Intelligence and Security Committee of Parliament

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Monday 9th September 2019 Grand Committee

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, I, too, thank the noble Marquess, Lord Lothian, for the way he introduced this debate. He was ably supported by the noble Lord, Lord Janvrin, on the work of the Intelligence and Security Committee. This has been an enormously well-informed debate, to the extent that I feel completely underqualified to make any meaningful contribution, but in preparing for our debates on the Investigatory Powers Bill, now the Investigatory Powers Act, I was privileged to visit MI6, to be briefed by MI5 and MI6 and to visit GCHQ. I associate myself with the remarks of other noble Lords. They were summed up by the noble Lord, Lord Ricketts, who described our security and intelligence services as one of our greatest assets. I am in awe. I was lucky enough to be told of some of the work that they were undertaking. What they do and what they can achieve is quite mindboggling.

The noble Lord, Lord Anderson of Ipswich, talked about the rigorous internal measures within the security services to ensure that everything functions properly, but said that they were no substitute for scrutiny and independent, hard-hitting assessments, as he put it.

The noble Marquess, Lord Lothian, talked about the fact that these debates used to be far more regular than they are now, and the noble Lord, Lord Anderson, said that the last debate on this subject in the House of Lords was in 2010. The theme running through the contributions was about a weakening of parliamentary oversight of these important issues. The noble Marquess, Lord Lothian, talked about how the committee is cleared to see highly classified information, yet in its report on the use of lethal drone strikes, for example, it said:

“Oversight and scrutiny depend on primary evidence: without sight of the actual documents provided to Ministers we cannot ourselves be sure—nor offer an assurance to Parliament or the public—that we have indeed been given the full facts surrounding the authorisation process for the lethal strike”.


If people cleared to the highest levels to see classified information are still denied the evidence they need in order to provide effective oversight, something is clearly amiss—something the Government need to address.

The noble Lord, Lord Anderson of Ipswich, comprehensively set out the benefits and necessity of external scrutiny. While I was hoping to get through a debate without mentioning Brexit, he quite rightly pointed out that, should we leave the EU, we would have to get an adequacy certificate from the European Union to continue to share data with it, and effective scrutiny and oversight is part of what the European Union will consider in deciding what to provide. The Government should be indebted to the noble Lord, Lord Anderson, for his comprehensive range of recommendations, which the Government would be well advised to take note of.

The noble Lord, Lord Janvrin, talked about the lack of diversity in the intelligence community. We are talking here not about political correctness but about ensuring that the very best people are employed in our security and intelligence services. If there is any way in which any community or group is finding it more difficult to access positions within those services—perhaps because of an overlengthy and bureaucratic vetting process—that is to the detriment of the ability of the security services rather than anything to do with political correctness or reflecting the community more generally. The noble Lord, Lord Janvrin, talked about what the committee will look at in future: the involvement of Chinese companies in the development of the UK’s 5G network. That shows how important and relevant the work of the committee is.

The noble Lord, Lord Ricketts, was able to provide an independent assessment of the independent assessment provided by the ISC. He described its report on the 2017 attacks as “exemplary”. He made the important distinction between the impact of leaving the European Union on law enforcement and judicial co-operation and the impact on intelligence co-operation, which tends to be on a bilateral rather than an EU-wide basis.

Not least because I am not qualified to comment, I do not intend to comment on the work of the committee, but I will comment on this apparent erosion of parliamentary oversight by the committee and the apparent contempt in which the Government appear to be holding the committee. The Government’s response to the 2016-17 annual report was received only on 23 July 2018, but I understand that under the memorandum of understanding it should have been published on 19 February 2018 because the Government’s response should come within 60 days of the publication of the committee’s report. The report states that further questions arose over government action in response to the committee’s other inquiries. The report also talks about the committee’s work being interrupted by a general election and the exceptionally long time after it for the committee to be reconstituted. Parliament was dissolved on 3 May 2017 but because of government delays in appointing new committee members it was not until 23 November 2017 that the committee met again, so nearly six months passed with no parliamentary oversight of the intelligence and security communities.

As I have mentioned, the report states that,

“effective and robust oversight of the intelligence community, entrusted to—

the Intelligence and Security Committee—

“is too important to have been left in a vacuum for so many months”.

We now have another period, albeit a shorter one of five weeks, where there will be no oversight by Parliament because it is being prorogued for an unprecedented and unacceptable length of time. With another general election likely after Parliament returns, there is likely to be another extended period with no effective oversight of the intelligence and security communities provided by Parliament. It is not just a matter of Parliament not sitting during a period of prorogation; it is all its committees being unable to sit to call for evidence and to interview witnesses.

All this points to a Government who are showing contempt for Parliament and its oversight of the Executive, not least in this extremely sensitive area. The important work of this committee and the importance of not having extended periods of prorogation where the committee ceases to function was highlighted in June this year when the Investigatory Powers Commissioner stated that MI5 had handled large amounts of personal data in an “undoubtedly unlawful” way. According to Liberty, MI5 has been holding on to ordinary people’s data illegally for many years. In a High Court action brought by Liberty, lawyers for MI5 stated that they could not explain the exact nature of the breaches in open court because of “serious national security concerns”. The former Home Secretary stated that MI5 had taken “immediate and substantial steps” to comply with the law but, again, national security concerns meant that he could not give any details.

This is exactly the kind of issue that the Intelligence and Security Committee can and must be dealing with because its members are security cleared and can be told the exact nature of the security breaches and what steps have been taken to comply with the law—although, from the sound of things, this Government under this Prime Minister seem to think that complying with the law is optional. As Parliament is to be prorogued for five weeks, there will be no effective parliamentary oversight, as the committee will not be allowed to call for evidence or examine witnesses.

The work of the committee is becoming increasingly important as the powers of state are increased, as they have been substantially and against our objections, by the Investigatory Powers Act. For example, as we argued at the time, tech specialists, security chiefs and former Security Service personnel have argued that measures such as storing internet connection records will create cybersecurity and privacy risks.

We are in danger of increasing the powers of the state to spy on us while weakening Parliament’s oversight of the intelligence and security communities. I look forward to the Minister’s counter to our concerns.