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Lord Pearson of Rannoch moved Amendment No. 82A:

After Clause 35, insert the following new clause—

"AMENDMENT OF PREVENTION OF TERRORISM ACT 2005
(1) After paragraph (p) of section 1(4) of the Prevention of Terrorism Act 2005 (c. 2) (power to make control orders) insert—
 
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"(q) a prohibition or restriction on his acquisition of specified property or assets (including intellectual property) or his use of rights enjoyed in respect of specified property or assets (including intellectual property);
(r) a requirement on him to dispose of specified property or assets (including intellectual property) whether by sale or otherwise;
(s) a requirement on him to disclose whether he has disposed, or is in the process of disposing, of specified property or assets (including intellectual property) whether by sale or otherwise, and, if so, to whom that disposal was made or is proposed to be made;
(t) a requirement on him to disclose whether he holds specified property or assets (including intellectual property) in trust for, or under any other fiduciary obligation to, any person or institution and, if so, what the terms of that trust or fiduciary obligation are and the identity of any beneficiary or principal."
(2) After subsection (8) of section 1 of that Act insert—
"(9) The references to property or assets in subsection (3)(q), (r) and (s) include references to property held by the individual as a trustee or under any other fiduciary obligation.""

The noble Lord said: My Lords, this is the same amendment as moved by my noble friend Lady Cox in our committee proceedings on 20 December at columns 1653 to 1659 of Hansard. I am moving it again at her request because she is being installed as chancellor of Liverpool Hope University—which I gather is our first specifically ecumenical university—and so cannot be with us today.

The amendment speaks for itself and was debated at length on 20 December. Its main purpose is to make sure that a person cannot carry out conduct for purposes connected with terrorism, as per Clause 5 of the Bill, through his control of a company or other asset which gives him influence with or access to sensitive sites in this country or to our industrial, commercial and charitable infrastructure. A particularly worrying example was cited by my noble friend Lady Cox and me at Second Reading on 21 November last year; we were joined by my noble friends Lady Park of Monmouth and Lord Elton in Committee. We all appreciate that the Minister cannot comment on particular cases, but it would be hard to think of a more worrying example of what the amendment seeks to cure than the case we have quoted—indeed, it is the inspiration for the amendment—although we fear that there may be other examples.

We are not yet convinced by the Minister's claim that the amendment is unnecessary because its purpose is met by existing legislation; nor are we convinced that the control order provisions of the Prevention of Terrorism Act 2005 cannot be extended in the way suggested by the amendment. If we are wrong about that, then we must ask the Government to devise another way of bringing this amendment into law, if it is not clearly covered elsewhere, and as soon as possible.

If the Minister is right and the amendment is unnecessary because it is met elsewhere, perhaps I can ask her to let the House know exactly where. I should emphasise that we are not interested in existing powers to deal with money laundering or the possession of cash and valuables, which she raised in Committee. As
 
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I have mentioned, we are interested principally in major shareholdings giving the power to elect and dismiss directors and to influence employment strategy.

There is one other question which the Minister did not appear to clear up in Committee: that is, whether vetting for the employees of contractors serving sensitive or important sites is generally carried out by the employer or by the contractor. The example I gave in Committee was the cleaning contract in your Lordships' House. I ask the question again—surely the answer cannot be a state secret. The same goes for surveillance and security contracts here and for our nuclear power stations, the courts of justice, New Scotland Yard, our Armed Forces establishments, Canary Wharf, British Airways, Texaco and other blue chip companies.

The Minister will be relieved that I am not here asking a specific question about the specific companies mentioned previously. I am asking the general question: are the employers in such examples responsible for vetting or are the contractors? Or is the answer that no one is responsible for vetting the personnel of such contractors? Unless she is entirely clear about these answers, I urge the noble Baroness to accept the amendment. What harm can it do? I look forward to her reply. I beg to move.

Baroness Park of Monmouth: My Lords, the House has spent many hours debating how best to counter the threat to our country that may arise from the acts of individual terrorists, particularly those who are part of, sustained and even created by international terrorist groups. We have been trying to counter the attacks through the front door and forgetting the back. The noble Baroness, Lady Cox, who has had more direct experience than most of us of contemporary terrorism in, for instance, the Sudan and Indonesia, is not able to be here. She has shown us the threat at the back door and in the basement.

It cannot make sense for two firms to be responsible between them for such a comprehensive group of our most sensitive national institutions—Parliament, MoD bases, 11 nuclear power stations, British Airways, Texaco and so on. It is an additional cause of concern that these two particular firms are owned by a man with known and close links with a militant Islamic African country, the Sudan. But we ought, I suggest, to be concerned whoever the owner is. This is too much power concentrated in one place. The elaborate protective devices installed round this House make little sense if we have a potential long-term unidentified enemy within.

Nevertheless, we can hope for a statement from the Government about this issue. I suggest that we should not neglect the potential enemy or allow unfettered access and more control to two firms only. We should not do that; that is asking for serious trouble. I believe that we ought to have some sort of commitment that an inquiry and review will take place to establish effective safeguards, and preferably that the present
 
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monopoly will be broken. I fully recognise that this is far too delicate a subject on which to expect any further answers, but I do hope for that.

Lord Elton: My Lords, I support the amendment. I will only touch on the grounds for doing so because they have basically been stated. The concentration of power in an individual—or, indeed, an organisation—responsible for essential organs for the survival of the state is an obvious risk whoever holds it. It seems to me that that raises two questions. The first is the question addressed by the amendment about the holding of a predominant, majority shareholding in a security organisation responsible for the protection of such bodies. The other question is whether any such company should hold contracts on a very large percentage of the machinery necessary to keep this country going. That question is not addressed by the amendment.

I hope that the earlier debate and the return of this amendment at this late and ill-attended hour is sufficient to bring home to the Government that this is an issue which sane and reasonable people who have held the same office as the noble Baroness regard as very real. It should not be brushed aside as belonging in the realms of fiction. Governments dealing with terrorism have to think outside the box. That is not easily done in this red leather Chamber, where everything has been done in roughly the same way for hundreds of years. Something quite unusual is required, and if that has to take place with my noble friends behind the office door of the noble Baroness, I shall be content with that—provided that I am content with the expression they wear when they come out of her office.

Lord Kingsland: My Lords, I share the views expressed by all three previous speakers. The nature of the threat to our security was well ventilated in Committee. In my submission, there is no doubt that companies which carry out contractual work for our basic infrastructure, where there is a suspicion that they might be controlled by someone with terrorist intentions, ought to be properly supervised by the executive arm of government.

I want to put two questions to the Minister. First, does she accept that this threat exists? Secondly, if she does, does she believe that the existing legislation on the statute book adequately covers the issue? Or does she think that some future legislative form other than this Bill—because clearly she does not believe that this Bill is the appropriate vehicle—might cover the problem?

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