Counter-Terrorism and Border Security Bill (Second sitting)

Matt Warman Excerpts

Committee Debate: 2nd sitting: House of Commons
Tuesday 26th June 2018 Public Bill Committees

[Nick Thomas-Symonds]

Q Turning from that issue to the retention of biometric data, do you think there should be additional safeguards to protect those who are wrongly arrested as a result of mistaken identity or poor intelligence?

Corey Stoughton: Yes, I do. Viewed against the context we currently live in, where the Government have struggled to correct existing deficiencies in databases such as the police national database of custody images, it is deeply concerning that the Bill’s provision on biometric data retention extends the powers on retention of data, including fingerprint data and DNA data, of people who are arrested but not charged—that is to say, innocent people—and also removes the critical safeguard of requiring that retention to be proved by the Biometrics Commissioner.

Arguably, the current system has insufficient safeguards and, against the backdrop of the repeated pattern of an inability to correct databases that have already been ruled by courts not to be complying with human rights standards, there should be great caution and a pause before expanding the Government’s power to retain the data, particularly when that data belongs not to people convicted of any crime, but to people merely arrested, which would include those who have been falsely or wrongly arrested for terrorism-related crimes.

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

Q Again to Corey Stoughton, your briefing says that clause 3 risks criminalising academics or journalists. I used to be a journalist, and I cannot myself recall a case where a journalist has been prosecuted for the kind of things that you are worried about, and which we would all be worried about. Is there a case that I have not noticed, or is this a theoretical inquiry, in which case, are you simply arguing for responsible prosecutions?

Corey Stoughton: It is not theoretical. I have to say that, although concern about wrongful prosecution is a legitimate concern, the real concern here is with the chilling effect that this has on journalistic activity. The question is not, do we believe that prosecutors will prosecute a Guardian journalist who clicks three times on extremist content. The real question is what journalist—what independent journalist, what citizen journalist—would be deterred from engaging in valuable journalistic activity? They will now, given the sentencing enhancements in this Bill, face a potential 15-year penalty for clicking on extremist content, which they may have done over the course of any unlimited period of time.

So we are concerned with that chilling effect and the fear of what that does to a journalist. It is a very brave journalist who would risk a 15-year sentence for anything, but you should not even require that level of bravery to be a journalist. Many journalists who are out there pursuing important critical activity are not protected by the legal teams that people at established journalistic institutions are, but that journalism deserves protection and respect, no less than other journalism.

[Matt Warman]

Q Is it your argument that that chilling effect is immeasurable because we do not know what it is, or do you have any sense of what that chilling effect might be?

Corey Stoughton: We have heard Index on Censorship reporters and press freedom groups that represent journalists say that they have serious concerns about that. That establishes quite well that the journalist community itself is concerned about it.

[Matt Warman]

Q Are those concerns backed up with evidence, or are they concerns about what the future might look like?

Corey Stoughton: I think they are both. It is one thing when you can say, “As long as I don’t download, I can engage in my journalistic or academic activity”—whatever mode of investigation a person is deploying in their life—but under the Bill the offence is merely clicking on something. That, I think, raises the bar a substantial degree over the current offence, which requires downloading. In point of fact, to date there has not been a stand-alone prosecution of the existing offence. It tends to be brought as a corollary charge when people are engaged in other acts that indicate they are participating in planning acts of terrorism.

To lower the bar further and to risk bringing legitimate activity under the criminal law compounds an error that, frankly, already exists under the UK’s current criminal regime. That error would be massively compounded by the Bill, which would make an offence of acts that are not themselves crimes or terrorism—there is no sense in which viewing or even downloading something is actually terrorism, according to the definition in the Terrorism Act 2000. They are acts that, in certain circumstances, can be associated with terrorism. We have already taken quite a few baby steps along the road of turning acts that might legitimately lead law enforcement to suspect that a person is preparing terrorism into criminal acts themselves. This takes another dramatic step in the wrong direction and, along the way, creates the risks we have discussed.

[The Chair]

Order. This is very engaging, but I have loads of Members who are trying to get in, so I am going to have to ask that answers be quite concise. I am also conscious that there are two other members of our panel who have given of their time today. The Minister and the shadow Minister now also want to come in, and I do not want to miss them out either.