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Mr. Charles Clarke: The hon. Gentleman may correct me if I am wrong, but I think that, at that time in Committee, he was talking about a technical approvals board. That matter exercised us strongly for the reasons stated in Committee. We are now talking about a technical advisory board, which will have much more power and effect in what he perfectly reasonably seeks to achieve.
Mr. Heald: Yes, the essential ingredient of both systems is that there should be an independent body to which such cases can be taken. As the Minister will recall, I tabled several amendments, all of which provided different solutions to that problem. One possibility was that people could go to court. Another route was a review by the technical approvals board. I had two or three other ideas, although I have forgotten them.
Mr. Clarke: They were creative.
Mr. Heald: I am grateful to the Minister for describing them as creative. It is welcome that, in the other place, it has been possible to find a solution that provides business with that extra reassurance. That reassurance is in the Government's interests, as much as it is in those of the industry. It will not now just be a case of the Secretary of
State introducing an order and a whole series of black boxes springing up in appropriate parts of the economy; there will be an element of independent advice and the ability to put such cases to the board to find out whether it agrees that what is proposed is right.It has been said that no one in the industry supported the idea of having a technical board. On Report, I read out a list of bodies that supported that idea--they are shown in Hansard. It was made clear to my noble Friend Lord Cope that various bodies supported that idea, including the Internet Service Providers Association, the London Internet Exchange, the Confederation of British Industry, the Federation of the Electronics Industries and the Alliance of Electronic Business, and others. That shows that there are sometimes misunderstandings about such issues. However, I welcome the fact that there will be a technical board, but it is a pity that it was necessary to defeat the Government in the other place to achieve that. [Interruption.] The Minister laughs, but that is true.
In Committee and on Report, we said that it should be a requirement that the Government shall make a contribution to the costs of internet service providers who have to provide such facilities. That was strongly resisted until a defeat in the other place. Again, it is good that the Minister now accepts the decision taken in the House of Lords that he shall make a fair contribution. That will build confidence in the industry, which the Government need if they are to implement the legislation effectively. It is good to talk, as the saying goes--[Interruption.] It is good to talk, and we appear to have an amendment with which we may all be content.
Mr. Ian Bruce: My declaration of interest will probably last longer than my speech, in that I advise the Telecommunications Managers Association and a company, Trevor Gilbert and Associates, which, at the periphery of its business, runs telephone exchanges. Both organisations were concerned that the Bill was originally too widely drawn and that people who work in the field peripherally or those who have large telephone exchanges as part of their normal business might be dragged in. Therefore, I welcome amendment No. 12, which sets that aside.
I rose simply to ask the Minister what he expects the Bill to cost. He was right to say that many of the figures bandied about were extraordinarily high. That does not let him off the hook, however, of how much he thinks the Bill will cost and how much he has asked the Chancellor to provide. Out of the £43 billion, has he asked for £500 million, £250 million or £5 billion? How much will the Government have to pay? We should not agree with the Lords amendment until that figure is on the record in Hansard so that we may later measure whether the Minister was correct.
Mr. Simon Hughes (Southwark, North and Bermondsey): I feared that I would left stranded without my cavalry when we reached the amendments. My hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Hallam (Mr. Allan), who knows most about these matters, has had to depart, and my right hon. Friend the Member for Berwick- upon-Tweed (Mr. Beith), who also served on the Committee, had not quite arrived when we began. I have been rescued by his arrival: more than one of us will now deal with the amendments and we have the benefit of some of the expertise that went into the Committee stage.
I shall make one preliminary point so that I will not have to make it later. It reflects the words of the Minister and the hon. Member for North-East Hertfordshire (Mr. Heald). The Bill's process in the Lords was a model of intelligent co-operation, and I pay tribute to the Conservative spokesman, Lord Cope of Berkeley, and his colleagues, to the ministerial team, and to my colleagues, Lord McNally and his team. The huge amount of co-operation that occurred is evident in the fact that the technical advisory board proposal came originally from Lord Cope. We worked happily with him to support it as a positive improvement and the Minister has been glad to accept it.
When the Bill left the House of Lords, I asked my colleagues what remained for us to do to make the Bill even better. I was told that there were three outstanding matters--overlapping warrants, tipping off and authorisation when the key was converted into plain text. My senior researcher, Steve Bradford, my hon. Friend the Member for Hallam, Lord McNally and I talked to the Clerks, but found, by one of the paradoxes of this place, that those are the very matters on which we were technically unable to table amendments--we can amend only what has been sent to us as Lords amendments.
That is why there are no amendments to the Lords amendments, and I am sure that the hon. Member for North-East Hertfordshire and his team have been through the same process. I make no complaint, but we are limited to considering only what has been sent back from the Lords, all of which improves the Bill.
Amendment No. 12 improves the Bill for the reasons given by the Minister, and amendments Nos. 9, 14 and others will produce a board sufficiently flexible and encouraging to give the industry the confidence that it did not have when the Bill went to the Lords. Even though there may have been some hype from industry--certainly, we all had an avalanche of correspondence from people who saw the Bill as the most draconian and awful piece of legislation--matters have been reappraised and industry has been reassured that the process can be called in so that it may give its expert opinion. The amendments are welcome and make the Bill more satisfactory to industry and commerce. We welcome it.
8.45 pm
Mr. Maclean: All that talk about the cavalry arriving and Lord Cope reminded me of the words of a Jacobite song following the battle of Prestonpans. It seems on this occasion that the English general, Johnny Cope, was wide awake in the morning, got his drums a-beating and got down his amendments on the technical advisory board. Lord Cope seems to have been more successful than his predecessor of more than 200 years ago. One naturally supports the technical advisory board. [Interruption.] Some Labour Members, of Scottish ilk, will appreciate the importance of the battle of Prestonpans.
I recall that the technical advisory board was raised in Committee, and I am pleased that, following the normal parliamentary processes, the Government are willing to accept it. It is a good idea and everyone agrees. I make no criticism of the Government for being slightly nervous of the concept in Committee. If a Government accepted every suggestion made in Committee, goodness knows
what would be in a Bill by the time we reached the final stages of the parliamentary negotiations. All is as it should be, and the Minister has wisely accepted the amendment.My only small quibble with the technical advisory board is with the view that it should be precisely balanced. It will not be so: the Minister is bound to ensure, using amendment No. 16--"that such other persons"--that he includes a couple of people so that the Government side and the agencies that want warrants will always have a small inbuilt majority in case the industry people become a little troublesome.
There should be no need for that. The Government are not making policy, and as the board is merely advisory the Government should not have to ensure that it is stuffed with their people in case other members come up with some crazy idea that the Government do not like. The Government can draw up terms of reference to ensure that the board does not have draconian powers that the Government will not like. They could then pick the best people to serve on the committee, and if nine out of 10, 11 or 12 turn out to work in private industry, so be it.
Of course, the Government must have an input to the board via those who seek the warrants, but the bulk of expertise lies beyond Government circles. The Government should not feel that they must have a majority on the technical advisory board, which will not stitch up the Government on a policy that they wish to avoid.
My other point relates to clause 13 and the amendments proposed to it. It concerns the cost. I accept that adding the words
- a fair contribution towards the costs
In those circumstances, if a business has had to pay out £5,000 purely to do something that it would not normally do but that the Government have asked it to, what would be a fair contribution towards the cost? I believe that it would be £5,000, and if a company had to spend £10,000 doing what the Government want, the fair contribution would be £10,000.
I appreciate that the Government have not wanted to pick a form of words that would amount to, "We will pay whatever it costs". That would create a difficulty. Some companies would do the gold-plated version and ensure that the Government picked up a heavier tab than necessary. Of course, the Government must reserve the right to say, "No, we are not going to pay every penny in case you try to rip us off. It will be a fair contribution and in most circumstances we anticipate that it may be 100 per cent."
I would like to hear a statement from the Minister tonight. No Minister wants to comment on a hypothetical scenario, such as, if I give him a bill for £5,000, how much of it will he pay--[Interruption.] If I were an internet service provider, I would give him a bill for £5,000.
We need to find out the Government's thinking as to what is a fair contribution in the case of a small provider who proves legitimately that the bill is not a rip off or fiddled, but that his costs were £5,000. Roughly what percentage would the Government anticipate paying?
My final quibble or criticism is that while the amendment deals with a fair contribution towards the running costs, we are still stuck with the old wording in clause 13(3) for the capital costs. Those who are forced to put in equipment or machinery under clause 12--what my hon. Friend the Member for North-East Hertfordshire (Mr. Heald) referred to as the "black box"--will be under an obligation to install some equipment that may make interception easier, and will receive only such contributions as the Minister thinks appropriate towards the cost involved.
I confess that I did not read the debate on this matter in the other place. I do not know why their lordships did not table a similar amendment there. For the running costs of operating an interception system there will be a fair contribution, but the company will get only what the Minister thinks appropriate for the capital costs incurred. I want to hear the reason for that distinction from the Minister. For example, if a company proves beyond any doubt that the equipment that it has installed cost £50,000--the bill is not fiddled, the auditors have gone through it and everyone agrees that the additional equipment that the Government have demanded cost X--what amount does he think it would be appropriate to pay?
Given those few words, I generally welcome the amendments.
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