—is to be fatally undermined. The proposals, in their current shape, run the risk of being seen as a charter against valuable and public interest journalism, but for the worst journalistic excesses.

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

I want to focus on several aspects of Lords amendment 15. First, I want to focus on what it is designed to do, in which I think it is fundamentally wrong-headed. It provides for an increase in the penalty that will be applied to newspapers where an accusation of phone hacking is made in a case that is brought against them. That is difficult, because in the ordinary course of events, a newspaper will want to protect its sources. A newspaper that tried to protect its source for a story would not be able to prove the negative that phone hacking had not been involved, even when it had not been.

The immediate risk will be that newspapers will be reluctant to print investigative stories because they will be unable to avoid the double penalty of extra costs, even in the event that their story was true. The particular outrage of amendment 15 is that the press could report a story accurately, fairly and honestly but still find that, if they were taken to court by an aggressive litigant, they would have to pay the litigant’s costs. That is an absolute charter for the very rich to bully the press into not publishing stories about them. It will not help the poorest in society, who will not be able to afford the initial fees to get a case going, but anybody with any funds will be able to use it as an opportunity to bully the press into not printing anything disagreeable about them.