Covert Human Intelligence Sources (Criminal Conduct) Bill — House of Lords, 2021-01-11
Topic: Law and Crime
Doreen Massey (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I very much enjoyed the previous speech, which gave me much information about a great number of things. I thank the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas My noble friend Lord Dubs has set out the parameters of Amendments 5 and 23 and my noble friend Lord Rosser has made incisive comments on them. I will add just a few comments in support of my noble friend’s arguments. Basically, the issues in the amendments are covered in Chapter 7 of the Joint Committee on Human Rights report on CHIS, entitled "Adequacy of oversight mechanisms"—surely absolutely essential. The Joint Committee had several concerns about this part of the Bill First, the Bill does not suggest any independent scrutiny of criminal conduct authorisations before they are made and acted upon. Secondly, the process of granting CCAs will be kept under review by the Investigatory Powers Commissioner in the oversight of CCAs after the event. He or she will not be informed of the authorisations at the time they are made, so how can prompt scrutiny take place? It is worth repeating those points, which were made by my noble friend Lord Dubs The Joint Committee on Human Rights report quotes Sir Desmond de Silva’s report on the death of Patrick Finucane. He accepts as legitimate the running of agents within terrorist groups as at the heart of tackling terrorism but says that the "agent-running must be carried out within a rigorous framework. The system itself must be so structured as to ensure adequate oversight and accountability." Those conclusions are consistent w\ith the requirements of human rights law. There must be effective safeguards against abuse. The question is: does the Bill provide that rigorous framework of oversight and accountability? The amendments query that. In its submission to the JCHR, the law reform and human rights organisation Justice said that the Bill is "extremely limited in its oversight mechanisms" and that its safeguards were "woefully inadequate" The draft code of practice published with the Bill describes how the CCA practice will operate. Only a designated officer within a public authority may make a CCA, and this must be made in writing unless urgent Oversight of the Investigatory Powers Commissioner —who must be a senior judicial figure, of course— applies to CCAs. The IPC has the powers to conduct investigations, inspections and audits, but these are oversight functions only. The IPC does not have the capacity to investigate every time a CCA is used. The IPC role is restricted to covering the use of the power to grant CCAs in the annual report to the Prime Minister. This can be redacted before going before Parliament Reprieve has said: "Once more, the oversight powers in this Bill are far weaker than those operated by the UK’s intelligence partners. The FBI has repeatedly released details of the number of crimes committed by its agents as part of efforts to increase transparency over the use of this power." There is currently a lack of prior independent scrutiny or approval for CCAs, as described in the report of the Joint Committee on Human Rights. This contrasts with, for example, police search warrants and phone tapping The Bill requires amendment—and these amendments in particular—to remedy this lack of prior judicial approval for CCAs, with provision for urgent cases, and I strongly support Amendments 5 and 23.