Investigatory Powers Bill (First sitting)

Lucy Frazer Excerpts

Thursday 24th March 2016 Public Bill Committees

[The Solicitor General (Robert Buckland)]

Ditto. I know many of the witnesses as well.

[Lucy Frazer (South East Cambridgeshire) (Con)]

David Anderson was my pupil master when I was a barrister.

[Christian Matheson (City of Chester) (Lab)]

I do not know this witness, Chair, but Mr McClure, a witnesses this afternoon, is my constituent and is known to me personally.

--- Later in debate ---

[Matt Warman (Boston and Skegness) (Con)]

Q Building on that, the Joint Committee did ask for an operational case for bulk powers to be published, and that has been seen and assessed by the ISC who do have the security clearance that you do not have, who do have visibility on all of the things that you are not able to see. The ISC says that they are happy with that operational case. It seems to me that the more people know about this, the more comfortable they are with that operational case. I wonder whether you are questioning their judgment or simply saying that you disagree.

Eric King: No. It is certainly true that the more you see about some aspects of agency practice, you do get more reassured. Certainly, in the process of Investigatory Powers Tribunal cases that have taken place, I was pleased that there were areas that had safeguards when I did not originally think there were.

I have also been fantastically disappointed in other areas, where I thought there should have been very obvious safeguards, such as areas of legal professional privilege that were found wanting and unlawful by the IPT. I am afraid I have become a terrible judge on which bits I think the agencies have got right and which bits they have got wrong. I seem to be very poorly predicting it. On the operational case, I think the issue here is that we need a whole range of experts outside the ISC to be looking at this. I am not sure that it is the perfectly placed organisation or body to be looking at this. It has known about these powers and approved of them right the way through. I think that at this time, now that they are being put before Parliament plainly for the very first time, we should be looking to do what they have done in the US, which is to have an independent scrutiny of many of those cases, so that you can test them.

It is not enough simply to provide a list of cases where this worked. They need to be really looked at, because, as we found in the US, some powers that many thought would work, like the bulk acquisition of communications data, turned out not to be terribly effective. The 64 cases that the agencies in the US put forward, to say that these were powers that were needed, turned out to be false. Only one was of relevance, and it was not a terrorism case. So it is vitally important that we scrutinise them and have the time to do so.

[Lucy Frazer]

Q I would like to pick up on something that you said in your evidence was about internet connection records. I would just like to ask you first of all, do you respect the work of David Anderson?

Sara Ogilvie: Absolutely.

[Lucy Frazer]

Q Have you had the opportunity to read his report?

Sara Ogilvie: I have.

[Lucy Frazer]

Q Are you familiar with paragraph 7.51 where he talks about Operation Notarise?

Sara Ogilvie: You will have to tell me what it says.

[Lucy Frazer]

Q Are you familiar with Operation Notarise?

Sara Ogilvie: I am not sure that—

[Lucy Frazer]

Q In that operation 600 suspected paedophiles were arrested, and 92% of the communications data requested proved helpful in tracking down suspects. That what he says in the report. Do you accept therefore that he has found evidence that the ICRs are helpful?

Sara Ogilvie: Those were not evidence for ICRs, as far as I am aware. I think that is to do with different communications data.

[Lucy Frazer]

Q I am just reading from the report, and that is what it says. It gives the figure of 92% of communications data and says the questions provided were helpful.

Sara Ogilvie: Communications data are quite different from internet connection records. A significant amount of the powers that we have in the current Bill are ones that are replicating powers in RIPA, and I think the comms data ones you talk about are those. Internet connection records are actually something quite new, and something that David Anderson—

[Lucy Frazer]

Q Do you accept that, if some communications data in an old form of technology is helpful, then in a modern form of technology exactly the same powers will also be useful?

Sara Ogilvie: I agree that there are powers that are absolutely necessary and helpful. I do not think that there is a direct comparator between old and new powers in this case. I completely agree that the security services and law enforcement need targeted powers to gather communications data, so maybe they can use those to target particular websites where we know that paedophile information is provided. They can be used to target suspected criminals. That is all completely adequate use of powers; but what we have is this broad power in the Bill that targets absolutely everyone and is not focused on those individuals, and that is what I have the problem with.

[Byron Davies]

Q Mr King, you have mentioned a couple of times now, in the first part of your evidence, you talked about formidable intrusive powers. You quite agree that the agencies should have these powers. So in view of what has happened recently in Paris and in Brussels, I am really somewhat confused as to what you are trying to tell us in your evidence as to what the agencies should have. Do you know? Are you clear in your own mind what these powers should be?

Eric King: Yes. The Bill’s structure—some of the core powers there—you do not disagree with. The question is often about the scale of the powers—how they are used and the safeguards that are put in place around them. To my mind, the mass collection of material in a generalised form for analysis is not a proportionate activity, and I think this is something that particularly the European Court are confirming. I heard David Anderson say that there was a split view on that. It will be important to hear the judgments later this year, but they have to have very strong powers; but it is how they are used, and the scale of them, and the targets of them, which are so vital to get right. I am afraid that for me this is the bit in the Bill that is not in the right place at the moment, I suppose.