Intelligence and Security Committee

Tobias Ellwood Excerpts

Monday 21st November 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Tobias Ellwood (Bournemouth East) (Con)]

My right hon. and learned Friend talks about the change in attitude and style in the work of our security services. Does he agree that after 9/11, in a bid to counter the asymmetric threats, the clandestine services lost their way for a period? I think of such things as Guantanamo Bay, water-boarding, rendition, dodgy dossiers and so forth. Does he agree that with the freedoms that were given to those services in a bid to try to find Osama bin Laden and hunt down the enemy we lost the moral high ground for some time and that it has taken a while for us to redeem ourselves?

[Sir Malcolm Rifkind]

I certainly agree that serious issues came to prominence during those years, some of which were the responsibility of the agencies and some of which were more the responsibility of government. However, I think we should get this into perspective. So far as I am aware, not a single British intelligence officer has ever been accused of personally being involved in water-boarding, torture or maltreatment of an individual. The issue—and it is a very serious issue—is whether they were aware of those matters and whether they might indirectly have colluded in such activity. I do not wish to diminish the seriousness of these matters but it is very important to make that point and get things into perspective because the same is not true of many other countries around the world. That is an important point that has to be made.

I want to speak briefly about four points in the report and then say something about the issues in the Green Paper, particularly about what is called the control principle, with regard to the handling of intelligence. Finally, I shall address the reform of the Intelligence and Security Committee. I shall try not to detain the House too long. The first of the four points in the report I want to address concerns the single intelligence account—the £2 billion that goes to the intelligence agencies. They have had a very large increase over the past few years but a cut is now being imposed—and understandably so—of 11% if one takes account of inflation over the next four years. The Committee has said:

“It is essential—given the fundamental importance to our national security of the Agencies’ work—that the settlement is kept under review and that there is scope to adjust it if there is a significant change in the threat.”

I know that every single recipient of Government funding would like to be able to say that, but I hope there is no dispute that when we are dealing with the fundamental issues of national security, if the threat were to change in a material way, it would not be acceptable to say that those resources could not be reviewed by a Government because that might in some way contradict public expenditure decisions. I have no reason to believe that the Government would take that view, but it is important to make that point, and that is what the Committee would like to stress.

The second point is the security that will be needed for the Olympics. The director general of the Security Service—again, I quote from our report—

“told us that he considers the Service to be well placed to manage the risks that the Olympics will bring.”

However, he added that

“the effort required to cover the Olympics will inevitably divert resources from the Service’s other work.”

The Committee would like to emphasise that the National Security Council must take such steps as are necessary to minimise that risk. Although we understand that the Security Service is not at present making representations and feels that the task can be handled effectively, it is too early to be certain that that will remain the case and it must be kept under consideration.

The third point relates to cyber security. In its reports of 2008 and 2009, the Committee drew attention to the increasing risks this country faces from cyber attacks. The Committee welcomes the fact that the Government have said that cyber is now a tier 1 interest in our national security strategy and have provided more than £600 million in new resources for that purpose.

The Committee’s concern is not those sums but the potential over-interest within Government in cyber matters. We note in our report that there are 18 units with responsibilities in this field across the three agencies— two law enforcement bodies and five Government Departments—and express our concern, which the Government share, about the risk of duplication. It is extremely important that these matters are looked at to ensure that, with such large sums and so many elements of Government involved, we do not do mischief to our own objectives.

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[Mrs May]

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for making that point. It is indeed the case that the National Security Council is able to bring together all the Government Ministers with an interest in matters relating to our national security—not only me and my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary but the Secretary of State for Defence and others. The right hon. Gentleman is absolutely right to point out that in looking at our national security we must also look at issues that arise abroad. As I have been saying, we must pay attention to the countries where people from the UK have the opportunity to travel to be trained and then to come back, perhaps to plot attacks here in the UK. What happens elsewhere matters for us on our streets, and he is absolutely right to say so. Indeed, when he intervened I was about to say that, of the people who are abroad in these areas, we know that some aspire to conduct terrorist attacks back at home.

The emergence of such groups is a stark reminder that the threat picture can change rapidly and that the factors that drive the terrorist threat to this country have not gone away. Recent attacks in Nigeria demonstrate the range of places around the globe in which western interests, including British interests, are now under threat. We also face a significant and ongoing threat from terrorism in Northern Ireland. There were 40 such attacks last year. That threat has obviously required increased effort and resources from the security and intelligence agencies.

The tragic events in Oslo this summer have also made us reconsider the threat from the extreme right. That is much less widespread and systematic than terrorism associated with al-Qaeda. However, contrary to some reports, our counter-terrorism strategy—CONTEST—already addresses that threat; that was a major change that we made to the strategy produced by the last Government. After Oslo, we will be allocating further resources to that work.

Traditional espionage continues to pose a threat—to the commercial sector, as well as to our diplomatic and defence interests. The foreign intelligence services operating in this country seek to obtain a wide range of classified and privileged information in the fields of defence, politics, government, energy, and science and technology.

The final threat that I want to mention is cyber-security. The national security strategy assessed cyber-security to be one of the highest-priority risks we now face. It is important to stress that this is not simply a risk for the future. Cybercrime is hitting British people, and cyber-espionage is hitting the British Government and British business, on a daily basis, right now.

All these threats must now be faced at the same time as we prepare for the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic games and the challenge of providing security for 10,500 Olympic athletes, 21,000 media and broadcasting personnel—double the number of athletes, I note—and the holders of some 10.8 million Olympic and Paralympic tickets. A question was asked earlier about the responsibility for cyber-security. That rests with the Cabinet Office, although that in no way detracts from the role of the Foreign Secretary in relation to GCHQ. The Cabinet Office is looking at a wide range of issues across Government in relation to cyber-security.

[Mr Ellwood]

My right hon. Friend is right to say that the Cabinet Office leads on that, and that co-ordination is welcome news. However, do we not all have a responsibility to understand cyber-security? A generation is now growing up that is using Facebook, is yet to own a credit card, and has very different liberal values when it comes to using the internet. Some small and medium-sized businesses are perhaps reluctant to pay for the addition of cyber-security because it is a little costly and times are difficult. We all have a responsibility for this, not just the Cabinet Office and Government.

[Mrs May]

My hon. Friend makes an extremely important point. There is an onus on all of us who are using the internet to ensure that we are aware of the responsibility that we have for our own security. One problem is that many people are unaware of what is available to help them to increase their own personal security in relation to these matters. That is a challenge that we all need to face and to rise up to.

All these threats require active and highly competent security and intelligence agencies to tackle them—and fortunately, in this country, that is exactly what we have. We should be proud of the agencies and of the work they do alongside their police colleagues. They work tirelessly, day in and day out, often at great personal risk to themselves, to keep the British public safe. They do this work without public thanks or public recognition, and we owe them an enormous debt of gratitude. As the Committee’s report notes, those working in this field continue to excel at a very challenging task. I am sure that the whole House will join me in sending them our thanks and our praise.

As the Foreign Secretary set out last week, those agencies not only defend us from threats to our national security and to the lives of British citizens but provide vital support to British military operations and diplomatic intelligence, which gives us a key national advantage in foreign and security policy. But it is precisely because of the importance of the agencies’ role, and because much of it must be kept away from the public gaze, that their work should be properly scrutinised. It is also important that, where there are any allegations of misconduct by the agencies, public confidence can be assured and retained by rigorous independent parliamentary oversight. That is why the oversight provided by the ISC is so crucial.

We sought in our Green Paper on justice and security to strengthen, clarify and modernise those oversight arrangements. For many years, successive Chairmen of the ISC have called for reform. We will answer that call. We therefore propose to formalise the role of the ISC, making it a statutory Committee of Parliament and allowing it to report to Parliament as well as to the Prime Minister. It will also be given a formal remit for oversight of the wider intelligence community. Crucially, our proposals will for the first time give the ISC the power to require information from the agencies.

I want to stress that, although the Green Paper proposes that we should consider the extent to which the ISC should oversee the operational activity of the agencies, no decisions in that area have yet been made. We need to consider carefully the consequences of creating such a broad power, including the impact on the operational effectiveness of the agencies and the additional resource burden that would be placed on them.

We are also looking at wider changes. We propose to consult on giving the intelligence services commissioner an expanded remit to monitor compliance with agency operational policies. We will also consult on more far-reaching proposals such as the introduction of an inspector- general to provide oversight of all agency business.

Separately, we have strengthened decision making on national security issues by creating a proper National Security Council, as was referred to by the Chairman of the Home Affairs Committee, and appointing a National Security Adviser. Those are important and profound changes to the national security and intelligence machinery at the heart of Government and I am grateful that the Committee has welcomed them.

Robust oversight and accountability are not the sole requirements of effective intelligence agencies. They also need to be able to keep the public safe, without the risk of vital intelligence or essential international intelligence-sharing relationships being compromised. For that, they need a proper legal framework that allows them to present their case in the courts and to defend themselves properly. It cannot be right that at the moment sensitive material is excluded altogether, meaning judgment is not reached on the basis of the full facts. That is why the Green Paper proposes reforms to allow the right balance to be struck between protecting sensitive material and giving the courts the access to the material that they need to allow justice to be done.

The Green Paper makes proposals, to which my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Kensington referred, to allow closed material procedures to be more widely available to the courts, to enhance the special advocate system, and to ensure that sensitive material, sources and techniques are protected. The overall aim is to allow cases involving national security to be heard fairly, fully and safely in our courts. I am pleased that the Committee welcomed those proposals and that there was cross-party support for them. I note that the right hon. Member for Blackburn (Mr Straw)—not always one to praise this Government’s decisions—called them “elegant solutions”.

I stress that those are just proposals at this stage. I note the encouragement of my right hon. and learned Friend to strengthen that aspect of the Green Paper. We will consider other ideas if they come forward. However, our aim is and must be to strike the right balance between protecting sensitive material and protecting the fundamentals of British justice.

As well as robust oversight and the right legal framework, the other thing that the security and intelligence agencies need to do their job is, of course, resources. I am pleased with the Committee’s conclusion that the agencies have been given a fair funding settlement in the spending review. Like the rest of the public sector, the agencies will seek to make savings in their support functions and corporate services. Collaborative working across the three agencies is the key to that. What is clear is that the agencies have the funding that they need to maintain their current range of operational capabilities and to invest for the future. For example, much of the £650 million of funding for our transformative national cyber-security programme will fund activity by the agencies. There is no question of allowing our national security to be diminished to make savings. Although the agencies face pressures, as they always do, like the ISC, the Government remain confident in their ability to meet those challenges.

It is important to note, with the Olympics approaching, that the agencies’ plans for meeting the significant additional challenge of securing the games remain on track and that the Olympics security budget is protected.

The first duty and the overriding priority of any Government is the protection of the British public. Although great progress has been made in counter-terrorism and other areas in recent years, serious threats to our national security remain. That is why it is so vital that we have security and intelligence agencies that can continue to reduce those threats and help keep us all safe. Their work is among the most important carried out by anyone. It is right that there should be robust oversight, which is why we are modernising and strengthening the oversight arrangements. I warmly welcome the Committee’s latest annual report. Its recommendations are informing change as we speak. I look forward to future annual reports being even more useful in helping our world-class intelligence and security agencies to get even better at the valuable work that they do to protect the public.

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[Mr Tobias Ellwood (Bournemouth East) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow the right hon. Member for Salford and Eccles (Hazel Blears). She speaks with compassion and conviction, and she articulates her points very well. She is an asset to the Committee, and it has also been a pleasure to work with her on other Committees.

As the final Back-Bench speaker, I should consider what points are left to be made in what has been a very informative debate. It is important that the British public and Parliament have confidence in the agencies’ ability to keep us safe, and to do so within the framework of the law and our democratic values. I therefore add my congratulations to the Committee and its Chairman on the work they do in helping to realise those objectives.

The Committee has now been in existence for 16 years, since the Intelligence Services Act 1994, and it is clear that greater transparency has been introduced year after year. The security services have, of course, been in existence for much longer than that, but it is also clear that the public remain largely unaware of what they really do. It has been left to romanticised fictional characters, from James Bond to George Smiley, to portray the role of our clandestine services, apart from when information has occasionally spilled out into the public domain, such as the revelations about the Cambridge spies and the break-up of the Soviet spy ring in the 1970s. Indeed, so well are our secrets kept that it was not until the right hon. Member for Blackburn (Mr Straw) became Home Secretary that he discovered the existence of his own MI5 file dating back to his days as a student radical. That shows how well our clandestine services can keep secrets.

Our modern-day service dates back to 1909, when it was called the Secret Service Bureau, but intelligence monitoring, collection and interception dates back far further—all the way back to the 15th century. Thomas Cromwell ran secret agents in Europe on behalf of Henry VIII and the famous Sir Francis Walsingham, private secretary to Elizabeth I, developed expertise in secret interception and maintained a network of more than 50 agents abroad. For the sake of completion, we must not forget the masters of intelligence gathering: those in the Whips Office. The party enforcers have long developed that dark art of intelligence gathering and monitoring, not to mention a range of creative punishments lest Members drift astray.

On a serious note, we live in turbulent times and there has been a focus on our secret intelligence services since 9/11. More demands have been placed on them, as our nation expects them to prevent attacks by recognising where they are coming from and intervening before they get out of hand. As I mentioned in an intervention, I believe that after 9/11 too much unchecked power fell into those hands, and the very standards that successive generations fought hard to create, defend and preserve slipped. As the Chairman of the Committee rightly pointed out, there is no criticism of the British intelligence services or their methods of gathering intelligence. We should be more focused on how we use that intelligence, how it was portrayed by the politicians and the consequences of the actions taken after that. Given Guantanamo Bay, rendition, water-boarding, the justification for the Iraq war, dodgy dossiers and so on, hon. Members will recognise that in the so-called “war on terror” we lost our way. I am very pleased that the Chilcot inquiry has finally got off the ground and will report soon. It will provide testament to what went wrong during the justification for going to war.

As a nation, we need to be an inspiring example of the values that we hold dear and that we must encourage others to stand up for. Once damaged, our moral authority in the eyes of the world is very difficult to replenish, so I am very pleased that this Government are overhauling how the security services do business, are held accountable and marshal their resources in a way that serves this country’s overall objectives. Three themes have emerged today. The first is the importance of the strategic defence and security review in providing that strategic direction, which, sadly, was absent for so long under the previous Government. The second is that new guidance is in place so that the courts can be used more appropriately and the Justice and Security Green Paper aims to strengthen our legal arrangements involving cases that require Security Service comment. The third is, as my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Kensington (Sir Malcolm Rifkind) outlined passionately, the new era of openness and scrutiny that we now expect. I am pleased to see that powers will very much be coming to the Committee to allow it to continue that work. It seems strange that we can now talk about Sir John Sawers, the head of MI6, Iain Lobban, the director of GCHQ, and Jonathan Evans, the head of MI5. In the past, those names would have been limited to a letter or would not have been known by us at all.

In the remaining minutes, I wish to discuss cyber-security, which I mentioned in an intervention. As the report suggests, this is a completely new dimension, which we have yet to master. It is constantly evolving and is introducing a complexity to security matters that we have not been able to appreciate before. It is also fuelling an explosion of new connections between Governments, economies and citizens. The use of cyber-world is overwhelmingly positive, allowing the transfusion of ideas, thoughts, economies and so on, but it is also a double-edged sword—there is a negative aspect to it. Aspects of the Arab spring have been attributed to the way in which Facebook has been used to communicate in a way that had not been allowed in the past. That of course is very positive, but the internet has been harnessed by terrorists, criminals and, in some cases, states to disrupt and attack. The question I pose to the Minister, which my right hon. and learned Friend mentioned in relation to cyber-security, concerns the number of agencies that have taken an interest in cyber-security. I believe that my right hon. and learned Friend talked about there being 18 units in all. That of course is very positive, because it simply means that every agency, organisation and Department recognises the need to understand and become an expert in this realm. Are we at a point at which there is the co-ordination we require, as illustrated on page 56 of the report, which lists the number of organisations with cyber-security interests?

I also mentioned in my intervention the changes in our society. The generation growing up today is living in a very different world from the one in which I grew up. The computer I first came to terms with was the ZX81, which would probably be found in an antiques store or even a museum now. I hear some chuckles from Opposition Members, and they probably recognise that name. Nowadays, everybody has a computer or has a mobile phone or iPad on their person. We are entering the digital world of the future—it is already the world of today. The liberal way in which youngsters today exchange information quite freely means that we need to ask whether, when they graduate to adulthood and become responsible for credit cards and information in small, medium and large businesses, they will have the same level of caution as we apply in using such technology. We are cautious because we are uncertain of it, because of the generation of which we are part.

There is also a concern about whether small and medium-sized businesses will have the intuition to recognise the importance of cyber-security. There is a worry that the financial crisis will mean that the last thing on any small business’s mind is the consideration of cyber-security and protecting their digital information. Of course, when we talk about cyber-security we have to remember that it is not just about terrorism but about criminality, too.

The impact on our society of the internet and of the digital age is, I would argue, bigger than the invention of the wheel or more significant than the printing press, such is the effect on the world and our lives. If knowledge is power, the internet means power now has no boundaries. The ability to simplify our lives through online banking and shopping is positive, of course, but the internet can be terrifying because of the risk of identity theft or, indeed, sabotage, which could lead to disasters such as a head-on rail collision.

If the Cabinet Office leads on cyber-security, we must then ask whether it—or another Department—should lead on educating businesses and the nation. If not, which Department should do that? It needs to be a priority for the reasons I have outlined. We have an opportunity now to harness such work to our economic benefit. We have an aerospace industry that is primed and ready to harness that capability. Can we now be the world leaders in providing protection in cyber-technology? Some of the recognised companies that we are dealing with, such as IBM and so on, are international operations—they are not British—but companies such as BAE Systems Detica and Logica are UK companies and when I spoke to them before the debate it was clear that they were concerned about university training. When we compare the university courses on cyber-technology, we see that only 15% of the content is consistent. That means that people are not sure and the universities are not in agreement about what needs to be taught in the future. There is an opportunity for leverage there.

Finally, it is important to work with our allies, as the right hon. Member for Salford and Eccles stressed. The Foreign Secretary said last week:

“Intelligence…is like a jigsaw…we…rarely have all the pieces”.

The analysis of information and working with our partners enables us to piece together each snippet of information to create the fullest possible picture of the threats to our national security and to act against them. We cannot work in isolation on that; we must work with our allies, too. That means training our allies so that they can recognise and work to the same standards as we do, not just in the technology but in the moral standards I spoke about earlier. That allows us to develop links with parts of Governments in other countries and to build capacity and infrastructure support while strengthening our diplomatic and military relationships.

In conclusion, our security services have the skills to assimilate information beyond the reach of everyday diplomacy, filling in the blanks in our understanding of our enemies. So much of their work is unseen and therefore receives little praise. They are our early warning system against those who plot to sabotage us, steal from us or kill us. It is difficult to find a country where the clandestine community performs so well under such scrutiny within the confines of democratic process. By and large, we sleep safe at night, oblivious to the many threats we face as they are dealt with by the service we never see.