Undercover Policing

UNCORRECTED TRANSCRIPT OF ORAL EVIDENCE    To be published as HC 772-i

House of commons

oral EVIDENCE

TAKEN BEFORE THE

Home Affairs Committee

Undercover  policing

TUESDAY 25 January 2011

DEPUTY COMMISSIONER Tim Godwin and COMMANDER Bob Broadhurst

Evidence heard in  Public Questions  1-65

USE OF THE TRANSCRIPT

Oral Evidence

Taken before the  Home Affairs Committee

on  Tuesday 25 January 2011

Members present:

Keith Vaz (Chair)

Mr James Clappison

Lorraine Fullbrook

Dr Julian Huppert

Steve McCabe

Alun Michael

Bridget Phillipson

Mark Reckless

Mr David Winnick

________________

Examination of Witnesses

Witnesses:  Deputy Commissioner Tim Godwin, Acting Metropolitan Police Commissioner, and Commander Bob Broadhurst, gave evidence.

Q1 Chair: Could I welcome to the dais Acting Commissioner Godwin and Commander Broadhurst? Could I refer everyone again to the Register of Members’ Interests, where the interests of Members of this Committee are noted? Are there any additional interests that need to be declared for this particular session as opposed to the others? Mr Reckless.

Mark Reckless: I am a member of the Kent Police Authority.

Q2 Chair: Acting Commissioner, you came to see me at my office last Thursday, following a letter that I wrote to you, following evidence that Commander Broadhurst had given to this Committee on 19 May 2009, as part of our inquiry into policing of the G20 protests. You stated to me that you wished to apologise to me, and the Committee, for the evidence that was given by Commander Broadhurst in respect of one particular aspect. Can I thank you, first of all, for coming to see me, and can I thank both you and Commander Broadhurst for coming here at the earliest opportunity to speak to Members of the Committee?

To be clear, the evidence that we are referring to followed a question from a then-Member of the Committee, Tom Brake from Carshalton and Wallington , when he was asking the Commissioner Sir Paul Ste ph enson about the presence of undercover officers at the G20 riots. This is question 350 , Tom Brake to Sir Paul Stephenson , who did not know precisely what was said. Tom Brake said, "Presumably, there were plain clothes officers in the crowd. I would expect there to be to spot the worst troublemakers" . Sir Paul Stephenson replied, "I just have to say the idea that we would put agent provocateurs in the crowd is wholly antithetic to everything I have known about policing for the best part of 34 years". Question 351, Tom Brake says, "Can I ask Commander Broadhurst, please?" Commander Broadhurst replies, "I was obviously the Gold Commander. We had no plain clothes officers deployed within the crowd. It would have been dangerous for them to put plain clothes officers in a crowd like that. The only officers we deploy for intelligence purposes at public order are forward intelligence team officers who are wearing full police uniforms with a yellow jacket with blue shoulders. There were no plain clothes officers deployed at all".

I think that is the bit we are concerned with. There will be other questions on process after I open this. Would you like to say anything on behalf of the Metropolitan Police before we question Commander Broadhurst?

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: I would, Chair. Can I also say a big thank you to you for the way that you saw me very swiftly when I made contact with your office, and for inviting us today to give us an opportunity to put the record straight and, additionally, to apologise in person to the Members of this Committee in terms of that evidence.

Equally, I bring greetings from Sir Paul Stephenson who is currently recovering in Lancashire, as many of you will know, following an operation to remove a tumour from his leg and, subsequently, from a fracture to that leg. As a result, he is recuperating at the moment, and I am the Acting Commissioner, as has been said.

I start by saying that the vast majority of deployments of covert officers is as a result of serious crime; it is a very small amount that actually goes into protest and I know that with the recent media revelations that this is an area of concern. It equally is an area of concern for us, in the sense that we need to understand the dynamics of that and to look to the future. The vast majority of covert officers are deployed against serious crime and they do a great job in very difficult circumstances. They’re immensely brave and courageous in reducing harm.

As a result, I want to be very cautious about answering specific questions that might expose them, which is why we’re also grateful that you’ve facilitated a private briefing for Members around the rules of conduct and use around our covert officers-

Q3 Chair: Can I stop you there? I think that was your suggestion. The Committee has not decided whether to take the evidence in private or in public, and we have not had an opportunity to put it to them. Clearly, we do take evidence in private when that is appropriate, but in view of the public concern I think Members of the Committee will want to look at that again. If we could deal with when you discovered that the evidence that Commander Broadhurst gave to this Committee was wrong.

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: After Commander Broadhurst gave evidence on 19 May 2009, we identified that the City of London Police had in fact deployed originally some plain clothes officers to various locations across the City of London.

Q4 Chair: When did you discover that?

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: That was discovered almost immediately after giving the evidence on 19 May.

Chair: What-in May 2009?

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: In May 2009 and, as a result, Commander Broadhurst and the Metropolitan Police made a letter available to this Committee to clarify that. At the same time, we then put in the protocols with the City of London to make sure that we were aware of any deployments that that force would make in similar operations. Following the recent media coverage around an officer that was deployed by the National Public Order Intelligence Unit-

Q5 Chair: Is that Mr Kennedy, since it’s in the public domain?

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: That is Mr Kennedy.

Q6 Chair: These are the articles in The Guardian about Mr Kennedy?

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: It is, and some of the revelations that he made, and your letter. We did cause some investigations to be made in terms of whether there were any covert officers deployed at G20. What we identified was that there were covert officers deployed by the Metropolitan Police Service, in terms of the G20 protest. As a result of that, I immediately wanted to contact you.

Q7 Chair: Sorry, did you not tell Commander Broadhurst first that the evidence was wrong?

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: Commander Broadhurst was told at about the same time as you were told, and as a result of that we wanted to make sure that, once we’d identified that there had been an error in the evidence, that we would make you aware and then arrange to come here with your permission to apologise in person, and equally to explain.

Q8 Chair: Thank you. Other Members of the Committee will come in and ask questions. I am turning to you now, Commander Broadhurst. So you were first told about this on Thursday. I was told at around about 3.00 pm on Thursday.

Commander Broadhurst: Indeed, sir, that was when-

Chair: Is that when you were told?

Commander Broadhurst: Indeed, sir, yes.

Q9 Chair: What would you like to say to the Committee as a result of the information that was given to you?

Commander Broadhurst: First of all, can I thank you for allowing me to come and may I first of all apologise? When I appeared before you on 19 May 2009, I gave you some information that now appears to be inaccurate and for that I apologise, but at the time I made it it was true to the best of my knowledge, otherwise I would certainly not have said it at the time. If I could briefly, if I may, put that week in context. I think it is important we remember exactly what it was we were dealing with.

Chair: Sorry, could you speak up a little.

Commander Broadhurst: Certainly, sir.

Chair: Thank you.

Commander Broadhurst: The Prime Minister of the day had invited the G20 nations to London for a summit on 2 April. As well as the G20 members, we had a total of 46 protected people in London for that five-day period. That included a State visit, with all the trappings that go with a State visit, and the first visit outside north America of the newly inaugurated President of the United States, Barack Obama-so a total of 46 VIPs to be moved around London.

As you can imagine, that began to attract a number of protests and I think, by the end of that week-or before that-we had been notified of 26 potential demonstrations that week; the majority on either 1 April or 2 April. Of course, for some time now 1 April has traditionally been a day of protest in London, and just an unlucky coincidence in some respects around that.

So, clearly, there was a security operation; there was a protest-some protest-to be managed. There was a good deal of chatter on open source, that is on the internet, on protest websites, about a desire to either stop the City of London on 1 April or indeed disrupt the summit on 2 April. Therefore, I am now looking at a large-scale security operation meeting with some degree of protest, and in that five-day period I deployed just under 12,000 officer shifts in five days, in an operation the Commissioner at the time referred to as the biggest peacetime operation the Met had done. So that puts it in the scale, size and context.

Q10 Chair: That is very helpful. Can you now move on?

Commander Broadhurst: I was just about to, sir.

Chair: I am concerned with your statement to the Committee more than anything else.

Commander Broadhurst: Indeed.

Chair: We did produce a report about the G20.

Commander Broadhurst: I know and I have read that. I was just trying to put it in context, sir.

Chair: Thank you.

Commander Broadhurst: At the time, the G20 was one of, fortunately, very few large-scale protests that descended into large-scale disorder during that period. As a result, the support of covert policing that we had once enjoyed had moved on, as Mr Godwin has said, elsewhere. I get intelligence for events from a number of sources, and some of that is provided to me by specialists from the covert policing world. That is the same for a number of events. Knowing how busy those specialists were, I hadn’t asked for covert policing at any of those protests, and wasn’t aware that I had any.

Q11 Chair: Would you have been told? You have been the Gold Commander in the past at other events of this kind. You are going to be in charge of the Olympics, I understand. Is it a duty of those who control these undercover agents to have told you? Ought you to have known that there were undercover agents there? Is this a question you ought to have asked somebody?

Commander Broadhurst: There is a review going on into that, sir. Certainly there have been events where I have known.

Q12 Chair: So what would they do, they would ring you up and tell you, would they?

Commander Broadhurst: Not necessarily. I would always have a specialist working to me on intelligence. Normally, they will tell me.

Q13 Chair: This did not happen so you did not know?

Commander Broadhurst: It didn’t happen on this occasion. Hence, I need to find out why that happened. It may well be, as you said, I didn’t ask the right questions, but genuinely I did not know.

Q14 Chair: As it stands, somebody ought to have told you or you ought to have asked somebody. This did not happen, so what you said to the Committee was what you knew?

Commander Broadhurst: Indeed.

Q15 Mr Winnick: Commander Broadhurst, obviously, we have noted and accepted your apology over the misleading information which was given to the Committee on 19 May.

Commander Broadhurst: Thank you.

Mr Winnick: But can I just point out to you that, when Mr Brake asked a question about plain clothes police officers, which you said didn’t occur, he followed it up by saying, if I may quote what Mr Brake said at that Committee meeting, "In which case, Commander Broadhurst, can I ask you what explanation there is for two men who I personally saw walking through the police lines where I had attempted to secure the release, if I can put it that way, of a number of people who needed medical attention…?" I would have thought that that would have given you some indication that there were plain clothes officers. Did you follow up what Mr Brake had pointed out to you?

Commander Broadhurst: Indeed, sir, Mr Brake’s complaint or that allegation was investigated. The officers on the investigation team looked specifically at the time and location that Mr Brake thought he had seen or these people were seen. We could not identify anybody that meets that. Mr Brake was made aware of that and I believe he withdrew that particular complaint.

Q16 Mr Winnick: Would it be wrong to come to the conclusion that, on a number of large-scale operations, it has been normal practice to have plain clothes officers? It may well be justified in view of the position, but it is not necessarily an exception for plain clothes officers to be involved?

Commander Broadhurst: No, sir, it’s not an exception at all.

Q17 Mr Winnick: So, if you say that, Commander, one accepts that plain clothes officers are at demonstrations?

Commander Broadhurst: They can be at some, if we think there is a risk of violence or crime being committed, yes.

Mr Winnick: Yes. So, why would you-

Chair: Sorry, Mr Winnick, one second, Commissioner.

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: Can I say that one of the problems that we sometimes get is the difference between plain clothes officers and covert officers, and so on, but if we are deploying specific covert officers we do need to comply with the regulations of the procedures investigations Act. Therefore, we do need to have authorities, and so it doesn’t always automatically occur that we deploy covert officers, on the basis that we have to satisfy the test of seriousness, necessity and proportionality, sufficient for the oversight of the Office of Surveillance Commissioners, so we may and we may not.

Chair: Thank you.

Q18 Mr Winnick: One is somewhat surprised that at a large-scale demonstration like G20, it would not be assumed that the police would in fact have plain clothes officers for all kinds of reasons. Yet, Mr Broadhurst, you were so absolutely sure in giving your answer there were no such officers.

Commander Broadhurst: And I was wrong, sir, and I have apologised.

Mr Winnick: Yes.

Q19 Dr Huppert: It seems that it might be helpful in future to Gold Commanders if there is a simple tick box so that they can be informed. Can I ask, after saying there weren’t any plain clothes officers deployed you gave the reason for why. You said, "It would have been dangerous for them to put plain clothes officers in a crowd like that". Do you think that is an accurate comment, and do you think that the City police, I think it was, who did supply plain clothes officers were putting them in an extremely dangerous position?

Commander Broadhurst: First of all, the City police only had them in observation points, not in the crowd, and I think we cleared that up at the time. There are inherent dangers in putting covert officers into many situations, but also crowd situations, and one of my concerns about not knowing is I wouldn’t be able to help them or go to their assistance if I didn’t know they were there. These are some of the issues we need to look at and make sure we put right for the future.

Q20 Dr Huppert: Can I also ask, both above and below you, the Commissioner was next to you; should the Commissioner have known about the presence of plain clothes officers in this demonstration?

Commander Broadhurst: No, sir, it is my operation. I should have known. I didn’t and I’ve apologised.

Q21 Dr Huppert: Presumably, there was somebody below you at some level who knew; you do have Silver intelligence or something like that. They presumably would have known that there were plain clothes officers. Did they not follow the discussion that happened about this? I'm surprised it takes so long-from 2009 to January-for somebody to have informed you that your statement was inaccurate.

Commander Broadhurst: Clearly, that is one of the issues that I need to look at.

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: One of the things that we did, for that very reason, is we have pulled all the media coverage at that point, as to how widespread was the knowledge at that time that Commander Broadhurst had made that question. At the moment it doesn’t seem to have been a main issue that was being addressed or reported. There was the issue about agents provocateurs, which of course we do still not believe to be the case.

Q22 Chair: So you don’t know whether there were agents provocateurs there or not?

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: No, no, what we are saying is that the evidence that we gave about agents provocateurs we still stand by, and-

Q23 Chair: So there weren’t any?

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: Not agents provocateurs, and what we are doing, just to make absolutely sure is we’re looking at all the logs of all the officers that were deployed and all of the evidence we have around that to make 100% sure, but in all the stuff we’ve done so far there weren’t agents provocateurs. That was the coverage, so it may well be that they didn’t realise that Commander Broadhurst had said what he said.

Chair: Thank you, Commissioner.

Q24 Alun Michael: Mr Godwin, you’ve acted very speedily to correct wrong information, and that is commendable. Would you agree that that needs to be the absolute standard for everyone at every level in the Met on all occasions?

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: I’d like to think that it is.

Q25 Alun Michael: In that event, can I just ask about the comment that was made that information came to light last May that officers had been deployed by the City of London Police? Would it not have been appropriate to provide that information to this Committee last May, rather than just recently?

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: No, that was May 2009-

Alun Michael: 2009, I beg your pardon, yes.

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: -which was straight after we came away that it was identified at that point that there were City of London officers there who were more overt. As a result of that, a letter was sent immediately to this Committee, as soon as that was identified, to correct it.

Q26 Alun Michael: I see. I was gaining the impression that that was not done at that time, but it was?

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: It was, yes.

Q27 Alun Michael: So what was the difference between the information that was given then and the more recent information?

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: Well, it is only following the revelations around the Nottinghamshire investigation that collapsed, and the revelations about the officer deployed by the National Public Order Intelligence Unit working for ACPO.

Chair: Yes, we are going to come on to that.

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: He then identified and then we went and looked at it following the letter.

Q28 Alun Michael: Can I just ask one other question to Mr Broadhurst? You referred to now looking into the situation and why it was that you didn’t have the information that you lacked at that time. Can we expect to be fully informed about the outcome of that investigation when you’ve had the time to undertake it?

Commander Broadhurst: I shall report to Mr Godwin. I would imagine that is his decision.

Q29 Chair: Who is actually undertaking this investigation into what went wrong?

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: At the moment, there are a number of inquiries going on. There is an Independent Police Complaints investigation into the role of the NPOIU officer; there is a thematic review by Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary about the conduct and use of the NPOIU, and the role of covert policing and protest.

Q30 Chair: So when will Commander Broadhurst have his answer, why nobody told him? How many months will we have to wait for this?

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: Well, hopefully, not many months, and I am not privy to where some of that is, because some of it may well be wrapped up into discipline inquiries, and all the rest of it, which of course creates concerns for you.

Can I say one other thing about intelligence, though? It isn’t always the case that you are told the source of intelligence when you ask for an intelligence requirement, because there are safeguards of where that might have come from; whether it is what we used to call a person who is acting as an informant, now a covert human intelligence source, which is always a mouthful, or whether it is an officer who is deployed covertly, because of the protections around those individuals. So, as a result of that, you don’t automatically always know where the source of the intelligence is and nor should you.

Mr Clappison: Are we coming on to the wider issues?

Chair : I am, in a second.

Q31 Mr Clappison: Could I just ask one very brief question then? To be absolutely clear, you had no knowledge about either the plain clothes officer from the City of London or the covert officers or any other plain clothes officers in the crowd at the time?

Commander Broadhurst: No, sir.

Mr Clappison: For my part, I accept that explanation.

Q32 Steve McCabe: I hope no one is going to want to castigate any officer for what is a genuine mistake, but I do think what possibly matters now is how credible the account that we’re now being given is, because obviously people will have doubts. I wonder if I could just try to understand: I’m right in thinking that the Gold Commander should normally be thought of as the person with overall responsibility for the operation.

Commander Broadhurst: Indeed so, yes.

Q33 Steve McCabe: In this case, what we’re being asked to believe is that an element within the Metropolitan Police and within the City of London Police both had officers involved in the operation that the Gold Commander wasn’t told about?

Commander Broadhurst: That’s true, sir, which is why I tried to give the scale of the operation. Ultimately, I was in charge. I should have known.

Q34 Steve McCabe: So it is reasonable for me to conclude that someone within the Metropolitan Police, who you have still yet to identify through the reviews and inquiries actually deployed those officers and forgot or omitted to tell you. That is a reasonable conclusion to draw. Is that right?

Commander Broadhurst: I would imagine, sir, they were deployed in all good faith.

Q35 Steve McCabe: I’m not disputing that, but I’m saying someone did authorise that deployment but omitted to tell you. That is what we should conclude, is that right?

Commander Broadhurst: It is not necessarily omitted to tell me; the fault may have been mine.

Steve McCabe: Forgot, omitted, didn’t tell you.

Commander Broadhurst: For some reason, sir, I didn’t know.

Q36 Steve McCabe: Ultimately, when you have finished working your way through the plethora of inquiries there is someone who deployed those officers. That is all I’m trying to establish, and you will eventually know who that was. Is that right?

Commander Broadhurst: Yes, sir.

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: Yes, we will, but the other point, in terms of the discipline inquiries, I’m not suggesting that there is a discipline investigation at this moment into those officers, in terms of those deployments, albeit we are reviewing the process. The discipline inquiries are into the Nottinghamshire allegations that have been made against specific people, which the Chief Constable has kicked off from Nottinghamshire, and equally a discipline investigation into revelations about a former undercover officer, or covert officer, in the late 1990s.

Q37 Steve McCabe: As I say, I don’t want to see anyone castigated for an honest mistake; I’m only trying to establish the credibility of what we’re being told now. It seems to me that what people will accept as credible is that you will now discover who authorised that deployment and how it is they managed to do it without reference to the Gold Commander. I would have thought you would be more anxious than me to get to that point.

Chair: The answer must be y es.

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: The answer is yes, but I do refer to my previous answer that sometimes intelligence cells sanitise the information so that you can’t actually brief individuals.

Q38 Steve McCabe: But in this case, as you’ve just said in your evidence, we’re talking about plain clothes officers; you drew the distinction between undercover agents and plain clothes officers a moment ago, so in this case we will be able to uncover, without it being sanitised, who authorised the plain clothes deployment, won’t we?

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: Yes, we will, and equally what they were deployed to do.

Chair: The inquiry is going on.

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: Absolutely.

Q39 Chair: Can I move on? Last week the Policing Minister announced that the National Public Order Intelligence Unit was to be put under the auspices of the Met, having originally started at the Met and then gone off to ACPO.

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: Yes.

Q40 Chair: In fact, at the moment, in terms of agencies dealing with protestors, there are still four under the control of ACPO: the National Extremism Tactical Co-ordination Unit; the National Domestic Extremism Team; the National Public Order Intelligence Unit; there is also the Welsh Extremism and Counter-Terrorism Unit; plus the four others that are controlled by SOCA, yourselves, CO19, as well as M15 and the Counter-Terrorism Unit. There seem to be an awful lot of units around this particular area. Does this cause you concern when you are going to be having this particular baby passed to you?

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: I think that we need to make sure that we understand, one, what has been going on and, two, what we need to do for the future. Hence, I very much welcome Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary, which is reviewing all those issues about: what is extremism and what is protest; what do we deploy in terms of protest; what are the rules that we comply with in terms of serious necessity proportionality?

Q41 Chair: At the moment, is this unit still under the auspices of ACPO, or has it been physically handed over to yourselves-because I understand there is a meeting on Friday for Chief Constables to ratify this decision?

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: Yes, that is correct. So at the moment it is in the transition but it does require the agreement of Chief Constables to pass that judgement.

Chief: So it is still with ACPO.

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: It is still with ACPO as we speak.

Q42 Chair: It will remain with ACPO for how long?

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: Probably until Monday.

Chair: Until Monday. Yes, Mr Reckless.

Q43 Mark Reckless: That needs the agreement of Chief Constables to transfer?

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: Yes.

Q44 Mark Reckless: ACPO is a private company. This unit was in the Met , went to ACPO , is now going back to the Met. Who is responsible for taking these decisions and under what powers are they made?

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: The National Public Order Intelligence Unit and the others mentioned, not the Security Service and the SOCA ones, but those under ACPO come within the business area of ACPO (Terrorism and Allied Matters). So that particular business area of ACPO makes those decisions that then go through ACPO.

As a result of the concerns that were raised about those particular units, in terms of the lead force arrangements, we offered to take it back into Governance and Control. We have a Covert Standards Unit now in the Met; we have a Covert Command; we have a professional commander that makes sure that we comply with the guidance and the standards, and that is why it is going across. Those units will be sanitised in the sense of some merging and making them more readily appropriate for the challenges that we face, and all this will be dealt with through the HMI review.

Q45 Mark Reckless: You have been giving evidence to a Parliamentary Committee and you have told us it is required to go through these processes, but ACPO is a private company. I don’t understand why it is required, or for that matter allowed, that this unit transfers from you to ACPO and then back to you, on the basis of some constitution set out in Articles of a private company. What I want to know, as far as this Committee is concerned, is on what statutory basis, in terms both of the MPS and Ministers, is the decision made?

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: In that case, in terms of the statutory basis, I can’t tell you. I’m not briefed on that. In terms of the means of operating with ACPO in 2005 when these decisions were first taken, then that would have gone through the ACPO rules at that point, and as a result of that there is asset that has paid for these units that come from a number of police forces. As a result of that, it has to go through that process to hand that asset over to us to manage on behalf of the national police.

Q46 Chair: Tell me: who will be in charge of this operation once it comes to the Met-which officer?

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: I think what we need to do is look at what the review is in relation to Her Majesty’s-

Chair: It is coming on Monday so somebody must be going to be running it.

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: Initially, it would come within the specialist operations, and that would link with Assistant Commissioner John Yates.

Chair: John Yates. Yes, Dr Huppert.

Q47 Dr Huppert: Thank you. I share Mr Reckless’ concern. If you say that the approval of Chief Constables is required, that implies they could choose not to give their approval, and I am deeply uncomfortable with a unit like this being at the whim of unelected people in an unaccountable private body. It seems to me this is something that should be accountable to Ministers and to Parliament. I think there is a general concern, which comes up with all of these issues, about scrutiny, whether it is the use of undercover officers in particular operations. Where is the scrutiny accountability? Is there transparency so that people should reasonably know? Where is the scrutiny about this whole area? The Chairman mentioned a number of different organisations .

Chair: Eight.

Dr Huppert: I wasn’t counting, I’ m afraid, Chair . I t’s not clear to me at all how those are accountable; who actually is responsible for their decisions; how that person reports to Ministers and to Parliament.

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: In terms of the specific operations of the National Public Order Intelligence Unit, for example, in order to deploy against a specific task intelligence requirement, that will be the requirement of the force that is requesting them to do it. So it still will go through the governance and oversight of that force, as in the case of the recent revelations about an individual officer. That was dealt with through Nottinghamshire Police, and it was a Nottinghamshire Police-run intelligence operation. That is all part of the IPCC investigation.

So basically, on ACPO, the decision making rested with Home Forces. What will now come out, is that we will make sure there is consistency of standard-and I do not envisage any Chief Constables disagreeing when it goes up on Friday-in terms of those authorities making sure that there is the regulation of the investigative procedures Act.

In terms of governance as well, all those deployments come within the Office of the Surveillance Commissioners, and there are checks and balances and dip checks around that for all those deployments. Additionally, there will be governance within those various police areas through their police authorities. What will occur this time is that it will come under the governance and oversight of the Metropolitan Police Authority, or its replacement depending on the progress of the Bill.

Q48 Mark Reckless: Acting Commissioner, you referred to an officer deployed by ACPO, I think, at G20 and also specifically said the Metropolitan Police had deployed at the G20. Which was it of the Met or ACPO that was responsible for one or more undercover officers we now know about?

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: As you know from revelations in the media, there was an officer from the National Public Order Intelligence Unit that wasn’t deployed by ACPO; it was an ACPO unit, but he was deployed by Nottinghamshire under Nottinghamshire authorities, which is part of the investigation about the power station and so on. There were also, though, covert assets deployed by the intelligence cell of the Metropolitan Police.

Q49 Chair: Is it no wonder that Commander Broadhurst did not know what was going on with so many different units involved?

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: I think, when you’re running a huge operation of the scale that Commander Broadhurst was running, you can’t know everything all the time. Equally, as I said before, with intelligence you don’t always know the source. However, I think what this has done is given us a sharp lesson in terms of protection to look at those, and we will look at that-

Chair: Indeed. A final question then, Mr Winnick.

Q50 Mark Reckless: Yes. I think what is proposed is these three national units moving from ACPO to Metropolitan as lead force. However, can you clarify the situation with undercover policing more generally? My understanding is the usual practice is for a force to use an officer from another force, in terms of protecting against recognition, and so on, and that Jim Murphy, I think the Chief Constable of Merseyside, with an Assistant Chief Constable there helping-whether as Merseyside or ACPO, I’m not sure-are in some way responsible for this pool and how it works. Is that the case and can you explain any more to us?

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: Chief Constable Murphy is the Business Lead for ACPO, in terms of the conduct and use of covert officers. Equally, we do have protocols about moving covert officers around that we share between forces, but the person who makes the decision to deploy will be someone-depending on what they’re being asked to do-an Assistant Chief Constable or a Commander that would do that authority for that force to do that deployment.

Q51 Mr Winnick: Mr Godwin, all this has come to light-undercover agents and the rest of it-arising from a Nottinghamshire case that collapsed, which you mentioned. The police officer involved, Mark Kennedy, was a Met officer. Is that the position?

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: He was.

Q52 Mr Winnick: Apparently, according to the press accounts, he was an undercover agent with one particular group-an environmental protest group, if that is the way it could be described-for some seven years. Does that come as a surprise to you?

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: I have a slight degree of difficulty here because obviously this is an Independent Police Complaints Commission investigation into that specific operation, and all that will come through.

Chair: If you cannot answer then just say.

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: In that case, Chair, with respect, I feel unable to answer that question.

Q53 Mr Winnick: Can I put this to you, Mr Godwin, if you can’t answer that question: do you understand the disquiet that exists among many people about the allegations-let’s put it no higher-that undercover agents so employed themselves that they engaged in intimate relations? Some of the women have said they had affairs with the undercover agents, with consent of course, but with no knowledge they were undercover agents. Indeed, one said it almost amounted in her view to state prostitution. These are matters of great public concern, are they not, that agents, even if they weren’t acting in a provocative way-and that is another allegation-so acted however in private matters, which as I say is bound to cause a great deal of disquiet?

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: I fully understand that disquiet which is why, in terms of those revelations, there are two investigations going into the conduct of those individuals involved. I think Chief Constable Murphy has made it very clear that the current guidance would not permit that to take place. As a result of that, there is an investigation.

Q54 Mr Winnick: You see, the police have stated; a very senior police officer says that relationships should not occur, but can I put it to you, Mr Godwin, if an agent over a period of time has infiltrated a group, whether it is right or wrong to do so, and acts in such a way that will mean that he or she, as the case may be, doesn’t form any sort of relationships, that is a sort of giveaway, isn’t it? The general consensus would be among that group, "Well, we’re dealing with a police officer". So if senior police officers have given that instruction, if it has been an instruction, have they done so on the basis that it’s likely to be implemented in practice?

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: We generally only give instructions that we intend to be implemented. Can I just say again that there have been revelations, there have been accusations, but they need to be investigated as to what actually occurred, why it occurred, and that is part of an ongoing investigation which I don’t particularly want to go into? Additionally, I don’t particularly want to go into the means of deployment of covert officers. We will obviously be negotiating with yourself, Chair, in terms of how we can go through that with you as Members without actually putting anyone at risk.

Can I just say that the vast majority of the men and women that fulfil this function on behalf of the police service are some of the bravest, most courageous people that we actually have, and they have lots of controls both in legislative terms, and lots of controls in terms of governance and oversight? Every now and again things go wrong and obviously we need to investigate those and we need to find out what has occurred, but the vast majority do a splendid job for this country.

Chair: You are right to mention that. In fact, when I raised other issues on this matter with the Minister, for example, the expenses claimed by some of those involved, he did say this was a matter for ACPO, so I have written to Sir Hugh Orde to ask him, because that is another concern, I think: the idea of lots of very expensive cars being bought and watches that can tape-record other people. It is really James Bond stuff rather than basic policing. Lorraine Fullbrook had a question.

Q55 Lorraine Fullbrook: Thank you, Chairman. I would just like to put on the record: do you not agree that it is unfair, unjust and wrong to target or smear all covert officers, because of one rogue officer, for example, in Nottingham? As you say, they are the bravest of the brave, and that is not an example of covert officers in this country.

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: I think if that was the case where that was the tenor of that, that would be unjust and unfair should we smear everyone, that everybody behaved in that fashion. I think what we need to do is to investigate the allegations that have been made and come to conclusions in the appropriate way.

Q56 Mr Winnick: No one has suggested that. In order that this should be absolutely clear, no one has suggested that all agents have acted in that way; no one in this Committee has suggested that some of the work undertaken, particularly against terrorism, is not absolutely essential in order to safeguard the country. What we are concerned about, in order to get this record absolutely clear, are abuses and whether in fact certain groups should have been targeted at all, but the need for undercover agents, particularly against terrorism and criminal gangs, is not going to be questioned by anyone who is concerned with the rule of law.

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: Thank you; I am grateful for that.

Chair: Thank you, Mr Winnick. Dr Huppert has a question.

Q57 Dr Huppert: Mr Winnick leads on nicely to it-about the range of organisations that are targeted under this process. We have a lot of concern that rather surprising groups appear to have been targeted. How do you decide which organisations are a real risk and how many are a group of environmental protesters who just happen to disagree with what the Government is doing?

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: Again, I don’t want to get into specifics for obvious reasons, but the one thing we have to do is comply by law, which is it has to be a serious offence that we are concerned about and that the deployment of covert tactics is necessary and proportionate, and that is challengeable by the Office of Surveillance Commissioners and we get dip checked around it. So there are safeguards in law to make sure that is done.

Q58 Dr Huppert: How often does the Commissioner check what is happening? Does the Commissioner get full details of what is happening?

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: The Commissioner will be told about the various deployments through the various authority processes, and they will make their decisions as to how they do it; how do they audit people, how do they review. We in the Met have had numerous audits by the Surveillance Commissioner about our deployments.

Q59 Dr Huppert: So the Commissioner would be in a position to know about every covert operation being done in the country?

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: They would know about the authority; they would dip check which ones are being done, and so on, and they will do their own checking. It would be impractical for them to check every single one, but they have their ways and means to ensure compliance.

Q60 Dr Huppert: They would have full access to any that they chose to check?

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: They can access whatever they want in terms of their audits.

Q61 Chair: We are coming to the end of this session. What worries, I think, Members of the Committee is the huge pressure that is now building up on the Met. You mention the fact that this new unit is going to be under the auspices of Mr Yates, who is himself conducting a number of investigations into other matters. This Committee is just concluding its investigation into phone hacking. Does it concern you that, with the resources that are going to be available to the Met, you can actually cope with all that is going on, and do you think that some of this stuff should go to the National Crime Agency rather than be dealt with by the Metropolitan Police? I'm talking about the specialist issues that seem to always fall on the desk of poor Mr Yates.

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: Mr Yates has a very big team, and equally, sir, it is not all done by John on his own. Additionally, we have the Specialist Crime Directorate as well, which has Covert Command within it. So it’s not all within his domain. Can we cope? Yes. I have been in London 10 years, and have I ever known it not to be busy and challenging? No. Are we used to being challenged? Yes. We take something like 13,000 phone calls a day first of all from the police service. We are a very big operation.

Q62 Chair: You think you can deal with all these matters in a timely and efficient way?

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: We can, but the one thing that with 55,000 people, 750,000 crimes, I can’t always say that somebody won’t make a mistake. Equally, I can’t always say that the Commanders will know what every single member of our staff is doing.

Q63 Chair: It is just that the former Prime Minister has said he wrote to the Met four months ago asking whether or not his phone had been hacked and he has not received a response. Have you enquired into why that was the case?

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: I haven’t enquired into the specifics about not receiving a response, but obviously I have had a conversation with the Director of Public Prosecutions only yesterday, in the sense of the assessment of all the evidence by Alison Levitt QC.

Q64 Chair: Because the last time Mr Yates was before us he said that he would contact the 133 people whose names were in the books as being hacked. I’m not sure whether he has done this or not, but I will be writing to him about it.

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: I am grateful for that because I don’t know, and it would be inappropriate for me to say.

Q65 Chair: Indeed. Commander Broadhurst, it is of course a very serious matter to mislead a Committee of this House. I think you have apologised to the Committee at least half a dozen times since you sat before us. We are extremely grateful to you for coming here at the very first opportunity to explain why the evidence that you gave to the Committee was wrong. You did absolutely the right thing.

And I am grateful to you, Commissioner, for coming to see me at an early opportunity to put the matter right. As far as this Committee is concerned, in respect of your evidence I think that is where the matter rests. However, we would be keen to know about the process. I am sure you would be keen to know, as Mr McCabe said. You must have been pretty angry to find out that information that you didn’t receive was subsequently given to the Select Committee in the way in which it had been given. I am sure you want to know the answer as to what happened, why you weren’t told. Indeed, as you very transparently have said to this Committee, it may have been your fault. You don’t know. I think as soon as we have that result the better.

We will take you up on your offer, Commissioner, for a briefing on undercover agents. The Committee hasn’t discussed this , but we will see whether or not we wish to enquire further into these matters. Obviously, Members are very concerned about the recent allegations in the newspapers, and I think we want to make sure these things are properly run.

But we would like to place on record our appreciation for the work that is done by many, many of your officers. As Mr Winnick has said, and Mrs Fullbrook has said, in the counter-terrorism agenda , you have to use these methods and we understand it.

Deputy Commissioner Godwin: Thank you, Chair.

Chair: Thank you very much for coming.