Telecommunications (Security) Bill

Lord Rogan Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 13th July 2021 Grand Committee

[Lord Fox (LD)]

I emailed the clerk, asking to speak after the Minister.

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Rogan) (UUP)]

I call the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones—sorry.

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

I must admit that I am somewhat baffled by the Minister’s response. The argument on the technical advisory board seems to be, “Oh, we’ve got enough technical advice, so we don’t need one”—but, clearly, it seems that there is a need for this. I quoted providers—I can go into the papers that we have received from them—as saying that real issues arise out of the regulations. These are technical and relate to things such as patches and audit and monitoring issues. There is a feeling that the department is just not listening on those issues, and what is needed is someone who is rather more dispassionate and can advise on the technical issues that are arising—perhaps, if it is seen as a conflict, someone like the noble Earl, Lord Erroll, who can genuinely advise on this kind of thing. It seems to me to be extraordinarily dismissive to say, “We’ve got enough advice. We don’t need a board of this kind”.

In the Investigatory Powers Act 2016, there is a very useful technical advisory board—it is not usable for this purpose because its function is rather different under that Act. When the Minister comes to the point about the judicial commissioners, saying, “Oh, no, they are for an entirely different purpose”, I say that, actually, if you read their function, it is four square with the kind of thing that would be useful under this Bill. They are talking about not technical issues but proportionality, appropriateness and so on—very much the kind of thing that they are dealing with under the 2016 Act.

So I am afraid that I do not buy what the Minister has to say, sadly; I just think that it is pushback based on the thinking that, “Well, the Bill’s the Bill and it’s all drafted, so we don’t really want to do very much with it by way of amendment”. That is the time-honoured government response to this kind of suggested amendment, but I believe that, constructively, both these aspects—a judicial commissioner and a technical advisory board—would make a great difference to the functioning of the Bill and would lead to much better regulations and codes of guidance at the end of the day.

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[Lord Fox (LD)]

My Lords, this is an interesting and nuanced—to coin a word we used earlier—debate. I am probably the only person here who has had to deal with a national security issue that impacted a consumer brand in real time on television. I must say that 30 days was not an option—30 minutes was not an option. Picking up on the point of the noble Earl, Lord Erroll, the time is entirely dependent on the nature of the crisis or security breach. My fear is that 30 days becomes a target rather than an injunction.

I think the point here is “no burial”. I assure colleagues and others in this Room that our amendments do not intend to bury the issue either, but to introduce some equivocation in the event that not announcing something makes things more secure than announcing them. The point of this is not to protect the reputation or otherwise of the network, but to protect consumers and the integrity and security of the network. That is the decision Ofcom would need to make. That would be its call. Its default position would be that it needs to be communicated to consumers as quickly as is sensible, unless there is a reason not to communicate it, and it would be up to the network providers to put their position forward. However, there are definitely times when it should not be communicated. At the moment the Bill seems rather unequivocal in its approach.

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Rogan) (UUP)]

I call the noble Baroness, Lady Barran.

[Lord Fox (LD)]

Sorry, I have not quite finished.

I would call Amendment 15 a “good manners” amendment. If Ofcom possesses information that the network provider does not, it simply calls for that network to be brought into the loop before the rest of us are. That seems good manners to me—you do not necessarily have to legislate for that, but these days it always helps. I have now finished.

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For the reasons I have set out, I am not able to accept either of the noble Lords’ amendments, and I hope that the noble Baroness will withdraw her amendment.

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Rogan) (UUP)]

I have received a request to speak after the Minister from the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones.

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

My Lord, until the Minster replied, “nuance” was the word being used in the context of information being provided and required and so on. I am afraid that nuance was completely lost in that response. The response to Amendment 14 was that the NCSC, the Government, the Secretary of State and Ofcom know best and that is it. They have to release the information. They do not believe there are any circumstances where it should not be released. It is all there in the NCSC guidance and well, too bad—tough. That seemed to be just about the Government’s position. That is pretty extraordinary considering that the relationship with the providers is extremely important, particularly in these circumstances where there have been breaches. We have heard from noble Lords during the debate that the timing of giving the information is important but the very fact of giving the information may also be important. I am afraid that is part 1 of a rather depressing response.

Part 2 was almost worse because the amendment being put forward is the mildest possible one. Ofcom must consult the provider in question

“where reasonably practicable to do so.”

As for the idea that this is going to lead to horrendous delay, the Minister really had to scrape away to find a suitably negative response to that amendment. I am afraid that her response in both respects does not engage with the real issues and I think it is grossly unsatisfactory in the circumstances.

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Clauses 7 to 12 agreed.

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Rogan) (UUP)]

We now come to the Question that Clause 13 stand part of the Bill. As many as are of that opinion will say, “Content”—

[A noble Lord]

We need to debate it.

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Rogan) (UUP)]

I apologise to the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones.

Clause 13: Appeals against security decisions of OFCOM

Debate on whether Clause 13 should stand part of the Bill.

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Clause 13 agreed.

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Rogan) (UUP)]

My Lords, that concludes the work of the Committee this afternoon. I remind Members to sanitise their desks and chairs before leaving the Room.

Committee adjourned at 6.52 pm.