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.”
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“That is why we spend more money on GCHQ than on the other two agencies put together, but that is as nothing—a drop in the ocean—compared with what the American agencies use. They have no problem at all with placing their information in the public domain. Furthermore, we have the internet. Any terrorist or criminal operating in the UK can look on the internet and find examples of the things that we are supposed to be concealing. Let me provide a topical example. The other day we were told about a particular technique that one of the agencies wanted to protect. For obvious reasons, I cannot talk about it, but just out of curiosity I googled it. Guess what? There is an article about it on an American site, outlining exactly how it happens and how it is used.”
“Friend the Member for Esher and Walton were intercepted, that evidence could not be used, but if there were a bug in my phone, the evidence could be used. Is one more secret than the other, or more dangerous to disclose? I think not. We might want to withhold from criminals the knowledge that we were using a laser microphone and interferometry —a high-tech mechanism—but we could use that evidence in court, whereas we could not use intercept evidence. That strikes me as laughable. There is a third aspect of the matter that is laughable. The right hon. Gentleman said that GCHQ was a competent and capable organisation, and I agree with him. However, in this type of work, which is complex but not incomprehensible, our sophistication, capability, skills, innovations and edge are all a function of the amount of money that is spent.”
“Member for Tottenham pointed out, that we can use foreign intercept evidence but not our own. A stark and, frankly, embarrassing example of that came to light after the Heathrow bomb plot, when the agencies had to obtain from Yahoo in California parallel intercept evidence to the evidence that I suspect they had in their own files. I cannot say that they had it, but I suspect that they did. I cannot think of a more laughable demonstration of the stupidity of the policy than our having to go to a foreign country to get evidence that we almost certainly already had. A second inconsistency is that we can use bugging, as the right hon. Gentleman also pointed out. If my telephone call to my hon.”
“I know of cases in which it has admonished Governments for the destruction of information, but I know of no case in which it has instructed them to release it. Even if it did so, we demonstrated pretty clearly in a Backbench Business Committee debate on prisoners’ votes some time ago that, if the House so decides, it can defy an ECHR judgment if it thinks that it is against the national interest. At the end of the day, that is our final recourse. I cannot imagine the House doing anything other than voting against disclosure, if we were instructed to release such information. There has been a tendency for the agencies, which are understandably nervous of exposure to the courts, to overstate the risk. That was the one weakness in the otherwise powerful Chilcot report. It is an astonishing inconsistency, as the right hon.”
“In some cases it may be necessary to withhold certain evidence from the defence so as to preserve the fundamental rights of another individual or to safeguard an important public interest.” I have not seen that put any clearer in any British court—that was the Strasbourg Court’s view—and that was not the only case. Almost exactly the same words were repeated in a subsequent case, Botmeh and Alami v. United Kingdom 2007. As Lord Lloyd said, “there is no absolute right to disclosure: disclosure is always subject to the overriding interest of national security.” Before I go on to outline the other inconsistencies, I want to point out that I think it highly unlikely that the ECHR would ever instruct us to release information.”
“Never once did a judge release into the public domain the sorts of the things that we are concerning ourselves with in this debate. Those who support the current ban then say, “But the European Court of Human Rights can overrule us and release this information to the criminals and the terrorists.” Actually, that is not the case. Using British criminal cases alone, we have clear direction and precedent. In Rowe and Davies v. United Kingdom 2000, the ECHR clearly stated that “as the applicants recognised, the entitlement to disclosure of relevant evidence is not an absolute right. In any criminal proceedings there may be competing interests, such as national security or the need to protect witnesses at risk of reprisals or keep secret police methods of investigation of crime, which must be weighed against the rights of the accused.”
“I do not say that it is used every day but it is used very frequently.” He then set out where it came from and said: “It is inconceivable that a judge would order documents to be disclosed, or information to be discovered, that would reveal methods used by GCHQ and other agencies. If the judge went off his head and did so order, the prosecution would at once appeal to the Court of Appeal, which would put the situation right.” —[ Official Report, House of Lords, 16 March 2007; Vol. 690, c. 967.] That is clear and it is clearly correct. In fact, throughout the entire period, over decades, when we faced the Soviet threat, which, I have to say to the House, was much bigger than the al-Qaeda threat—it was more sophisticated, more dangerous and more existential—never once was what Lord Lloyd of Berwick described broken.”
“That is how authoritative this man is. He is the man who knows more about this subject than anybody else in Britain—full stop—and he has tabled a Bill in the Lords to try to bring forward the change in the restriction that we are debating. Lord Lloyd of Berwick said the following about the legal position: “In common with every other common-law country, we have developed a means of protecting sensitive information that is thought to be at risk in some way. The principle is called public interest immunity; there is nothing new about it. It is well understood in the courts.”
“First, if criminals knew they were being intercepted, they would cease to use the telephone or whatever medium was being intercepted, and that would lead to the loss of valuable intelligence. The right hon. Member for Tottenham made suitably short work of that viewpoint in his argument. Secondly, criminals might be able to work out the methods by which the intercept evidence had been obtained if it were used in court. In a minute I shall quote at some length from Lord Lloyd of Berwick; I should remind the House that he was a senior Law Lord and head of the Security Commission for most of the ’90s. He was the man whom the last Conservative Government asked to review the entire sweep of terrorist legislation and to revise it for them, and the last Labour Government implemented everything he recommended.”
“It was quite clear that, for the Americans, intercept was not just a marginal advantage; it was a massive advantage in the fight against organised crime and terror. Similarly, the Australian evidence—we did not go to Australia—is much the same. There are some categories of case that simply cannot proceed without intercept—in particular, cases involving the importation of drugs. Again, the Australians said that anybody who does not use intercept is not acting seriously—that was the phrase of, I think, the director of public prosecutions federally in Australia. We are the only major democracy to have such a bar to the use of intercept evidence. The arguments are essentially twofold.”
“If I can quote him approximately correctly, the Department of Justice representative said, “If we go to a case”—either a major gang case, a major gangsterism or organised crime case, or a terrorism case—“and there is not intercept, the jury wonder what’s happened. They wonder why we have not got the intercept.” The idea that the criminals involved do not know that intercept technology is being used is therefore laughable—I use that word carefully. I will come back to that point. Incidentally, the Department of Homeland Security is another place we went to. The homeland security gentleman we spoke to—I cannot remember whether he was the deputy director or the head, but he was one or the other—said he could not understand why the British took the stance they took.”
“As a result, the Azelle Rodney case has gone to judicial inquiry, and, as I said, the Duggan case might well follow suit. This is a massive problem for the families and communities involved, but it is also a massive problem for open justice and a handicap for our national security. Some years ago, my hon. Friend the Member for Esher and Walton (Mr Raab) and I went to the United States to talk to people about the whole question of the use of intercept. We talked to the National Security Agency, to the FBI—I think—to the Department of Justice and to the National Counterterrorism Centre. I have probably forgotten some of the other organisations, but every one of them said exactly the same thing: in summary, they could not do their jobs without the use of intercept in court.”
“It is essential, therefore, that we have an open and fully informed inquest after every single fatal operation of the state against an individual, because that is what keeps us a civilised state. As the right hon. Gentleman said, in two cases that is either not possible or likely not to be possible: the Azelle Rodney case, which has already gone to a judicial inquiry, and potentially in the Mark Duggan case. As outlined, the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 “specifically bars any evidence in court, or any question, assertion or disclosure in legal proceedings, which results from warranted interception or would reveal that warranted interception had taken place.” As the right hon. Gentleman said, that is an incredibly draconian restriction. That quotation came from the Chilcot committee’s summary.”
“Gentleman listed: to ensure that it is never done improperly and that there is never a deliberate killing by the state; to ensure that errors and accidents are never repeated; and to ensure that systemic failures are not repeated—very much an issue in the Jean Charles de Menezes case, and possibly an issue in the two cases to which he referred, the Rodney and Duggan cases. Also, not equally important but still massively important, it is necessary to ensure that the public, the families and the communities from which the people come have confidence in the system. The mother of a young man who has been shot should never feel that her son has been judicially—or, indeed, extra-judicially—executed. I am afraid that, in at least one case, that appears to be the situation.”
“It is easy in the cold environment of the Chamber not to understand the terror, fear and pressure on people in those circumstances. What I am about to say, therefore, is not a criticism of them. That is not an excuse, however, for not knowing the full facts after the event or for pulling our legal punches. It is an absolute requirement that the killing of a British citizen by an agency of the state be properly and publicly reviewed, with access to all key data. That is the case for all sorts of reasons, some of which the right hon.”
“In one that I am aware of, the Jean Charles de Menezes case, there was an open verdict, and some, of course, are still outstanding. Although I will be critical of agencies of the state, I want to make one point: I am not criticising police officers operating on the front line as parts of the armed response units. Their job is sometimes terrifying. I was critical of what happened in the Jean Charles de Menezes case, but the policemen involved went on to a tube train not knowing whether the man they were seeking to apprehend was carrying a bomb that would have killed everybody on the tube train, including themselves. In other circumstances, the armed response units are deployed when they do not know whether the people they are seeking to apprehend or stop will shoot them or use armed force against them.”
“If colleagues want to test that, I suggest they consider the operations of the British state when it has operated outside the constraints of the rule of law, such as in Kenya during the Mau Mau rebellion, when well brought up, well educated, and no doubt expensively educated, men—it is always men—acted with a brutality that would have done justice to some of the totalitarian states to which I have referred. The rule of law prevents that by exposing acts of the state to judicial challenge and questioning, and that process is never more important than when a citizen of the state dies at the hands of an agency of the state. Since the 1997 general election, 38 people have been killed in Britain by police forces. In most cases, the inquest gave a verdict of lawful killing.”
“We believe we treat our citizens in a civilised way compared with the totalitarian states—they will imprison, torture and, in the final analysis, kill without trail, whether they are Soviet or Nazi states, or any of the other species or flavours of totalitarian state that we have been unfortunate to see in past decades. Emotionally, we might believe that we do not do those things because we are nicer people than they are, but the reason for the distinction—between totalitarian states and our state and similar ones such as America—is simply the rule of law.”
“It is a privilege to follow the right hon. Member for Tottenham (Mr Lammy), who has done a sterling job of making the basic case, and, perhaps in some ways more importantly, of defending the interests and rights of his constituents, some of whom feel very aggrieved after the events of last year. I shall speak more briefly than he did and try to wrap around his argument, but hon. Members should forgive me if I repeat one or two things he has said. The primary distinction between the great democracies of modern times and the totalitarian states is how they treat their citizens.”
“I have long thought, partly as a result of the Northern Ireland experience, that our intelligence agencies are predisposed to go for disruption rather than prosecution. The whole nexus of the things my hon. Friend describes, their attitude to the use of intercept evidence and the problems addressing the exponential increase in GCHQ reinforce that. Does that not support the argument that a step change is needed from a disruptive approach to a prosecutorial approach, which is clearly what the Americans do, and with more success than us?”
“I will put to one side one of the weaknesses of the Privy Council report, namely its assessment of the effectiveness of intercept in prosecutions, and take up the issue of control orders. When we eventually allowed the use of control orders, our presumption when in opposition was that they would allow the control of people who could not be prosecuted in the courts because the available evidence—in other words, intercept evidence—could not be used there. Now we are being told that such people are having their freedom removed on the basis of, in essence, suspicion, because there is nothing beyond intercept other than suspicion. Members on both Front Benches are in a Catch-22 situation: either intercept is effective in dealing with control orders, or control orders are being imposed on the basis of suspicion alone.”
“I, for one, congratulate the Home Secretary wholeheartedly on her decision on Gary McKinnon today, but I also share some of the concerns of my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for North East Fife (Sir Menzies Campbell). There are a number of cases where there are concerns over justice being done, with respect to both Europe and the USA—in particular, in respect of the USA, there are fears that the intimidatory use of the plea bargaining arrangements force possibly innocent people to make guilty pleas, and similar problems in the justice systems of other European countries. Will the Home Secretary give the House an undertaking that what she proposes to bring about today will give protection to UK citizens equal to that which American citizens get from their constitution?”
“On 4 September, the European Court of Human Rights is hearing the case of Miss Nadia Eweida, the lady who lost her job at British Airways for wearing a crucifix as a mark of her Christianity. The behaviour of BA in this was a disgraceful piece of political correctness, so I was surprised to see that the Government are resisting Miss Eweida’s appeal. I cannot believe that the Government are supporting the suppression of religious freedom in the workplace, so what are we going to do about this sad case?”
“I speak as a past Public Accounts Committee Chairman who summoned bankers, rail operators, pharmacy companies and all sorts of companies that did not want to come, to give their documents or to give evidence. We did not take evidence on oath, but they did not want to give evidence to the Committee and were made to do so.”
“I am quite certain, for example, that even if it is confined to banking, things such as the derivatives market will undergo a lot of investigation in the course of the Committee’s investigation. We must understand that this issue is much bigger than just LIBOR. Secondly, we should take on board the fact that we are debating the superstructure of the inquiry when we should perhaps be talking about its engine room. What matters are the inquiry’s powers, whichever we have, and they do not need to be so different for a judicial inquiry and for a Select Committee inquiry. I am afraid that the hon. Member for Eltham (Clive Efford) was just plumb wrong about the status of Select Committees in this House and their powers.”
“If it stopped there, we could deal with it through two actions: a change to the procedure to make it transaction-based and audited, and the criminal prosecution of everybody involved. That would resolve the issue once and for all, but that is not as far as this goes. We all know that the practice of banking in this country has become perverted by huge incentives, which have led bankers to behave in ways that do not serve the economic interests of the country or our national interests—indeed, they have had the opposite impact. Although the Chairman of the Select Committee rightly said that the inquiry would need to be tightly drawn, it will nevertheless go pretty far.”
“I will start by declaring an interest. When I was the chairman of the Future of Banking Commission it was funded by the Consumer Association, which might have influenced my views on this matter. May I start by commending the Chairman of the Treasury Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for Chichester (Mr Tyrie), for the tone of his speech? I agree that we should not let the smoke of political battle in this place come between us and rescuing one of the most important industries in the country. Members on both sides of the House should bear that point in mind. The title of the debate and of both motions refers to the professional conduct of the business of banking. This is not just about LIBOR and the LIBOR scandal.”
“We will solve it through a different mechanism that either approach would have to use and that, frankly, would be in camera hearings with those witnesses. Although the conclusion will have to be wide, open, wide ranging, honest and transparent, that might not be possible for the evidence-taking. Although a House inquiry will be faster than a judicial inquiry—there is no doubt about that, for the reasons the Chancellor has given—there is the simple problem that any inquiry will have trouble completing by Christmas.”
“Let me make one more point about judge-led inquiries—it goes back to the Leveson inquiry and is slightly embarrassing for those on my side of the House, but I shall make it anyway. Judge-led inquiries cannot work around a criminal investigation without paying attention to it, and that can cramp what they do. If Members did not see it, I recommend that they look back at the evidence given by Andy Coulson and Rebekah Brooks, both of whom were facing potential criminal charges. Those were wholly useless days at the Leveson inquiry because the QC involved had to tiptoe around the issues. That might apply to almost every witness who appears before this inquiry, thanks to the issues facing it, so we must bear it in mind that we cannot solve that with a judge.”
“Absolutely. The Select Committee on Culture, Media and Sport and its inability to reach a unanimous view has been held up as an example. In my entire time as PAC Chairman—and, I think, that of all the subsequent Chairmen—there was never anything other than a unanimous outcome, because of the factual basis of the inquiries. That is what this inquiry must have. It must rest on the facts, which is why the Committee will need forensic accountants, lawyers and investigating teams. It will, I think, need one change in the law. It will need protection for whistleblowers, as we do not have that, but the same would be true of a judge-led inquiry. That would open the inquiry up to its full extent.”
“I have taken one intervention and I cannot take any more. Whatever the inquiry, it will take a long time, because it is a big issue, and it has to be got right. If it is got wrong and the inquiry is handled badly, and it turns out not to be well managed, it will do enormous damage to the City of London and the entire economy. If it is got right and it leaves the City of London with a reputation for clean and honest dealing it could be the single most important thing that happens under this Government.”
“On 4 September, the European Court of Human Rights will hear the case of Nadia Eweida v. the United Kingdom Government. I understand that the Government are resisting the case. Miss Eweida is the lady who effectively lost her job with British Airways for wearing a cross, a symbol of her religion, at work. Is it any part of the British Government’s policy to support the denial of people’s religious rights at work? If not, will we reconsider our position on that case?”
“I, like my right hon. and learned Friend, am hoist with two petards: one is my belief in the principle of jury trial; the other is the practicalities that he quite rightly outlines. What I want to understand in his description of the Bill is under what circumstances a jury trial will be triggered. What are the criteria that will trigger a jury trial instead of a judge-only trial?”
“This matter was raised with my right hon. and learned Friend, the Secretary of State by the hon. Member for North Antrim (Ian Paisley). Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that the measure of serious harm for a corporation or large profit-making body should be very different from that for a small company or less well-off individual, and that as a result the provision should act as a deterrent against big companies using libel laws as a bullying mechanism?”
“It is my privilege to present a petition in the same terms as those of my hon. Friend the Member for Beverley and Holderness (Mr Stuart), who made it clear that this is being done to prevent enormous numbers of job losses around the country, with the highest concentration probably in East Yorkshire, not least in Haltemprice and Howden, on behalf of which I present this petition signed by 612 residents. The Petition of residents of Haltemprice and Howden constituency. [P001039]”
“In recent times there have been a number of controversial applications to extradite British citizens to the United States, including that of Mr Christopher Tappin. Some appear to have been based on American police sting operations on British soil. How are they approved, and how many have been approved in recent times?”
“Further to the point of order, Mr Speaker. As you might imagine, since the right hon. Member for Neath (Mr Hain) has been suffering this burden, a number of us have been looking into the possibilities. If you are able to answer the right hon. Gentleman’s question in the affirmative, will you tell us whether the House could also consider recommending legislation to the Government, given that it is almost certainly necessary?”
“Without any separation of Executive and legislature, the power of the Executive in this House means that this House is less good than it could be at defending the rights of individuals when the Executive impinge too much on them. We saw that very often with the previous Government. There were a great number of occasions when I am sure that many Labour Members did not want to support some of their Government’s more illiberal actions. That is why the House of Lords is incredibly important.”
“One of my concerns about our whole approach to the House of Lords is that we are arguing about its composition without worrying enough about its purpose, which we have not done enough to consider. There is a great deal of talk about the House of Lords as a revising and reforming Chamber, but it has a much greater function than that. Historically, the House of Lords has been a serious check on excessive Executive power. It was a check on the Government of Margaret Thatcher when she had a very large majority, on the Government of Tony Blair, and on the Government of the right hon. Member for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath (Mr Brown), and no doubt it will be a check on this Government as time goes on. It is very important in Britain that we have this check, because we are different in one respect from most other democracies.”
“Members: “That was less than a minute!”] Well, I will make up the whole minute by saying that the Government can be proud of most of their record in the past couple of years on the issues of liberty and justice, which the Prime Minister knows I hold very dear. Their actions on identity cards, on cutting down on the amount of detention without charge, and on the misuse of counter-terrorism stop-and-search powers are all matters of pride for them. Beyond that, however, I have three concerns: one about a constitutional issue, one about state power, and one about justice. Let me start with the constitutional issue on which the right hon. Member for Tottenham finished—the House of Lords.”
“It is a pleasure to follow the right hon. Member for Tottenham (Mr Lammy). While I may differ with his analysis, there is never any doubt that he holds his views passionately. He certainly supports his constituency and community passionately, and has done so in the past several years in which I have watched him in this House. Let me say to the Prime Minister that it is also a pleasure to talk about the real Queen’s Speech as against the one that I and others proposed last week. This Queen’s Speech has enormous merits to it, particularly in the context of growth. I am particularly supportive, as he will be unsurprised to hear, of his proposals on bank reforms, competition law, and joint enterprise law reform, including labour law reform. He will be happy to hear me mention those, but I am afraid that it goes downhill from here on in. [Hon.”
“A House of Lords that exactly reflected the political composition of the House of Commons would not be very much of a check on the Executive, and that would be a really serious problem. We must be very careful about what we do. I do not believe that a referendum, of itself, will solve the problem, because it is a subtle and difficult matter and will be very hard to argue in public. However, it is very important.”
“I am grateful to my right hon. Friend, because he goes right to the central point. The House of Lords is not perfect, and there are many things that it has wrongly allowed to happen. I am in favour of reform of the House of Lords, but we must be very careful to get it right. If, in our reform, we do away with, or weaken or mitigate to any great extent, the check that it provides, that check will never be returned, because no Government will ever bring back a restraint on their own powers. I think it was the Deputy Prime Minister who characterised his preferred state of the House of Lords as being one that more reflected the political composition of the House of Commons. That is precisely what I would not want it to do.”
“I take my hon. Friend’s point, although I believe the greater problem would be legislative gridlock if too much legitimacy were given to the House of Lords. The simple fact is that over the course of the past century, these Houses have managed a pretty effective balance without crippling government. The position that we have arrived at still needs reform, but very careful reform.”
“I agree with the last point, but the hon. Gentleman should not let the best be the enemy of the good. I will finish my points about the Lords, because I want to talk about two other significant issues of justice and freedom. For me, the test is to look back and see what would have happened in the past decade if we had introduced whatever new reform we will come up with. As the Deputy Prime Minister will be only too conscious, in the past decade the Lords have stopped the curbing of jury trials and a number of other measures, including the extension of detention without charge. That would not have happened if we had had too politically similar a House of Lords. When the House considers the matter in some detail, my test will be whether a reform will achieve the same check on the Government.”
“We will therefore create something, which some Ministers said will cost £2 billion—the London School of Economics suggests that it will cost £12 billion—that will not be effective against terrorism, but constitutes general-purpose surveillance of the entire nation.”
“Friend’s shadow Home Secretary we opposed because we thought that it would not work against terrorism. That is also true of the measure that we are considering. I took advice from experts. I asked them a simple question: “If you were a terrorist, how would you avoid this scrutiny?” I stopped them when they got to the fifth method. It is pretty straightforward: for terrorists, everything from proxy servers to one-off mobile phones means that such scrutiny is easy to avoid. For criminals, it is also easy and quite cheap to avoid. However, for ordinary citizens, that scrutiny is not easy and cheap to avoid.”
“Friend the Prime Minister made when we were in opposition. He said: “Faced with any problem, any crisis—given any excuse—Labour grasp for more information, pulling more and more people into the clutches of state data capture…And the Government doesn’t want to stop with the basic information…Scare tactics to herd more disempowered citizens into the clutches of officialdom, as people surrender more and more information about their lives, giving the state more and more power over their lives. If we want to stop the state controlling us, we must confront this surveillance state.” We opposed those measures in opposition, not just because they were illiberal or risked turning our country into a nation of suspects, but because we believed that they were ineffective. Nearly every measure that we opposed when I was my right hon.”
“I will give way to the Deputy Prime Minister if he really wants to argue the point, but I do not recommend it, because the Government have already consulted heavily with internet service providers and producers and talked to them about what they want to do. They want to require companies to maintain large databases of contact information. If I have telephoned somebody, there will be information about who the call was to, when it was made and where from. That will lead to extremely large databases, which the state then wants to be able to access relatively freely. Frankly, I am surprised that the Government have made the proposal, because both coalition parties opposed it in opposition, and as far as I can see, it goes against the thrust of the coalition agreement. It certainly goes against the thrust of a comment that my right hon.”
“I want to move on, but I will give way later if the hon. Gentleman still wishes to intervene. The second issue that I want to mention is state power and what has become known colloquially as the snooper’s charter. The Queen’s Speech stated that the Government intended “to bring forward measures to maintain the ability of the law enforcement and intelligence agencies to access vital communications data under strict safeguards to protect the public, subject to scrutiny of draft clauses.” I take the last part to mean that how it will happen is up for argument. That is a good thing, because I am afraid the proposal is very similar to what the Labour Government came up with.”