Counter-Terrorism and Border Security Bill

Lord Kennedy of Southwark Excerpts

3rd reading (Hansard): House of Lords
Tuesday 15th January 2019 Lords Chamber

[Earl Howe]

My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, and the noble Lord, Lord Judd. I beg your pardon. The noble Lord, Lord Kennedy, should speak first.

[Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Lab Co-op)]

My Lords, I rise briefly to say that I support the amendments before us. I am pleased that the Government have listened to the proposal put by my noble friend Lord Rosser, who is unable to be with us today. I think that the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, has raised an important issue as regards the medical terminology used, but the noble Earl has answered the point in terms of what can be expected. Generally, I support the amendments because they certainly clarify what we put forward in the first place and I thank the Government for listening in this case.

[Earl Howe]

My Lords, I am doubly grateful to all noble Lords who have spoken. I am sympathetic to the point made by the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, but only up to a certain point. Given that this is Third Reading, our starting point has to be that any further amendments to the Bill should be limited to those that are absolutely necessary to improve the drafting of the Bill in the light of the amendment agreed by the House at Report. I am not persuaded that adding to the list of exemptions from the offence properly falls within the category of amendments that we should now be contemplating at this late stage of the Bill, either today or when the Bill returns to the Commons to consider the Lords amendments.

However, I can assure the noble Baroness that the Government will keep the list of exempted purposes under review. The Bill now helpfully includes a power by regulations—a Henry VIII power to all intents and purposes—to add to the list of exempted purposes should it be appropriate to do so in the light of experience of operating the new offence. I am sure that officials in the Home Office will closely scrutinise the use of this power and will work with their colleagues in the Department for International Development and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office to determine if peacebuilding could usefully be added to the list of exempted reasons in the future.

But I need to make clear to all noble Lords that this is a nicety. In the absence of such an exemption the Government are clear that entering and remaining in a designated area for the purpose of engaging in peacebuilding would constitute a reasonable excuse. We have that all-encompassing provision, as the noble Baroness is aware, in the Bill. There is a problem associated with any approach that has within it a list of some kind, which is why we started out with a very short list indeed. Through our debates we persuaded ourselves that it would be helpful to augment the very short list that the Government started off with, but we have to ask ourselves where we stop.

I hope what I have said has offered some assurance to the noble Baroness and she understands that, while it would not be appropriate to add peacebuilding to the list of exemptions at the moment, that will not preclude us doing so in the future, should there be an operational imperative.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Marlesford (Con)]

My Lords, this Bill was intended to do everything necessary at present to counter terrorism and protect our borders. It does not. I have made repeated attempts to persuade the Government to evaluate—just evaluate—the need for a secure personal identity number system, with biometrics held on a secure central database with which the biometrics of any UK citizen could be compared online by those authorised to do so. The Home Office has refused point blank to even consider this suggestion. This is inexcusable. I recognise that the default position of the Home Office has long been to ignore, reject or oppose external suggestions for changing its procedures, practices or policies, but that is not a satisfactory situation. That it may get away with such behaviour can of course be a reflection on the effectiveness of Ministers, some of whom are coaxed into being mere parrots of Home Office views. I suspect that a rule of the department is, whenever necessary, to remind Ministers “Theirs not to reason why”.

On border control, I will make three points. First, the list published in Hansard, in response to Written Questions I have put down periodically since 2012, of Home Office immigration officials who have been sentenced to often long periods of imprisonment, up to eight or nine years, for misconduct in public office—that is what Hansard describes their offence as being, in most cases—now includes over 50 such cases. This is a disgrace which should have been tackled long ago. All that has happened is that the Home Office has now decided to withhold the names of those who, in open court, have been so convicted, apparently on the grounds that it infringes their privacy or human rights. Secondly, there is still no record, for online access at entry and departure points, of other passports held by UK passport holders. Thirdly, the Home Office seems to have been caught by surprise, with the Home Secretary having had to hurry back from holiday, by the sudden increase in the number of illegal immigrants who have sought to travel to the UK across the Channel in small boats. This was both predictable and predicted, and it can be expected to increase greatly next summer unless effective action is taken to halt it.

Perhaps I could end by quoting Sherlock Holmes:

“From a drop of water a logician could infer the possibility of … a Niagara”.


I am afraid there is a shortage of logicians in the Home Office.

[Lord Kennedy of Southwark]

My Lords, I join others in thanking the Government and in particular the noble Baroness, Lady Williams of Trafford, and the noble Earl, Lord Howe, for the way they have conducted themselves in the course of this Bill. I enjoy our tussles across the Dispatch Box very much and I have great respect for both noble Lords on the way they conduct themselves in the House, as does the whole House. I thank them very much for that. I also thank Ben Wallace MP, the Security Minister, for his engagement in this Bill—he has been very helpful. I too thank my noble friend Lord Rosser. He is much missed, and I hope he will be back in the House very soon. He is certainly more forensic in dealing with the Government, and I look forward to having him back by my side shortly.

I also thank the officials from the Bill team and other officials from the Home Office and elsewhere whom we met. They were able to discuss our concerns and look at the issues that we were raising, and they came back in a very positive way. That was very helpful for me and my noble friend Lord Rosser.

I thank noble Lords across the House for their contributions. As the Minister said, they have been wide-ranging and authoritative. Something that we certainly saw on this Bill was the authority that people spoke with on a variety of issues. In particular, as has been said, the contributions by the noble Lords, Lord Anderson of Ipswich and Lord Carlile, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Judge, and the noble Baroness, Lady Manningham-Buller, helped us to understand where we were coming from.

I thank Grace Wright from the opposition office. She has been helpful and supportive in her guidance to me, and ensured that we were able to put our arguments forward well and effectively. She is a skilful member of staff and we are very appreciative of the work that she does for us all.

All sorts of claims and counterclaims have been flying around for the last hour or two about who did what or who did not in relation to the Bill. That is all quite regrettable, and I am not going to engage in it. All I will say is that my job as the opposition spokesperson here is to table amendments and put forward suggestions and ideas to engage with the Government. Hopefully, we all agree that the Bill was necessary; it is about ensuring that we keep our country safe and can deal with the threats that are posed. At the same time it is about protecting our liberties, and that is the balance that we always have to find. That is certainly my and my colleagues’ job here. I think we have got the balance right. The Government have listened on a number of issues, and I thank them very much.

I also thank the Minister for her comments on the issue of Prevent. We had certainly hoped that the Government would look at reviewing it, and clearly they will. Hopefully, in time we will have some good news about that, but if not then I am sure we will have a further debate in the House. At this stage, though, I again thank the House with respect to the Bill.