Investigatory Powers Bill

Lord Brown of Eaton-under-Heywood Excerpts

Monday 11th July 2016 Lords Chamber

Although there is some debate over what the real costs are going to be to internet service providers, it is likely to be considerable. In his summing up of the debate on Second Reading, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen, said that he did not know where our estimate of a billion pounds had come from, but when we come to the discussion, we will go into detail about how we arrive at that figure. As I said on Second Reading, the creation and retention of internet connection records will create vast quantities of highly sensitive personal—

[Lord Brown of Eaton-under-Heywood (CB)]

My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord for giving way. I ask whether I have completely lost the plot here. I thought this was the first group of amendments, Amendments 1, 2 and 3. I do not understand why we are ranging over the entire Bill.

[Lord Paddick]

My Lords, what I am trying to demonstrate here is to counter what the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen, said in his letter, that the Bill complied with the 10 tests put forward by RUSI. I am simply indicating where we feel that the Bill is deficient.

Moving on, we share others’ concerns that the technical capability notices and national security notices, only enforceable against UK companies, could make British products and systems more vulnerable to illegal hacking. There could be a considerable competitive disadvantage to UK companies as a result.

We are concerned about the operation of the filter. As I said at Second Reading, it creates a virtual database, and the noble and learned Lord in his summing up—

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Strasburger]

That is exactly what I was just doing.

I fully support the amendments in this group. They seek to give effect to the Intelligence and Security Committee’s demand that privacy protections should form the backbone of the legislation around which these surveillance powers are built as exceptions to the privacy norm.

Clause 2 was the Government’s answer to the ISC’s demand, but it is incomplete and insufficient and needs to be seriously beefed up. The amendments in this group give full effect to the ISC’s reasonable requirement that privacy should be the backbone of the Bill by, among other things, incorporating the 10 tests devised by the Royal United Services Institute review. I commend these amendments to the House.

[Lord Brown of Eaton-under-Heywood]

I, for my part, am entirely content with Amendment 3 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Janvrin. I marginally prefer it to Amendment 2. It may be doubted whether either is strictly necessary, but let us have the simpler one. With the greatest respect, I regard Amendment 1 as entirely superfluous. It unnecessarily overcomplicates things and in large part it overlaps with other provisions in the legislation. It just is not a good idea. It is all very well to treat this legislation with some element of scepticism, but, please, not cynicism. That is the way this is approached in that context.

[Baroness Buscombe (Con)]

My Lords, following on from what the noble and learned Lord, Lord Brown of Eaton-under-Heywood, said, I think that, in respect of Amendment 1, it is necessary to stand back and remember and recognise that this has got to be practical. If a public authority were presented with a list including, “the rule of law”, “necessity”, “proportionality”, “the need for restraint”, “the need for effective oversight” and statements such as “multilateral collaboration”, it would probably end up being terrified and do nothing. As the noble and learned Lord, Lord Brown, said, this is all dealt with in the Bill. It is entirely otiose.