David Davis
MP for Goole and Pocklington · Conservative · United Kingdom
“On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. May I start by congratulating my right hon. Friend the Member for New Forest West (Sir Desmond Swayne) on putting a Bill in front of the House that has support from literally everybody in the Chamber?”
“The Post Office Horizon scandal highlighted the institutional instinct to find a convenient scapegoat. Innocent people paid the price, while the institution sought to protect itself. If the Thirlwall inquiry asks too narrow a set of questions, systemic NHS failures will go unexamined.”
“Last month’s sentencing of Nicola Sturgeon’s husband exposed the real reasons behind the Scottish Government’s persecution of Alex Salmond. From 2010 to 2022, Peter Murrell abused his position to embezzle almost £500,000 from the SNP to buy luxury items. He used SNP money to buy a £33,000 Volkswagen Golf.”
“The consultants also reported that in the two months since the change infants have been sick but recovered as expected.” The report highlighted deficiencies in staffing levels, leadership and communication, but, in the trial, it was not shown to the jury—they knew nothing of it.”
“One of the nurses let go later described it as “the decimation of the Nursing and Midwifery service”, adding that “eight registered nurses...were replaced with nursery nurses...unqualified staff are replacing qualified staff”.”
“There was little space, cots and incubators were stored in corridors, and mothers struggled to find somewhere to breastfeed their babies. Susan Gilby, the hospital’s chief executive between 2018 and 2022, later described the unit as “dark, dingy and cramped”, providing a “less than ideal” environment to work in.”
The complete record
Every one of 5,828 lines we hold for David Davis, in date order, each linked to its source. Free to read, in full, without an account. Page 34 of 117.
“The morning after the shooting, the police found the getaway car abandoned in a field in the nearby town of Ballynahinch, but they failed to examine the field properly. They left the car wide open to the elements before it could be fully examined, and they destroyed the car only 10 months later. The murder weapons were found in another field only 10 miles from O’Toole’s bar. The police recovered ample DNA evidence from the rifles, but they failed to follow that up on investigation. The police also had informants embedded in the UVF who were involved in the procurement and distribution of arms, but, again, the police failed to follow up. The investigation was such a failure that it prompted the victims’ families to call for the Police Ombudsman for Northern Ireland to look into it in 2006.”
“Six people were murdered and five more were badly injured in a brutal sectarian attack by loyalist paramilitaries. The people were targeted because they were Catholic. It is known as the Loughinisland massacre and has gone down as one the darkest moments in the Northern Irish troubles. It was an atrocity that shocked even those who lived among sectarian violence day in and day out. At the time, it was described by the media as brutal, inhuman, barbaric, callous slaughter, and it was worldwide news. The families of the victims received condolence letters from the Queen and from the Pope. The Royal Ulster Constabulary’s investigation, however, was marked by a litany of missed opportunities to gather and examine evidence.”
“Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. You are right: I have provided a copy of what I have to say, and I will stick to it religiously throughout the debate. I commiserate with my right hon. Friend the Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office, who has to answer me. He seems to be the Minister for receiving hospital passes from me in the past few months, one way or another. The issue today is very serious. Twenty-five years ago, on 18 June 1994, a crowd of locals gathered at O’Toole’s pub in Loughinisland in County Down, Northern Ireland, to watch the Republic of Ireland play Italy in the World Cup. Shortly after Ireland scored the winning goal, two members of the Ulster Volunteer Force burst into the pub with automatic assault rifles and sprayed bullets across the bar.”
“Press freedom is at the core of our democratic system, and it must be protected.”
“Without very good reason, data from innocent journalists should never be kept. It surely cannot be right for police to store data obtained from a warrant that has been ruled unlawful. I therefore urge the Home Office and the Northern Ireland Office to keep a close eye on the development of the Loughinisland case and, when it is adjudicated, review the policies on data acquisition and retention for the PSNI and other police forces throughout the country. This issue is not confined to Northern Ireland, so it will impact investigative journalists and whistleblowers across the whole country. Whistleblowers will see such cases, feel intimidated and think that the information they give to journalists is subject to capture and inspection by the police or other agencies of the state.”
“Data retention by the police throughout the UK has been a long-running issue—from DNA to fingerprints, from biometric data to personal electronic data. These issues often face tension between civil liberties, individual privacy and the demands of the police. For example, when someone is arrested, it is commonly the case that their phone data is held long after the person is released and exonerated. We all understand that a certain amount of data retention is necessary for fighting crime, but by definition this data should be about guilty people committing crimes; as far as possible, we should avoid retaining the data of innocent people. On the rare occasions when that proves necessary, it should be under the strict control of the courts and its use strictly limited.”
“That is what this case represents, but it is sadly now back in the courts. Following the quashing of the warrants, the PSNI had to be hauled back before the Court again to have the journalists’ property returned. Again, the Court ruled in the journalists’ favour, and the police duly complied. But the police now insist on retaining the data taken from the phones and computers seized from the journalists. So far, everything I have said is in the public domain. However, as you said at the beginning, Mr Deputy Speaker, I am precluded by sub judice rules from discussing the particular issues currently before the Court in this case. It must be said that this is a judge-only hearing heard by the Lord Chief Justice, so there is little risk of any undue influence. Nevertheless, I will comply with the rules.”
“Sir Declan Morgan, the Lord Chief Justice of Northern Ireland, handed down a damning indictment of the police’s conduct and in defence of a free press. He struck down the search warrants as unlawful. He went on to say the journalists acted in a “perfectly proper manner with a view to protecting their sources in a lawful way.” The Court rightly stood up for the fundamental principle of press freedom and protected these journalists from a misguided attempt by the police to prevent their own embarrassment. If this warrant had been allowed to stand, it would have had a hugely chilling effect on investigative journalism across the whole country—the whole United Kingdom. A truly free press must be able to stand up to the state and the establishment without fear of reprisal. It must be able to expose uncomfortable truths and ask tough questions.”
“Imagine if the same had happened to the journalists who published leaks from the National Security Council on Chinese involvement in the 5G network, an issue that really did have an impact on national security; or the leaked diplomatic telegrams from Sir Kim Darroch; or the leaked Yellowhammer documents last month—there rightly would have been a national uproar. All those leaks were uncomfortable for the state, but that is precisely what journalism is for: to hold those with power and authority to account, and force them to answer for their decisions. Barry McCaffrey and Trevor Birney had the courage to challenge this outrageous intrusion into press freedom in the Northern Irish courts. In June, the High Court quashed the search warrants used to search the properties and seize the electronic equipment—I was in the Court.”
“The PSNI’s action was extraordinarily heavy-handed; some 100 armed officers turned up at their homes at seven in the morning while their families were eating breakfast. The police arrested the journalists in front of their wives and children. Then the police searched their homes and offices, and seized their phones, laptops and hard drives. They even seized the phones of Barry and Trevor’s children. Now the police hold a huge amount of very personal data belonging to these journalists and their families.”
“The ombudsman passed that information on to the PSNI. They wanted to be sure the PSNI was informed in case there was any concern for the safety of the suspects or in case the police had any other compelling reason why the film should not be released. They received no response. When the documentary was released in 2017, it was well regarded by both communities in Northern Ireland, and in July 2019 it was nominated for an Emmy in the “outstanding investigative documentary” category. But a year after it was broadcast, Barry McCaffrey and Trevor Birney were arrested on extraordinary charges by the PSNI. For simply doing their jobs, they were arrested and charged with suspected theft, handling stolen goods, breaches of the Official Secrets Act and breaches of data protection rules.”
“In a plain unmarked envelope, Barry McCaffrey was sent an unredacted Police Ombudsman’s report naming the suspects and detailing the evidence behind the allegation of police cover-up. It found collusion between the RUC and the UVF, incompetence and a cover-up of the true events, and for the first time, it named those whom the police believed to be responsible for the brutal murders. What started as a hard-hitting documentary on a huge event in Irish history would now become a dramatic exposé of the failure of policing. It was of course an investigative journalist’s dream leak, but, even so, during the film’s pre-publication and editing process, the journalists offered the named suspects a right of reply, which was not taken up. They also informed the ombudsman of the suspects the film would name.”
“This is not the main point that I want to make today, but I urge the Government and the PSNI to reopen the original investigation into Loughinisland to ensure that it is done to everybody’s satisfaction this time. Thirteen years on from the brutal assault, two Northern Irish journalists, Barry McCaffrey and Trevor Birney, exposed the truth. In a remarkably hard-hitting documentary called “No Stone Unturned” released in September 2017, they told a story of the victims of the massacre and their families, shining a light on the collusion and incompetence at the heart of the investigation and naming those suspected of being responsible. Like countless journalists have done over the years, they got their information from an anonymous leak.”
“As well as my interest in press freedom, I share with the hon. Gentleman a long-standing interest in the affairs of Northern Ireland throughout the whole course of the troubles, as he well knows. I take this opportunity to pay tribute to his gallant service in the Ulster Defence Regiment right at the height of the troubles and the difficult times, so we are in the same place on this. I have the greatest respect for the original RUC and now the Police Service of Northern Ireland. All the officers serving in those forces are brave, and the vast majority are absolutely determined to see justice delivered, but on this occasion, there is a different view put by the ombudsman, and I think I have to treat that as the overriding judgment.”
“The hon. Member for Leeds West (Rachel Reeves) highlighted the point that the biggest concern is not simply how much is paid to executives, but their being paid for failure, not for success. The current arrangements in British company law allow chief executives and other executives to be paid on the basis of share price and allow them to buy back shares, propping up the share price. This is a formula for payment for failure. Is the Department looking at that?”
“They have lived through some of the most brutal and inhumane fighting in modern times. Some have witnessed beheadings and other appalling acts of brutality, and others are suffering from terrible physical and psychological damage. Some of our international allies have already used the five-day ceasefire to fulfil their duties and repatriate their own children. If we do not do the same, British children would be left at the whim of a brutal dictator, of a terrorist organisation or of roving bands of militia. If we do nothing, we will be abandoning our moral obligations and risking those vulnerable children growing up in a war-torn area and perhaps turning into terrorists themselves. The time to act, Minister, is now.”
“I thank the Minister for his compassionate tone and for what he had to say. Last Tuesday, the Foreign Secretary made the commitment to look at whether orphans and unaccompanied minors in north-east Syria could be repatriated to Britain. I welcome that commitment, but I am afraid that it does not go far enough. Save the Children has now confirmed that, of the 60 children in the region, only three are orphans. The children who have not been orphaned still deserve the United Kingdom’s protection. These children are at the heart of an unfolding geopolitical disaster in Syria. Many of them under the age of five have been born of parents who made a grotesquely misguided and irresponsible decision to go to Syria. The children are there through absolutely no fault of their own. They should not be punished for their parents’ mistakes.”
“I have listened to the Minister’s answers, and he intimated that we are replacing quantity with quality. Much of this problem goes back to the Capita contract for recruiting soldiers, sailors and airmen, which was massively criticised in a Public Accounts Committee report earlier this year in terms of both quantity and quality. Today, 10% of our troops are incapable of deployment abroad for medical reasons. What can he do to fix those problems?”
“Despite the fact that those who oppose Brexit have tried to undermine his negotiating position at every turn, despite the fact that the Benn Act sought to remove his strongest negotiating lever, the Prime Minister has done what they said was impossible two weeks ago and got the European Union to reopen and change its negotiating position. Does he agree that, during the referendum, this Parliament effectively made a promise to the British people to deliver on their decision, and that today is the day to deliver on that promise?”
“Many victims of violence and domestic violence experience terror when their assailants are released from prison. At the moment, provision to exclude those assailants from areas where the victims live is restricted to the time of the sentence. Will my right hon. Friend consider extending that, possibly to lifetime exclusion?”
“I commend the Foreign Secretary for his sober and sensible response to what is, after all, a geostrategic disaster. The most immediate threat to British and European security will arise from the escape of Daesh terrorists as a result of the increased conflict in the area. Can he reconsider with his Cabinet colleagues our approach to taking back the people who are of British or European origin and making them face British and European justice, rather than leaving them at risk in the area, and bringing back their families, so that we do not see them raised as another generation of terrorists to threaten us in the future?”
“When violent criminals are released, it is a time of fear and sometimes terror for their erstwhile victims. Release under licence allows the restriction of both movement and access, but not beyond licence. When the Lord Chancellor reconsiders the issue of licence, will he consider whether restrictions can be put on such criminals after their licence periods are over, to protect the victims?”
“(Urgent Question): May I add my commendation to the Trade Minister who responded to the previous urgent question, who did so as to the manner born? To ask the Minister for Crime, Policing and the Fire Service if he will make a statement on the Home Office’s response to Sir Richard Henriques’s independent report on the Metropolitan police’s Operation Midland.”
“However, it is not just the Met. Other police forces across the country follow policy guidelines, automatically believing all allegations brought by complainants, and therefore disbelieving the defendants. This has damaged the reputations of Cliff Richard, Paul Gambaccini, Jim Davidson, my hon. Friend the Member for Ribble Valley (Mr Evans) and many other, less well-known defendants. Will HMIC therefore review not just Operation Midland, but the judicial and policing rules and procedures covering all such cases, so that we get justice for victims and protection for the innocent?”
“The fundamental principle of our justice system is innocent until proven guilty—a principle undermined over the past decade when the rules of police forces were amended, particularly after the Jimmy Savile scandal. The entirely understandable aim of those changes was to increase the conviction rate for sexual offences, but that has been a complete failure, with conviction rates for sex crimes having dropped dramatically in the last five years. The price that has been paid in terms of reputational damage and ruined lives has been enormous. High-profile figures investigated under Operation Midland have had their reputations disgracefully and unjustly tarnished. The IOPC, whose report was published this morning, has failed miserably to identify the Met’s failures, identify the culpable people or resolve the issues.”
“9. What (a) support and (b) financial relief he plans to provide to people subject to the 2019 loan charge during the duration of the independent review of that charge.”
“On the issue that my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough (Mr Bone) raised with the Minister, the hard fact is that seven people facing challenge or investigation for the loan charge have taken their own lives. He can attribute cause as he wishes. The fact is also that the distress has been caused by the historical incompetence of HMRC and the subsequent willingness of Ministers to use retrospective taxation. Are the Government going to give up on the premise of using retrospective taxation, or does it fall to the House to pass laws that will stop them doing so in future?”
“Further to that point of order, Mr Speaker. You say you have taken advice on this. You may remember that the last time a Bill was put through the House at this speed was the Data Retention and Investigatory Powers Act 2014. That was done relatively quickly, supposedly under the pressure of the Government of the day needing that law. That Act was effectively overturned in court in Davis and Watson v. the Home Secretary of the day—she was subsequently Prime Minister—and part of the argument that I am sure affected the judges was the speed with which the House came to decisions on matters of fundamental constitutional importance. Have you taken advice from Speaker’s Counsel as to the robustness of the legislation before us today in the face of such a judicial challenge?”
“We have evidence from one month ago, Mr Speaker, when you allowed an urgent question in this Chamber to the Ministry of Defence, which had produced internal policy documents that explicitly conceived of Ministers approving co-operation with states that had used torture to acquire information. So, plainly, the Government have not learned their lesson yet. There are a number of reasons for having an inquiry—legal, reputational, operational, closure and the simple one of keeping the promise we gave—and I am afraid that the Government will eventually be forced into that position.”
“If we want a real coruscating comment on that, we need only look back at the Binyam Mohamed case and the remarks of Judge Neuberger on the Government’s and agencies’ handling of it throughout. The Government should simply not be allowed to mark their own homework. On the point that the Government have solved the problems, I am afraid that that is plainly and demonstrably not true. That is illustrated most clearly in the point raised by the shadow Foreign Secretary that there is no prohibition on Ministers approving torture. My right hon. Friend the Minister says that they are required to obey the law, but they were required to do so in 2002 when the law was precisely the same in terms of international convention, so that does not apply either.”
“I will resist the temptation to reply to the failure to provide a judge-led inquiry in four words; those words being, “See you in court,” because it is quite plain that this decision will face a judicial review and that will take even more time and give less closure. My right hon. Friend asked us to accept that the Government have solved the problems, and ironically he cites as evidence of that a number of ISC reports from some years ago that are now understood to have got the answer wrong because they were misinformed. The current ISC report—much better, much higher quality—was of course limited, as we heard from its Chairman, by the restriction on witnesses. So the Government are asking us to allow them to mark their own homework.”
“To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department to make a statement on the Home Office’s policy on police surveillance of journalists.”
“So can the Minister reassure the House that these intrusive surveillance techniques were not used against journalists in this case and that they would never be used unless there was either a serious crime or a real and serious threat to national security?”
“Journalists get particular protection under it, and there are only two ways such intrusive surveillance could be legally carried out. One is for the police to have obtained a warrant on national security grounds, in effect. Given the fact that the Government did not even use the DA, or defence advisory notice, procedure to stop publication of the telegram—they did not even use the procedure available to them—it is very unlikely that such a warrant would have been granted or such an agreement have been given by a commissioner. The other way is for one of the state agencies—the secret agencies—to have obtained the data. Given that the leak was embarrassing, but not a threat to national security, this also seems unlikely.”
“One of the worst things a Government can do to damage democracy is to undermine the freedom of the press. In the past week, there have been numerous press reports of the police using “the full force of the state” to pin down the source of the recent leak of diplomatic telegrams. According to the reports this includes analysing mobile phone data in journalists’ phones, including location data showing everywhere they had been in the previous weeks. If true, this would be an astonishing intrusion on press freedom, because it puts at risk every confidential source they have, not just the one the police might be looking for. Since the successful court case brought by the hon. Member for West Bromwich East (Tom Watson) and myself against the Government, the Data Retention and Investigatory Powers Act 2014 has been tightened up.”
“Whatever it is, I hope that what I shall say next will help my right hon. Friend in his argument with them. If he does not announce an independent judge-led inquiry in his statement later this week, or next week, I will certainly seek advice on whether we have broken either of those articles, and, if need be, use the proper judicial mechanisms to ensure that the Government are put back within the bounds of the law.”
“I hear what my right hon. Friend says about obeying international law, but it is clear from the Prime Minister’s apology to the Libyan victims alone that the British Government, at very best, came perilously close to breaching article 3 of the European convention on human rights, which forbids torture but also its facilitation or complicity in it. Moreover, without an independent judge-led inquiry, the Government may now be in breach of article 13, which, as well as encapsulating centuries of established common law, provides for the right to “an effective remedy”. I do not know what is making the Government take so long to decide whether to pursue a judge-led inquiry. It may be pressure from the agencies, although I doubt that now, or it may be pressure from allies who were complicit or involved in this.”
“The loan charge all-party group claims evidence for four suicides relating to the loan charge and HMRC has referred itself with respect to one. When I asked a parliamentary written question on the assessment the Treasury had made of the impact of the loan charge on the mental health of the people subject to pursuit, the answer was, to put it mildly, less than satisfactory. Will the Minister now tell us what effect the Treasury believes its policy has had on the mental health of all the people subject to pursuit in both the public and private sectors?”
“Could the House authorities make representations to the House of Lords to make sure that that is taken on board and corrected?”
“On a mundane but important point of order, Mr Speaker. The House of Lords Commission gave the following ruling on passes for parliamentary assistants in its last report: “Members may not sponsor a pass for anybody whose primary role is to support an All-Party Parliamentary Group.” That may have been to deal with some problem of misuse—I do not know; I cannot speak to that—but I am concerned about it. I see the right hon. Member for Twickenham (Sir Vince Cable), the leader of the Liberal Democrats, is in his place; some years ago, he changed the law—under some influence from me, I think—to make Members of Parliament authorised people under the whistleblowing Act. Organisations such as the all-party group on whistleblowing therefore need staff in the House.”
“In May, San Francisco, one of the most tech-friendly cities in the world, banned the use of live facial recognition technology because of massive error rates and concerns about racial bias in its use. Five United Kingdom police forces use similar cameras and systems. Both the Met and South Wales police have seen a 90%— or worse—misidentification rate of innocent members of the public. It is clear that the cameras carry serious risks, yet no legislation governs the use of the technology; it operates in a legal void. The Minister refers to the Metropolitan police. This is not a decision for a police force to make; it is a decision for Parliament. Will the Minister bring legislation to the House laying down strict guidelines on the use of this technology?”
“(Urgent Question) : To ask the Secretary of State for Defence if she will make a statement on the Ministry of Defence’s policy on co-operating with the use of torture overseas.”
“It seems to me that the IPCO might have approved the overall approach but not the precise policy document that I refer to, which I understand was published after the consultation. Will she ensure that that document, which appears to give Ministers the right to overrule the law, is published along with any commentary on it?”
“We cannot ignore the morality or the law. Paragraph 15.9 of the Ministry of Defence’s policy document states that information sharing should not proceed “unless ministers agree that the potential benefits justify accepting the risk and the legal consequences that may follow”. The fundamental problem with paragraph 15.9 is that it presumes that Ministers can overrule the law, even international law, including that on absolute rights such as the prohibition of torture: they cannot, they must not, and I hope that my right hon. Friend will ensure that they do not. Given the Ministry of Defence’s claim that the Investigatory Powers Commissioner’s Office, the investigatory powers oversight body, approves of this, will she publish the documents showing that?”
“I thank the Secretary of State for that answer. Our most senior living soldier, Field Marshal Lord Guthrie, said 10 years ago: “Torture is illegal. It is a crime in both peace and war that no exceptional circumstances can permit…We need to distinguish ourselves from our enemies. We must not, in the false name of moral equivalence, degrade ourselves to their level.” He was right. The prohibition of torture is one of our few absolute incontrovertible rights. There can never be a reason or justification for torture; what is more, it does not work. It leads to bad intelligence and bad decisions. The decision to undertake the Iraq war, which led to hundreds of thousands of deaths, the destruction of the stability of the region and the destruction of the reputation of the west, was based on so-called evidence obtained on the basis of torture.”
“Every month’s delay in fixing this problem is another month of deprivation, distress and uncertainty in very young lives. I know the Secretary of State is committed to correcting this problem, but I urge her to spend whatever it takes to do this as quickly as possible.”
“I have a constituent, Susan Hatton, with an eight-year-old daughter, Jessica. Jessica suffers from achondroplasia; she cannot wash herself, dress herself or brush her own hair; she frequently falls over, is regularly on concussion watch and wakes up several times every night. Her mother needs help. In August, Jessica’s DLA was withdrawn despite her condition worsening. While an appeal was ongoing, the Department recommended she put in a second claim to hope for a better outcome. Eight months after that, they went to court and the judge said that because the second proposal was in play, he could not answer on the first one. So not only did my constituent have to wait an unduly long time for her appeal to be heard, but she now finds herself facing the entire process over again.”
“The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster will know that the Government are about to award a £300 million contract including requirements to host British citizens’ biometric data. To protect the security and privacy of British citizens, can he guarantee that that data will not be held by foreign companies subject to foreign Government laws giving foreign Government access to British citizens’ private data?”
“Other countries with very strong records of protecting asylum and the rights of individuals under criminal investigation, such as Canada, Norway, Denmark, Sweden and the Netherlands, have seen fit to extradite suspects back to Rwanda. Why have we not?”
“It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Scunthorpe (Nic Dakin), who is a near neighbour of mine. He and I represent seats in the north of England that are not full of city slickers and billionaires avoiding taxes with expensive lawyers. I pay tribute to the APPG for the work it has done on this, representing constituents up and down the country who have suffered dreadfully under this arrangement. US Supreme Court Judge Marshall once said, “the power to tax involves the power to destroy”. This, I am afraid, is a good example of that—a tax policy that is destroying families, homes, mental health and even lives.”