11. LETTER
TO
RT
HON
JACQUI
SMITH
MP FROM
THE
PERMANENT
SECRETARY,
HOME
OFFICE,
25 MARCH
2009
You asked me for my views on the principle of using
police records, collected in the course of your personal protection,
to verify the number of nights you have spent in London and in
Redditch.
I have discussed this with [the Head of Propriety
and Ethics] in the Cabinet Office. Her advice is attached.
I very much agree with that advice. It would be an
unusual and, as far as we know, an unprecedented step for police
records to be used in this way. We would greatly prefer it, if
all other avenues for resolving this matter could be used before
asking the police to release their records.
The Home Office is, as you know, responsible for
the policy on personal protection within Government. [
]
We do not normally even confirm or deny whether individuals receive
protection and certainly never reveal any details about the nature
of that protection.
The police, of course, are responsible for the provision
and operation of protection. They decide on its details, in consultation
with the individual concerned and the Home Office and also place
a high priority on confidentiality and privacy. It is entirely
a matter for them what records they keep. I do not know how full
these records are or what police resource might be involved in
collating usable information.
It would therefore be a highly unusual step to reveal
any information relating to personal protection, even to the Parliamentary
Standards Commissioner. Personal protection is provided for just
thatthe protection of the individual. It is not designed
to provide a record of an individual's movements and private arrangements.
Many senior politicians accept protection as a necessary consequence
of the job they do, but dislike the intrusion into their and their
families' privacy which it necessarily involves. If, in the future,
they thought that it might be used to provide personal information
to a third party, I fear they may look at protection in a completely
different way.
For all these reasons I, like [the Director of Propriety
and Ethics] would much prefer it, if police records were only
used as a last resort. Following discussions with her, I have,
however, agreed with you that, in line with your wish to be as
helpful as possible to the Standards Commissioner, he can have
access to your Home Office diary. These are official diaries prepared
by civil servants and, although they would no doubt require some
interpretation and commentary, they are, unlike police records,
an official account of your movements. I should have thought that
they will provide the basis for verifying your stays in London,
Redditch and elsewhere. But as [the Director] points out, this
release is in itself a rare occurrence for Ministers with a high
level of personal protection, and I would want to stress that
we would never normally make the diaries accessible to anyone.
25 March 2009
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