Beyond Brexit: Policing, Law Enforcement and Security (EUC Report)

Lord Bilimoria Excerpts

Friday 11th March 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bilimoria (CB)]

My Lords, the security of the country always has been and always must be the number one priority of any Government, so I welcome the European Union Committee report, Beyond Brexit: Policing, Law Enforcement and Security.

Clearly, the trade and co-operation agreement that we negotiated with the European Union is very basic. It is almost the extreme opposite of the recently concluded Australia free trade agreement, which is probably the most comprehensive, wide-ranging, in-depth, modern free trade agreement in the world, covering every aspect. With the TCA, we have a lot to build on.

Part 3 of the TCA on law enforcement and judicial co-operation in criminal matters sets out the detailed, complex arrangements enabling effective co-operation on a range of policing and criminal justice measures. The committee welcomed a lot of the provisions, including the continuation of sharing passenger name record data, continued UK access to EU databases covering fingerprints, DNA and criminal records—these are absolutely essential—and the commitment to the rule of law and the European Convention on Human Rights. All of this is fine, but here is the big “but”: the agreement does not provide the same level of collaboration that existed when the UK was a member state. The best example is that involvement in Eurojust and Europol will no longer include a role in their overall management or strategic direction.

One of the most significant consequences of the UK now being a third country is the loss of access to the Schengen Information System—SIS II. The real-time access that it provides to data, persons, objects of interest, wanted people and missing people was completely and rightly emphasised by the committee. The effectiveness of alternatives comes nowhere near to it. Can the Minister confirm that that is the case and that the Government accept it? Again, the committee rightly said that lots of areas need to be kept under review.

Brexit has been concluded and yet it still comes up time and again, not least because the Northern Ireland protocol still needs to be resolved. The former Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau once said to his American neighbours:

“Living next to you is in some ways like sleeping with an elephant. No matter how friendly and even-tempered is the beast … one is affected by every twitch and grunt.”


Whether we like it or not, the European Union is by far our biggest trading partner, right on our doorstep, next to us. Having a defence and security relationship is absolutely crucial. The 2021 integrated review of security, defence, development and foreign policy barely mentioned the European Union. Will the Minister confirm that?

As president of the CBI, I would like to focus on the national cyber strategy. I recently chaired a meeting with GCHQ. Why are the Government not doing more to promote the fantastic free resources that exist from GCHQ to help businesses of all sizes make the right decisions and be more prepared and resilient when it comes to cybersecurity? Cyberattacks are devastating, and now, with the Ukraine situation, it is even more likely that we will be hit by them. Will the Government do more to promote these amazing free-of-charge resources?

To conclude, I remember that during the Brexit negotiations I spoke to one of our most senior police officers in the country. This individual said, “If people realised what is at stake when it comes to security in our relationship with the European Union, they would be very concerned.” The Ukraine situation has now exacerbated this. We now need to build on our TCA and on the security relationships we have with the EU. The one word which stood out for me in the pandemic was “collaboration”—it is collaboration that works.