National Security (State Threats) Bill

Lord Beamish Excerpts

2nd reading
Tuesday 23rd June 2026 Lords Chamber

[Lord Beamish (Lab)]

I welcome the Bill. The fact that we need it less than three years after the passing of the National Security Act demonstrates the evolving threat that this country faces.

In 2020 the Intelligence and Security Committee, which I chair, published its ground-breaking Russia report. I gently remind the noble Lord, Lord Davies, that it took three years for the then Government to implement most of the recommendations in that report, including the FIRS. Since then, we have produced in 2023 our report on China and in 2025 our report on Iran, and all pose a threat to UK security. The playbook they use is very similar: sabotage, cyber attacks, intimidation of the diaspora, misinformation, kidnapping, assassination in some cases—all carried out not just in this country but across Europe. Many examples can be found in open source material. Their strategy is not only well thought out but well funded. It is to undermine the trust in government, increase social division, weaken the rules-based order and, in Russia’s case, try to limit our support for Ukraine.

After the attack in Salisbury, thanks to the efforts of our security services and our international partners, we have made the operating environment in the UK and across Europe far more difficult for these actors. That is why they have gone to using proxies. Again, it is not just about acts of sabotage. There have been good examples across Europe, such as shopping centres in Poland being attacked. Earlier this year I was in Latvia, where the railway system is attacked on a daily basis—not because it is breaking down but because people are being paid to disrupt the network. We have seen Iran using organised crime networks across Europe to assassinate those who oppose the regime. We have also seen, closer to home, the example of the former leader of Reform UK in Wales, Nathan Gill, who was paid by the Russians to put out a positive image of Russia and to undermine the West’s support for Ukraine.

This is a very difficult environment for law enforcement and security services to act in. For example, it might not be evident straightaway that acts of sabotage are being supported by foreign actors. We saw the case last year of the attack on a warehouse in east London that was being used to store supplies for Ukraine.

Will this threat increase and is it going away? No, it is not going away. I argue that it will increase. Certainly, in Russia, as Putin comes under more pressure, this is a low-risk element in trying to undermine the West. We do not know what is going to happen next in Iran in terms of the fallout from the war, but again this is a low-risk strategy for Iran because it can deny involvement in many of these attacks or misinformation campaigns, whether they are attacking warehouses in east London and synagogues or posting antisemitic rhetoric online. We also have increasing activity by the Chinese, who are targeting universities and looking for trade secrets, something that the Bill will take on. Will this Bill be the end of it? Will that be it? No, it will not. I think we will be coming back. As our adversaries react and adapt, we will have to come back for more.

There is an issue that the previous Government ignored, even though they gave a commitment on it: the review of the Official Secrets Act 1989. The problem I have with this legislation is that there is now going to be a huge disparity between 14 years for an offence under this legislation and two years for an offence under the Official Secrets Act. The review was promised in 2019 but shelved, and I urge the Government to revisit it.

It is often said that democracy is fragile. It is. It has to be nurtured. We have to ensure that in any legislation such as this we get the balance right between protecting our nation and its citizens and the rights of individuals. As chair of the ISC and a member of the ISC for nearly 10 years, I see the regular reporting on what is happening: the attacks not just in this country but across Europe. I think we need to have an honest public conversation about the threats. In his report, the reviewer said that statistics should be published. I think we need to publish them, whether in his annual report or in the ISC’s annual report.

I come to the issues around designation. Reference has been made to the IRGC. This was covered in our Iran report. Yes, the current legislation is not fit for purpose and I think this is a way forward, but I stress to individuals who are calling to put the IRGC in the Bill that that is not the way we operate because proscription is done independent of politics on a threat-based assessment. I think it will meet that threshold, and I hope we can see a movement forward.

I will just touch on some of the concerns expressed by the noble Lord, Lord Anderson. I agree with him that there are concerns. We need to alleviate them; it is about getting the right balance between protecting our nation from harm and making sure that those who are doing good in the world are protected as well. There are instances where Governments, NGOs and others have to deal with some very nasty people. That is a fact of life. I have to say—it might not be very popular in this debate—that on occasion NGOs and Governments have to be involved even with individuals linked to the IRGC.

This is a movement forward. Will it be the final say on this situation? No, it will not. This is going to be an ever-increasing issue that we will have to come back to, and the Government will have to be agile to react to it. Finally, like my noble friend I say thank you to the members of our security services and the police who keep us safe 365 days of the year.

National Security (State Threats) Bill

Lord Beamish Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 30th June 2026 Lords Chamber

Our world is being remade, and the front line is no longer somewhere distant or abstract—it is here. It is embedded across our infrastructure, our institutions and our daily lives. If we fail to act now, we risk confronting a crisis at a point when control has already slipped beyond our grasp. This amendment is not about alarmism; it is about preparedness. It ensures that we recognise this emerging category of threat before it materialises, not after. We must write the rules before the systems outgrow them.

[Lord Beamish (Lab)]

I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, and the noble Lord, Lord Alton, for the amendments in their names. It is timely to have a debate and to keep raising—as I know the noble Lord, Lord Alton, does regularly—the threat we face from China. The ISC in its China report outlined the very detailed structure which the Chinese state, which has the largest security services in the world, uses not just at home for repression but abroad for undermining other nations’ ability to act, and in persecuting individuals who oppose the Chinese communist regime.

The issue around the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office is an obvious one which has raised concerns. The Bill is needed because whenever we have made the operating environment more difficult for states to use diplomatic cover, they have gone to other lengths. The success in identifying individuals who are using diplomatic cover for other activities shows that our security services are conscious of this. The response to the Salisbury attacks—in this country and across Europe among our allies, where a number of individuals were expelled from Russian embassies because of their links to intelligence services and activities which were not in keeping with their designation under the Vienna convention—certainly proved that point.

The problem I have with Amendment 4, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Alton, is in defining strategy. That would be very difficult in terms of the united front. We all know what our adversaries get up to and what the aims are. The Bill is important because, as the operating environment has become more difficult, they are subcontracting this to individuals. So it is not necessarily about not understanding what the Chinese state is up to—we have a very clear understanding of this, and it is very complex and broad. The other thing the ISC report highlighted is that it is not just the scale but the lengths it goes to, both to intimidate individuals here and across the globe and to suck up information—which many of us might think is pretty irrelevant—for economic purposes and for building up a picture, a matrix, of what is happening in various political systems around the world.

It is good that these issues have been raised, because it throws a spotlight on what is happening not just in terms of China but what both Iran and Russia are doing. As I said at Second Reading, it is important to have that public debate to keep highlighting the dangers this country faces, and I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Alton, on his tenacity in continuing to do this. These dangers are on multiple fronts, whether it is universities being targeted, and individual diaspora members being targeted there, or IP thefts from both companies and universities. This is something that needs constant vigilance.

[Baroness Ludford (LD)]

My Lords, I was pleased to co-sign the amendment tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter. All the amendments in this group—Amendments 1, 3 and 4 in particular—are expressing frustration with the limited scope of the Bill. Perhaps the Minister might be able to give an idea as to whether the national security Bill that was heralded in the King’s Speech will be able to pick up some of these themes, if we are not successful in persuading the Government today to make amendments to this state threats Bill.

There is a feeling of concern that some threats that have been experienced, or that are pretty obvious, are not being sufficiently dealt with by the Government. This is particularly in relation to China, where we have been urged to wake up and not be naive about the underwater crocodile. Whether the Government are being naive or shaped by other considerations towards China, there is a feeling that there appears to be so much going on—demonstrated in the recent trial concerning the staff of the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office, and otherwise instanced by the transnational repression towards residents of this country from Hong Kong who are being persecuted by the Chinese state, while they are supposedly under the protection of this country and this Government, which is intolerable—that we need to wake up and smell the coffee in relation to China.

I would like to hear some reassurances from the Minister that if he cannot take up some of these points in this Bill, the Government will take them up in the forthcoming national security Bill, which is intended to:

“Consolidate the Government’s approach to countering state threats to align more closely with the approach to countering terrorism”.