Examination of Witness ( Question Numbers
140-159)
RT HON
SIR PETER
GIBSON
13 MAY 2009
Q140 David Simpson: Sir Peter, can
I touch on the alleged "live" monitoring of the telephone
contacts? Did GCHQ monitor specific mobile phone numbers relevant
to the bombing at the request of Special Branch and, further to
that, was any such monitoring carried out "live"?
Sir Peter Gibson: Forgive me if
I appear evasive but I do not think I can answer that consistently
with what in the technical jargon is the "NC"—I
can neither confirm nor deny. I fear I cannot answer that, much
as I would like to.
Q141 Chairman: Are the answers to
that in the full version of the report?
Sir Peter Gibson: Of course, yes.
Q142 David Simpson: It is in the
full report?
Sir Peter Gibson: Absolutely.
Chairman: This is why we find it so unsatisfactory.
This is no criticism. I repeat this. It is not your fault, but
we do find it so difficult that I have not been able to see this,
so that I can tell my colleagues. They would accept my word; I
know they would. It is not that we do not accept yours. You must
not feel that. Nobody is questioning your integrity at all, but
we do feel at a disadvantage.
David Simpson: Working in the dark, Chairman.
Chairman: Yes, we are; but we are grateful
to you for the clarifications. Could I move on to Stephen Hepburn?
Q143 Mr Hepburn: Could I ask you
a question about the Panorama programme? The Panorama
programme obviously had a tremendous impact after this terrible
tragedy. Having done your report, what is your view of the Panorama
programme?
Sir Peter Gibson: I am very reluctant
to stir things up further. As the Chairman has commented, Mr Ware
thinks he was treated badly by me and I really much prefer not
to answer that; but, if you press me, I am afraid I think the
BBC got it completely wrong.
Q144 Mr Hepburn: Just for the record,
are you satisfied that all the relevant intelligence that was
passed from GCHQ to Special Branch was done in line with the procedures
but also as efficiently as possible?
Sir Peter Gibson: As efficiently?
I am sorry?
Q145 Mr Hepburn: As efficiently or
expeditiously as possible.
Sir Peter Gibson: Yes. I say so,
I hope expressly, that there was nothing that was not fully—again,
subject to this not confirming or denying intercepts and so on—but
there was nothing that was not passed fully and quickly to Special
Branch, the designated recipient of any information from GCHQ.
Q146 Mr Hepburn: Then why did it
take CID something like nine months to trawl through literally
millions and millions of telephone records, mobile phone records,
to try and trace a suspect device?
Sir Peter Gibson: That you will
have to ask Special Branch. I repeat what appears in my report.
I did not look into the reasons why Special Branch acted cautiously—I
use the adverb "cautiously" to describe what occurred.
I saw the people in Special Branch who were in office at the relevant
time. So far as I can judge from the quite lengthy interviews
I had with them, they are men of integrity. I deliberately did
not go into questions like why certain things were done or not
done.
Q147 Mr Murphy: Do you therefore
think it was a mistake that part of your inquiry was not actually
to ask the question why they acted cautiously?
Sir Peter Gibson: No, if I might
say so. If I had been asked that, I am far from certain I would
have undertaken the inquiry at all, because it seemed to me that
was inevitably going to lead into questions about whether the
police acted properly, well, non-negligently—things like
that. Once you go down that path—and I have seen it in my
career at the Bar and judicially—you open the door to legal
procedures and requirements. For example, if you criticise any
person in a report, the practice these days is to send a draft
to that person; that person then raises queries on the report.
The whole procedure is lengthened very considerably. The Prime
Minister wanted to know how quickly I could produce a report.
It could not have been produced in anything like the timescale
that I followed had extra questions such as that which you have
asked been the subject of my review. Also—if you will allow
me to say this—no documents were produced relating to what
Special Branch was doing at the relevant time. They may have had
various activities ongoing. I know not. But the search for the
truth would have been that much more difficult—and it is
10 years, as you know only too well, since this awful happening.
Q148 Mr Murphy: Given the enormity
of Omagh and the very fact that the inquiry was limited to the
parameters you have outlined, nevertheless this really does go
to the heart of whether indeed, as you say, Special Branch acted
in the cautious way it did. That implies to me that Special Branch
did not do all they could at that particular time. Surely it begs
the question that that should have been part of your investigation?
If it was not then, do you think it would achieve anything reopening
the investigation on that particular part?
Sir Peter Gibson: I have adverted
to the difficulties in finding the truth in relation to that matter.
If, as I have been led to believe, there are no documents, you
are relying only on memories; so I am not confident that it should
have been investigated in that way. Certainly, if a judge does
it—particularly one with my background as a Chancery judge
and a Court of Appeal judge, where I do not deal with crime—I
would not have begun an inquiry like this without assessors. So
you are bringing in experts who would evaluate what it is that
Special Branch were doing at the time and why it was that they
behaved so cautiously. You are second-guessing decisions taken
some 10 years ago. I repeat, that is very difficult.
Q149 Mr Murphy: It is but, given
your background—and I am sure that you always choose your
words very carefully—why did you put that phrase in? "Special
Branch acted in the cautious way it did."
Sir Peter Gibson: Because it was
that, as you will have seen from the paragraph where I set out
the limits of what was handed over, the information was not very
extensive. I implied no more than that.
Q150 Christopher Fraser: Given what
you have just talked about in relation to Special Branch and what
they were doing, can you tell us this? Did they specifically request
intelligence on intercepts before the bombing?
Sir Peter Gibson: This is Special
Branch?
Q151 Christopher Fraser: Yes.
Sir Peter Gibson: I set out in
my report the function of GCHQ and it was in effect to assist
the police, through the agreed mechanisms, in the performance
of their duties. Again, I must be cautious as to what I can say
about what their instructions were, but you will know again from
what I say that GCHQ's speciality is signals intelligence.
Q152 Christopher Fraser: Are you
able to tell us whether there were any requests by Special Branch
to GCHQ in the hours immediately after the bombing?
Sir Peter Gibson: Again, I am
struggling to give you as full a reply as I can without going
into the area where I said I would not go. Perhaps I can put it
negatively. I am not aware of any request made by Special Branch
to GCHQ that was not complied with.
Q153 Stephen Pound: Sir Peter, I
realise that it has already been said a couple of times but please
forgive me for repeating it. It is a great pity that we are having
to put you through this. We are very grateful for your coming
today and I hope you will forgive me for saying that, were the
Chairman able to see the unredacted report, we would all have
been spared this. I know that I speak for my colleagues on my
side of the Committee when I say how much I regret this. Could
I ask you a question that I am not sure you can answer but it
is something that interests us greatly. When GCHQ provides information
to Special Branch, how does it then reach Special Branch itself?
Does it go directly to them or is there a mechanism whereby GCHQ,
both before, during and after Omagh, provides routine intercept
intelligence? Does it go to Special Branch generally or directly
to Special Branch South?
Sir Peter Gibson: I think I say
somewhere that it goes to Special Branch South directly and RUC
headquarters. There is no sort of filter, if that is being suggested,
or anything that holds it up. Indeed I have referred to the fact
that the answers come, if there was a telephone communication—that
is to say, GCHQ speaking on the telephone to Special Branch, that
part of Special Branch which is deputed to receive information—that
is done immediately.
Q154 Stephen Pound: Is that standing
operating procedure? Does that happen in the normal course of
business, if I can use that expression?
Sir Peter Gibson: You may be able
to infer the urgency which would accompany such a communication.
Again, I am sorry to repeat it. GCHQ is there to provide information
which Special Branch want. Special Branch are treated as the experts;
not GCHQ. GCHQ provides the information that is requested and,
as I have indicated, they do so fully and in a timely fashion.
Of course, if there are other things to be done, like typing things
out, then there may be some delay; but no significant delay occurred.
Q155 Stephen Pound: It tends to be
raw data that is not highlighted in any way that is passed from
GCHQ to Special Branch, and they then decide whether to extract
from that or transmit it in toto. Is that correct?
Sir Peter Gibson: That is right.
It does not stop GCHQ from making comments.
Q156 Stephen Pound: Indeed not, but
surely Special Branch had to get clearance from GCHQ before they
could pass any of this data to CID? Would that not slow the process
down quite significantly?
Sir Peter Gibson: There is bound
to be extra time needed in order to comply with those procedures,
yes.
Q157 Stephen Pound: My colleague
earlier on raised the question of the nine-month time lag in analysing
the telephone numbers. Have you any idea what the normal timeline
is for CID clearance to be obtained from GCHQ by Special Branch?
Sir Peter Gibson: No, I really
cannot say what is normal or not normal.
Q158 Stephen Pound: I appreciate
that normality is not the issue here.
Sir Peter Gibson: GCHQ is treating
Special Branch as a customer; so it is trying to do what the customer
wants. If the customer wants something done urgently, it can say
so. If it wants further information, it can do so.
Stephen Pound: I have not heard that
analogy since the high days of New Labour, but—
Chairman: I am not sure that is relevant!
Stephen Pound: I think that is really
as far as I can go with that. I thank you for your courtesy.
Chairman: I do find all of this rather
like having to examine Shakespeare having only read Lamb's
Tales! Could we bring in Dr McDonnell?
Q159 Dr McDonnell: I am listening
to your evidence there, Sir Peter. I am very impressed and I get
the clear impression that GCHQ did its job; but the question I
keep asking myself is what was the point of all the monitoring
if, somewhere or other, it was going to get lost between up there
and down there? Am I correct in arriving at the conclusion that
either rivalry or malfunction somewhere within the Special Branch
allowed all this useful work to go astray?
Sir Peter Gibson: Without being
specific about the points on which complaint has been made, you
will know from the reports, the post-bombing reports, that you
first had the Parliamentary Ombudsman for the Police making certain
criticisms about Special Branch not passing things on. The monitoring
has to be done, of course, by GCHQ if GCHQ's assistance is sought.
A great deal of it may be done by other agencies, such as the
RUC itself. The purpose is to put into the hands of the specialist,
Special Branch, what is being monitored. You are asking a different
question when you are asking about the transmission of information
from Special Branch to, say, the investigating team. That is a
matter for them; it is not up to GCHQ.
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