Police Searches on the Parliamentary Estate - Committee on the Issue of Privilege Contents


Examination of Witnesses (Question Numbers 260-279)

DR MALCOLM JACK, MS JACQY SHARPE, MR MICHAEL CARPENTER AND MS VERONICA DALY

9 NOVEMBER 2009

  Q260  Sir Malcolm Rifkind: Then I must ask you again. When she asked you on the day whether she had delegated authority to allow a Member of Parliament's office to be searched, why did you say to her that she did?

  Dr Jack: I said that she had permission, that she was the operating officer for the purpose of giving permission to search.

  Q261  Chairman: It is a question of process rather than substance.

  Dr Jack: Yes; exactly. That is exactly correct.

  Q262  Chairman: So as a matter of process it would be the Serjeant to whom an approach would be made for permission to search.

  Dr Jack: Yes; exactly. That is it.

  Q263  Chairman: And in that sense she had delegated authority.

  Dr Jack: Yes; exactly.

  Q264  Chairman: She did not have to approach the Speaker himself.

  Dr Jack: No; exactly.

  Q265  Sir Malcolm Rifkind: Now I understand.

  Dr Jack: That is exactly it. I am sorry I was not clear enough.

  Q266  Sir Malcolm Rifkind: So she was the person. The police were quite right to go to her.

  Dr Jack: Yes; exactly.

  Q267  Sir Malcolm Rifkind: But you are saying that she did not have the right to sign that consent form without clearing it with the Speaker.

  Dr Jack: Yes; absolutely.

  Q268  Sir Malcolm Rifkind: Might she have misunderstood, just as I misunderstood? Is it possible she might have done?

  Dr Jack: We were not talking about a consent form.

  Q269  Sir Malcolm Rifkind: She might have thought she was.

  Dr Jack: She might have thought that.

  Q270  Chairman: Does that not expose the overwhelming requirement that at this level in the House of Commons people should be entirely frank and open with each other?

  Dr Jack: Yes; absolutely. That is of course now incorporated in the protocol.

  Q271  Chairman: You know that there is some reference to the particular unit of the police force that was responsible for this search, the anti-terrorist unit, by whatever name it is known. Do you think that the fact that it was that unit may have had the result of creating in the mind of the Serjeant at Arms the view that she could not tell anyone about it?

  Dr Jack: Yes, I do; yes I think that is the case.

  Mr Carpenter: I do not know whether it is right now to point to the obvious fact that there is a world of difference between a search conducted under a warrant and a search conducted where consent has been given. In the minds of people—and of course I am necessarily having to anticipate the evidence that other people might give—if they are thinking this is a search with a warrant, then of course you are talking about the mechanical process and how that is to be handled. Quite a different question, if the real question that was not put on that day, I would submit, is: is it permissible to allow the consent of a Member's room without a warrant?

  Dr Jack: That puts it rather more clearly than I did, for which I apologise.

  Q272  Sir Malcolm Rifkind: When the Serjeant asked you this tentative question as to whether she had authority and the question was in relation to the possibility of a Member of Parliament's office being searched, even though she may not have shared with you the information as to why she was asking you that question, were you not curious? Did you not think it appropriate that you should be involved?

  Dr Jack: With the benefit of hindsight, I wish I had been more curious. As I explained earlier on, it is my lot to receive queries of all sorts from senior officers and others throughout the day on any day and I did not think that there was anything peculiar about this. I am trying to be very clear about thoughts at the time rather than importing hindsight. It may have occurred to me later that there was a connection with a terrorist matter, that perhaps this was something to do with documents or something in a room in the Palace which needed to be searched. No, with hindsight, I wish I had been more curious.

  Q273  Chairman: May I press you a little on that? I was wondering how many times you had been asked that question. Had you been asked that question before?

  Dr Jack: Yes, indeed. We had discussions about searches of offices on a previous occasion.

  Q274  Chairman: Was that the occasion which gave rise to the McKay memorandum?

  Dr Jack: No, there have been other occasions. There have been searches of offices of staff, for example.

  Q275  Chairman: Like Sir Malcolm, I am quite surprised that the alarm bells did not ring. I have to put that to you.

  Dr Jack: Yes, of course. I think the alarm bells might have rung if I had known a little bit more that this was a serious and imminent business. I had no idea that there was any context to this. I had no idea that the Serjeant was actually talking to the police.

  Q276  Chairman: You did not know that she had left three police officers in her office.

  Dr Jack: No, I had no idea. The question was posed in a complete vacuum.

  The Committee suspended from 4.49pm to 4.56pm for a division in the House.

  Q277 Mr Henderson: May I come back to this issue of consent? Was it your understanding before 16 November that consent could be given for the search of a Member's office without the Member agreeing?

  Dr Jack: Yes; certainly yes. The issue of a warrant and the procedure set out in what is known as the McKay guidance, which the Committee now have, is based on the premise that the Member will not be told in advance.

  Mr Henderson: We were going to take up this issue a little later. I do not know whether it is appropriate to do it now.

  Q278  Chairman: Perhaps you would like to come back to that point. There is one question I wanted to ask. Dr Jack, you expressed a view that you would have expected the Serjeant to tell you about the approach of the police. Would you have expected the Speaker to tell you that he had been told that there was a matter of confidentiality but it involved the anti-terrorist police?

  Dr Jack: I can only say that I was not consulted.

  Q279  Chairman: You were not at all.

  Dr Jack: No.



 
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