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Lord Renton: I am puzzled. I do not see why we need a commissioner as well as the director general referred to in Clause 6, to which I did not hear the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh, refer. If we look at Clause 6 we find in subsection (1),
- "NCIS shall have a Director General appointed by the NCIS Service Authority on such terms and conditions as the Authority considers appropriate".
- In subsection (2) it says that,
"The Director General shall be chosen by a panel of members of the Authority from a list of persons eligible for appointment which has been prepared by that panel and approved by the Secretary of State".
The noble Lord, Lord McIntosh of Haringey, now wants to drag the Prime Minister into this and say that the Prime Minister shall appoint a commissioner. I am sure that we cannot have both solutions and I should have thought that the one in the Bill was the right one.
Perhaps I may be greatly daring and refer back to the discussion on drafting that we had on a previous amendment. In his new clause the noble Lord used the expression,
- "the quality, accuracy and content of criminal intelligence information".
- There we have tautology if ever we had it. The noble Lord said "any information"; he wants information. I should have thought therefore that if the new clause is to be introduced it should read, "the content of criminal information gathered or stored by NCIS".
Clearly an independent commissioner appointed by the Prime Minister is nothing to do with the appointment by the Home Secretary or by the steering authority of a director general. The director general is in managerial, administrative charge of the organisation. The proposed commissioner is an independent check on the quality and accuracy of the information collected and would be responsible also for laying down rules in regard to disclosure and retention.
In relation to the use of the phrase "criminal intelligence information", if the noble Lord, Lord Renton, reads with his usual assiduity he will discover that we have taken that phrase from other parts of the Bill, in the same way as we have taken all of the references to the appointment and responsibilities of the commissioner from Clauses 93 to 95 of the Bill.
Lord Hylton: Before the Minister replies on this amendment, can he say what are the Government's plans to ensure that information gained by NCIS remains there and is only used for bona fide police purposes? I ask that question because it seems to me that much of the information will be highly sensitive and possibly damaging to people's reputations.
We have all heard of "cheque book journalism". There may be pressures from the media to obtain information when they should not be obtaining it; equally, there could be pressures from commercial organisations which want to find out what information is held. I hope therefore that we can hear what the safeguards are to be so that the information is not improperly disclosed.
Baroness Seccombe: I see the appointment of a commissioner as an extra layer of bureaucracy. When we have important and sensitive information, the fewer people involved the better. There is machinery to ensure that the NCIS is working properly. We must never forget that the thrust of the Bill is to fight sophisticated organised crime. Very often no crime has been committed. Therefore, it is to try to stop crimes being committed that we need a body such as the NCIS.
Lord Thomas of Gresford: I support the amendment. I come back to the point I made earlier concerning the enhanced criminal record certificates. A chief officer of a police force may provide any information which in the chief officer's opinion might be relevant for the purposes described in the statement. Any information in the possession of the chief constable may find its way onto an enhanced criminal record certificate which can be used for employment purposes. With respect, this is not an additional layer of bureaucracy. This is an important safeguard. The amendment seeks to introduce an independent person--independent of the Home Secretary and independent even of the NCIS itself--to deal with,
- "the quality, accuracy and content of criminal intelligence information".
My experience is that the accuracy of information that is kept in files may not be guaranteed. I recall a colleague of mine who discovered that in a file concerning him kept not very far away from your Lordships' House he was described as a married man with four children, which did not disturb him, and a Liberal, which did. He had clearly been confused with me. That may have affected his employment prospects and his career. It was just by accident that he discovered this inaccuracy. With the appointment of a commissioner who can act independently, the accuracy of such criminal intelligence information as my life could be checked.
5.15 p.m.
Baroness Blatch: I shall reject the advice of the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh of Haringey, and go down the road of one of the points raised by my noble friend Lord Renton. My noble friend Lord Renton said that the effect of the amendment would be to drag the Prime Minister and yet another layer of bureaucracy into the system. I shall come back to safeguards. I have been drawn by a number of Members of the Committee on to the issue of safeguards and I shall refer to them.
I believe that the arrangements proposed in the amendment would be impractical to operate and would impose a further layer of bureaucracy which could hinder the NCIS's vital contribution to the fight against organised crime. Any new arrangements would be in addition to procedures that already exist in the NCIS. Those include induction procedures for new staff covering duty to use and handle information responsibly and an internal inspection process which reports to the director-general. It is an obligation on the director general--this point was made by my noble friend--to operate in accordance with the provisions of the Act. He will have no alternative. Not only that; the director general will be responsible to the service authority, so there is that layer too. I shall come back to even greater safeguards in a moment.
In considering the amendment, it is important to understand the role of the NCIS. It is not itself an investigating body. The role of investigating will remain with the police, Customs and Excise and other law enforcement agencies. Together they will provide much of the information and intelligence collated and developed by the NCIS. They must be responsible in the first place for the quality, for the accuracy and for the content of the information that they pass to the NCIS. That is where the importance of accuracy of content is concerned. In turn, the NCIS must do all it can to verify the information. It already carefully grades information to take account of its source and its likely accuracy. For example, information provided by a police officer about an event witnessed by the officer would be graded A1. On the other hand, hearsay information supported by a less reliable source would receive a lower grading. I see no practical way in which the proposed commissioner could check the quality, accuracy and content of the information gathered and stored by the NCIS without going back to the source of the information or the subject of the intelligence report. In addition to the logistical difficulties, there is the risk that in some cases sensitive police investigations against some of the world's worst criminals operating in this country would be jeopardised.
The NCIS is a policing body and provisions in the Bill place it firmly within the controls that apply to the police. That is one safeguard. The Bill extends the role of Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary to cover the NCIS and envisages a formal complaints procedure for staff in the NCIS based on the current police complaints regime. That regime is open, it contains an independent element in the shape of the Police Complaints Authority and it works well. Any member of the public who has concerns about the way the NCIS has or may have dealt with him will be able to use the
complaints procedure to address his concerns. Equally, any member of the NCIS who disclosed information when he should not would be dealt with as appropriate through the discipline procedures or the courts. The complaints and disciplinary regime in the NCIS will be established by regulations made by the Secretary of State under Clauses 37 and 38 of the Bill. Those regulations will be laid before Parliament, which is a partial answer to the point raised by the noble Lord, Lord Hylton.As to legal proceedings, the NCIS is subject to the Data Protection Act, although I take the caveat mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh. Some of the Data Protection Act will bite. But where the exemption applies when the NCIS is in pursuit of a serious crime I hope Members of the Committee opposite will support us--that the exemption is important. If there is an exemption which allows it to pursue crime and to carry out its role we should be on the side of the NCIS. Nevertheless, there is the Data Protection Act. An officer gaining unauthorised access to computer material could be prosecuted under the Computer Misuse Act 1990. Its staff could also find themselves liable for prosecution under the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act if they improperly disclose information from which the recipient could impute that someone had had a spent conviction. There is also the possibility that a member of the NCIS using information improperly could be the subject of an action for breach of confidence. A commissioner would not strengthen or improve any of these arrangements.
The need to retain information must be informed by the other information available--for example, about the associates of a person and their activities--and judgments about the relevance of that information at the time or the likely relevance of the information in the future. These are operational decisions which quite rightly rest, as my noble friend said, with the director-general of the NCIS. They are matters which the director-general takes very seriously. The NCIS has a strict weeding policy to ensure that unnecessary information is not stored needlessly. This weeding policy also serves the practical purpose of ensuring that the NCIS is not swamped by information which is being held needlessly. These are not matters for a commissioner.
In opposing the amendment, I am mindful that the Bill makes provision for a commissioner to oversee the authorisation of intrusive surveillance operations and that Security Service activity of this kind is subject to oversight by a commissioner. Comparisons with these other commissioners is not valid. The sole purpose of a surveillance commissioner is to ensure that the proper procedures for authorisation are followed. Similarly, the Security Service Commissioner exists to investigate that warrants permitting the Security Service to enter on or interfere with property have been properly authorised.
The amendment would provide an extra layer of bureaucracy. We certainly believe that it would be impractical. The idea of a commissioner with oversight, delving around within the NCIS for the accuracy of the content when the accuracy of the content is way down
with the Customs officer, the police officer or the person gathering information and carrying out the investigation is wholly impractical.The bodies are subject to the National Audit Office, the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act and the Computer Misuse Act. As I have said, they have induction programmes for internal purposes. There are internal inspections and Her Majesty's Inspectorate would externally inspect. There is a formal complaints procedure and the bodies will be governed by the improper disclosure of information regulations. That could result in internal disciplinary measures being taken or legal remedy in the courts.
There are so many safeguards built into the Bill and if one more layer were to be added it would not add to the security of the way in which these bodies carry out their work. We have to strike the right balance. These are very sensitive matters for which oversight by a commissioner provides the best way to ensure that powers may be used properly, but that is not necessary in the case of the NCIS given its role and the other means of ensuring its accountability. In fulfilling the role intended by this amendment, the commissioner would also be duplicating the existing effective and open oversight arrangements that apply to the police and which the Bill would extend to the NCIS. In my view the proposals in this amendment would hinder rather than help the fight against crime.
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