Draft Investigatory Powers Bill

Kit Malthouse Excerpts

Wednesday 4th November 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

I thank my hon. Friend, particularly for her reference to her own experience. Sometimes people have a vision of judges taking a very long time to do all this, but as she says, there are many occasions on which they have to react very quickly to requests, and they have to be available to do so. I expect that they will do that in these circumstances as well. I believe that this Bill will strike the right balance between public accountability and the independence of the judiciary, which will give the public that extra confidence.

[Kit Malthouse (North West Hampshire) (Con)]

The House has generally welcomed the Home Secretary’s balanced approach, as do I, but may I urge her to be much more aggressive in one regard? In her statement, she referred to equipment interference powers. May I encourage her to frame those powers in such a way that they could be used to disrupt or even destroy servers distributing child abuse images or other criminal material?

[Mrs May]

My hon. Friend raises an interesting point. We do everything we can to take action against those who distribute child abuse material, and a lot of work is being done with the industry in relation to taking down such material in order to protect children online.