Covert Human Intelligence Sources (Criminal Conduct) Bill

Commons Reasons and Amendment

Motion A

That this House do not insist on its Amendment 1, to which the Commons have disagreed for their Reason 1A.

1A: Because the Commons consider that this amendment would cast doubt on whether belief need be reasonable for the purposes of other authorisations under Part 2 of RIPA.

My Lords, I begin by paying tribute to all noble Lords who have contributed to the debates on this Bill. The quality and detail of discussion have been exceptional, and even where the Government have not agreed with the remarks of noble Lords, I recognise the value they have added to the debate. I also thank those noble Lords with whom I have discussed the Bill directly to seek to reach agreement on key issues, and I thank Opposition Front-Benchers in particular for the collaborative approach they have taken. I hope that today, we are able to reach consensus on the issues raised in these amendments, and to provide the certainty and assurance that CHIS and operational partners deserve when this Bill moves on to the statute book.

I have been clear throughout these debates that the Government’s position on this Bill is driven by the need to ensure that this important tactic remains operationally workable. We cannot risk the operation of the tactic or create unintended risk of harm to CHIS, or indeed the wider public, through damaging amendments, even where the sentiment behind them is well-intentioned. However, where we have been able to provide additional reassurances about the safeguards underpinning the power in an operationally workable way, we have welcomed the opportunity to do so. I again thank the noble Lord, Lord Anderson, for his amendments on real-time notification. I hope I can demonstrate that same approach to the amendments we will discuss today.

Amendment 1 would place on the face of the Bill the requirement that an authorising officer must reasonably believe an authorisation is necessary and proportionate. As I have previously confirmed, it is indeed the case that the belief of the authorising officer should be a reasonable one. The revised code of practice confirms this, and in response to concerns raised by noble Lords, this was further amended to make that clear. However, placing this requirement on the face of the Bill risks casting doubt on whether the belief must be reasonable when that is not specified elsewhere—for example, in Section 29 of Part II of RIPA.

These amendments provide significant additional safeguards for the authorisation of any juvenile or vulnerable adult CHIS but, crucially, ensure that there are no unintended consequences for the safety of the CHIS or the operational workability of the tactic. I pay tribute to all who have spoken on this important issue and hope that I have demonstrated the extent to which the Government have listened and, in response, sought to provide additional reassurance and safeguards.

Finally, Amendment 5 relates to real-time notification to the IPC. The Government support this amendment, but are unable to support the further amendment from the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd, nor indeed the Motion from the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, which threatens the workability of the regime by giving judicial commissioners the power to unilaterally cancel an authorisation. We maintain that it is the authorising officer who is best placed to consider not only the necessity and proportionality of an authorisation but the live operational environment and safety of the CHIS. They are therefore also able to best consider comments from a judicial commissioner in the context of the safety of the CHIS. However, I reassure noble Lords that this does not mean that an authorising officer would simply ignore the comments of a judicial commissioner; they place great weight on their views and will consider any action to be taken in response to concerns. This is a collaborative process and operational partners and IPCO do, and will continue to, work closely together on issues raised by judicial commissioners.

I also reassure the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, that it is already the case that a judicial commissioner would inform a public authority if they felt an authorisation should not have been granted. They may advise the authorising officer that the activity should be reported to the relevant authority—for example, a law enforcement body or prosecutors—and it would then be for prosecutors and a court to determine whether the authorisation was lawful. While the primary responsibility for making that report rests with the public authority, judicial commissioners are also able to refer matters directly to the relevant authorities, including the prosecution services, as per the process set out in Section 232 of the Investigatory Powers Act.

I thank the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd, for further discussion on this point and recognise that it would be helpful to provide clarity in the code of practice. We will therefore add language to the code which states:

“Where a judicial commissioner makes observations in relation to a notification, it is for the authorising officer to determine what action should be taken. Having consulted with a more senior officer, they must, as soon as reasonably practicable, notify the office of the Investigatory Powers Commissioner of the intended action, or where action has been taken, for example in urgent cases, of the action.”

I hope that this provides the necessary reassurance and that noble Lords will support the Government on the amendment

I hope I have sufficiently set out the Government’s position on each of these issues and demonstrated a willingness to seek agreement where possible. The Government seek to put this Bill on to the statute book as soon as possible and I therefore hope we can reach agreement on all issues today. I beg to move.

My Lords, at this stage in the journey of a Bill, I know your Lordships’ House will be mindful of its role as an unelected revising Chamber, but in the context of this Bill I humbly suggest that noble Lords be equally mindful of the serious constitutional, human rights and rule of law implications of the legislation, which was not a manifesto commitment of any party.

While mature democracies the world over have written constitutions and entrenched Bills of Rights, including ultimate strike-down powers with which their highest courts can protect fundamental rights and freedoms, that is not currently the case in the United Kingdom. Instead, the burden of protecting rights and freedoms must be more evenly shared between the judiciary and legislature. While your Lordships’ House lacks the other place’s elected legitimacy, it can in my view justify its existence at all only by having more of the independence of mind required to stand up for the most fundamental human rights of the vulnerable against state oppression, by accident or design, in the form of authorised criminality with total legal impunity.

Furthermore, the Joint Committee on Human Rights has an important role in our unusual constitutional scheme. It has been unequivocal in its critique of the ways this legislation violates the European Convention on Human Rights. Your Lordships took its clear advice, and that of my noble friend Lady Massey, in the form of the amendment banning the authorisation of certain grave crimes, in particular murder, rape and torture. The Government’s rebuttal is both circular and hollow. They argue that the grave offences in this amendment would provide a deadly checklist against which suspected undercover agents might be tested, but they also argue that the convention rights already provide these express prohibitions. This amendment might be either dangerous or superfluous, but it surely cannot be both. Which is it?

In the past, government lawyers have argued that the convention rights do not bind undercover agents of the state, and only recently, in the very litigation that provoked this Bill, they argued that agents are not precluded from committing murder. I am clear in my belief that the Human Rights Act binds undercover agents of the state, alongside the state itself. I would be grateful if the Minister could place her express agreement with that proposition on the record during today’s proceedings.

My Lords, I will speak to Motions A, C and D and my noble friend Lord Paddick to Motions B and E. I thank the Minister and the Government for their engagement on the Bill, which raised far more issues than its slim size might have suggested.

The noble Lord, Lord Anderson, proposed the way forward on the first point, along with the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas. They and we on these Benches would have far preferred the new Section 29B to require criminal conduct authorisations to require “reasonable belief” on the part of the person granting them that they are necessary and proportionate and that the requisite arrangements are in place—in other words, for that to be placed in the Bill. Necessity and proportionality are dependent on a belief which, as the Bill is drawn, is subjective, which dilutes the safeguards. The House agreed with us.

The Government have been concerned that, because Section 29 of RIPA—the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act—which deals with authorisation for the conduct and use of covert human sources, requires belief only, the different wording in new Section 29B would throw Section 29 into doubt. I understand the significance of consistency in legislation, but I do not entirely follow the argument in this case, since Section 32A, which was inserted into RIPA in 2012 and deals with authorisations, including those under Section 29—I hope noble Lords are following so far—provides for judicial authority if and only if the judicial authority is satisfied that there were reasonable grounds for believing and so on. Even if the argument is restricted to consistency, our view is that the term should be included in the Bill. The Commons disagreed with this on the basis of inconsistency, which would cast the doubt to which I have referred. The Solicitor-General assured them that

“the legal position is already that the belief must be reasonable, as a matter of public law.”—[Official Report, Commons, 27/1/21; col. 425.]