Serious Crime Bill [Lords]

Maria Miller Excerpts

Monday 5th January 2015 Commons Chamber

[Maria Miller (Basingstoke) (Con)]

Just before my right hon. Friend moves on, I understand why there are provisions in the Bill for confiscating assets without a conviction being needed—she has made a very powerful case for that—but, given that the provisions are quite powerful, will she also outline what she is doing to protect the civil liberties of those involved?

[Mrs May]

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for declaring that the provisions in the Bill are quite powerful. The whole point is to try to increase our ability to deal with these issues. Obviously, judgments have to be made about any of the issues with which we are dealing, but until now it has been possible for people to use third-party assets and timing loopholes to ensure that their assets cannot be accessed. They can put the finances that they have made as a result of their organised crime out of the reach of the authorities.





It is important that we tighten that and increase our ability to confiscate the assets of crime. Decisions will be made by courts as part of these processes and they will be properly considered in relation to the individuals concerned, but I am also concerned about the civil liberties of all those who are the victims of organised crime. I think that it is our job to try to ensure that we reduce organised crime as much as possible, and dealing with the assets and profits of organised crime is one way of sending a clear message to criminals and ensuring that they desist or that it becomes less attractive for them to undertake such activities.

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[Stephen Hammond]

My hon. Friend makes a very important point. We should recognise that the Government are spending that money and are committed to looking at the specific law enforcement challenges of cybercrime, but we must also consider the economic consequences of that crime.

Particularly through organised crime, but also by foreign state activity, there can be a breakdown of networks, such as those for electricity, telecoms, power, banking, and food and fuel distribution. Everything relies on those logistical systems. Only today, companies have announced that their online retailing is now stronger than their direct retailing, and only today, there have been comments about the amount of money lost in banking fraud. Online retail and on-time logistics are clearly areas of potential attack, and the paralysis of such networks as a result of cyber-attacks is not just a security risk, but probably the most significant and serious threat to our economy except for world economic factors.

If those networks come under criminal control, even for a relatively short period, there would be not only grand-scale theft, fraud and illegal drug dealing, but a cost that would dwarf the figure of £24 billion, which the Home Secretary rightly remarked last year was the cost of organised crime to this country. I say “dwarf”, because daily banking transactions in the UK alone probably total five or perhaps 10 times that amount.

The potential for crime is huge, so it is absolutely right for the national cyber-security programme to break down cybercrime into its two parts: cyber-dependent crimes, which can be committed only by using computers and computer networks; and the even more significant cyber-enabled crimes, which can be committed offline and online.

[Maria Miller]

My hon. Friend is making a powerful case. I am sure that he agrees that many provisions in the Bill will strengthen the law on cybercrime, but does he share my concern that, as some of the statistics perhaps show, business also needs to take cybercrime more seriously than it has in the past?

[Stephen Hammond]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely correct. Any number of reports in the past six months have found that major companies have not helped Governments either to assess the risks to their own networks, which creates a national risk, or to assess the threat from organised crime, which leads to serious risks not just to such companies, but to individuals. A number of companies should accept their responsibilities in that area.

The Bill is very important because of the sheer expansion in the potential for cybercrime. Sections 1 to 3 of the Computer Misuse Act 1990 clearly set out ways to deal with unauthorised access, but the provisions of that Act are now simply too limited. What was relevant in 1990 is no longer relevant, and the pace of change in equipment and software capability requires a significant updating of the response. Economically, part 2 is a singularly important part of the Bill. It accepts that the current law is hopelessly inadequate, and puts in place a new offence in relation to unauthorised acts

“causing, or creating risk of, serious damage”.

The Home Secretary set out that that applies not only to the area of economics, but in other areas, such as security and the environment.

Simply in the area of economics, such crimes are so serious that they could wreck—that is not too strong a word—the whole economy. It is therefore hugely important that the Bill covers unauthorised acts in relation to computers that result in serious damage. The definition of “serious damage” has rightly been left somewhat opaque, because some of the information inside banking systems would be difficult to assess, but the Bill rightly recognises how far the world has moved since the 1990 Act.

It is clearly right for the Home Secretary to include protections in the Bill. The need to establish a significant link to the UK is now clear—for example, one of the accused, the target computer system or the damage must be in the UK or, if the attack is from abroad, the accused must have been a UK national at the time of the attack and there must be a similar offence in the relevant country. That provides relative protection while putting in place the right measures to enable law enforcement agencies to tackle this crime. There has been some detailing of the need to upgrade sentencing, and the Bill also recognises that the 1990 Act fails to deal with the seriousness of such crimes. It therefore rightly imposes life imprisonment for serious injury or death, while a sentence of 14 years applies for serious economic damage.

The potential to commit cybercrime, and the manner in which is it committed, is constantly evolving, and it is right for the new offence to recognise that and the seriousness of its effects. It is also true that whatever we do in the UK—our attempts to extend protection extra-territoriality in the Bill are important—it simply will not be enough. Much of cybercrime is international, and although like many in the House I am hugely concerned about the onward march of certain areas of the EU into our lives, no sensible person would set their face against international co-operation.

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[Maria Miller (Basingstoke) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Slough (Fiona Mactaggart). I was particularly pleased that she said the Bill “moves us forward”, which encapsulates the tone taken by many hon. Members in the debate.

This important Bill demonstrates the undiminished work rate of this Government. Hon. Members on both sides of the House have welcomed it, particularly for its ensuring that the National Crime Agency, the police and other enforcement agencies have the powers they need to bring criminals to justice.

My right hon. Friend the Member for South East Cambridgeshire (Sir James Paice) was right to say that government is not just about passing laws, but about enforcing them. The Bill demonstrates that we must be continually on our toes and watchful about how we can strengthen the law on organised crime, particularly in relation to cybercrime and the protection of vulnerable individuals.

As we have seen today, in the Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department, my hon. Friend the Member for Staffordshire Moorlands (Karen Bradley), we have a Minister who is truly on her toes. Her intervention at the Dispatch Box showed her doing her job in real time, adapting policy as and when it is good to do so to improve the law she is responsible for passing. I very much welcome her approach.

I will focus my speech on the parts of the Bill relating to computer misuse and to protecting children and other vulnerable adults. Before I do so, I want to say that I was rather taken aback when I looked at some of the data on the proceeds of crime measures. I will not dwell on them, because hon. Members have already made extremely good and lengthy speeches about them. The fact that the proceeds of crime are relevant to all our constituents and that having strong law to tackle the issue more effectively is important was brought home to me by Hampshire constabulary’s seizing of cash and assets well in excess of £20 million in our county alone during the past year. That money was gained illegally from hard-working individuals in my constituency and other parts of the county. It really brings home the need to ensure strong legislation that is relevant to all our constituents.

To move on to the first of the two areas on which I want to comment, computer misuse, my hon. Friend the Member for Wimbledon (Stephen Hammond) outlined the huge potential economic consequences of not getting the law right in this area. Indeed, throughout the Christmas period, we have been reminded of the devastating effect of cybercrime on big business in this country.

I very much welcome the work that the Government have already done in this area. Online crime takes many forms, and the Bill starts to address new ones. It is an area in which the Government have to be nimble. I particularly thank colleagues in the Ministry of Justice for what they have already done, through the Criminal Justice and Courts Bill, to outlaw revenge pornography. Again, I welcome the work that Ministers are doing on computers that cause or create a risk of serious damage, and on outlawing that.

Current legislation does not reflect the sort of damage that a major cyber-attack on systems could cause, so I welcome the measures in the Bill and agree that tackling cybercrime must be an important part of the Government’s organised crime strategy. There was some debate in the other place about the way the new legislative power has been framed. Criminal law must provide protection against a cyber-attack on essential systems such as food and power supplies, and other forms of infrastructure. Will the Minister tell the House why she has decided to frame that part of the Bill in such a way, and say what would constitute serious damage to the environment or the economy? I know that the Joint Committee on Human Rights considered that issue when scrutinising the Bill, and it would be helpful if the Minister outlined why the provision has been framed in such a way.

By its very nature, cybercrime needs to be addressed on an international stage, and the Government have done an incredible amount of work not only within the European Union but with US law enforcement agencies on the issue of child exploitation. Will the Minister outline what progress has been made on that, because I think the UK Government are groundbreaking in their approach? Can she give any more detail on work that is being doing to learn from protocols that have been established on child exploitation, and say how those could be used in tackling broader cybercrime?

The third area on which I would welcome the Minister’s remarks when she winds up the debate is the progress that the Government are making on tackling this issue in the broader business context. I intervened on my hon. Friend the Member for Wimbledon on that matter, and was interested to read the report by the National Audit Office on the importance of ensuring that business takes the threat of cybercrime seriously. Although the NAO commended the Government for their progress in trying to tackle such matters, particularly on national security, there was perhaps a little more concern about the progress being made by business and the wider public services in tackling cyber-security issues.

I was particularly interested to read work by the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills in that area, and its analysis—this information is dated 2014, so it is current and recent—that some 24% of large organisations detected that outsiders had successfully penetrated their networks in the last year, and that that figure had risen from 20%. I commend the Government and Ministers for their work to ensure that the legislative framework is sound, but will the Minister also update the House on her feelings about how business is taking the issue forward? Some 59% of respondents to the BIS survey expected that there would be more security incidents next year compared with last year. When we are talking about companies that provide our electricity, gas or food supplies—organisations that are critical to our everyday life, and for which I know the Minister wants the Bill to provide legislative support—I am concerned to read that there is still a way to go for them to be doing all they can to ensure that their systems are as robust as we need them to be.

Perhaps the most worrying thing of all in the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills survey is the fact that some 7% of the worst security breaches were partly caused by senior management giving insufficient priority to security. That might be a slight improvement over time, but it is still worrying—the number should not be above 0%.

Part 5 of the Bill is on the protection of children. We have heard extremely powerful contributions from hon. Members who have incredible knowledge of this area of law over time. My hon. Friend the Member for Mole Valley (Sir Paul Beresford) made a powerful contribution on paedophile manuals—he has been involved in getting provisions on them into legislation.

The Government have done so much to strive to make this country a safer place for children, providing protection from those who seek to exploit children and do them harm. It is not surprising that the Bill needs to tackle that problem again and make important amendments to strengthen the provisions that are in place, but I want to make one point in support of the Children’s Society briefing on the age range that the Bill and the protection from cruelty provision cover.

The provisions are primarily designed for children who are in the care of an adult, and to provide protection for children who are in receipt of care that falls well short of that which they should expect. The vast majority of 16 and 17-year-olds live in a family with a guardian and carers, and for the most part are in schools or in training. I gently ask Ministers what work they have done on trying to ensure that the Bill provides the protection for 16 and 17-year-olds that they clearly want to afford to those under the age of 16.

I have enormous sympathy for the Minister. I know from my responsibilities as a Minister that there is considerable inconsistency in the law’s treatment of under-18s, but the provisions are clearly for children who are still being cared for by an adult. Does she agree that the work of the Joint Committee on Human Rights might be worth looking at again? Could she ensure that such protection is afforded to those 16 and 17-year-olds? As the mother of a 16-year-old, I know, as many hon. Members will, that 16-year-olds are far from adult and very much in need of their parents’ support.

[Sarah Newton (Truro and Falmouth) (Con)]

I support my right hon. Friend. Sixteen and 17-year-olds can be very vulnerable. Prosecutions are attempted every year for dreadful acts of cruelty and neglect. Does she, like me, hope the Minister will give us some comfort in her summing up—we accept that it is a difficult area—that she will look at what provisions could be made in the Bill for vulnerable 16 and 17-year-olds?

[Maria Miller]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right and I hope the Minister reflects on that. I know from my experience that the law is not consistent in its treatment of young people of that age. I therefore understand the challenges she faces, but I hope Ministers have heard the protestations from Government Members and provide reassurance to us.

I wanted to touch briefly on another provision in this part of the Bill because only one other hon. Member did so—my hon. Friend the Member for Enfield, Southgate (Mr Burrowes). An amendment is required to update the law on the suffocation of children to ensure that it includes individuals who are under the influence of drugs as well as those who are under the influence of alcohol. It struck me in reading those provisions that I hoped that Ministers had taken some expert advice from organisations that were supporting people, especially those with very young children. This issue was not debated in the Lords, as far as I could tell, and I was concerned that it might not have had the scrutiny that it needs. Perhaps the Minister can provide some reassurance on that point.

The Bill also contains important provisions relating to FGM, about which we have heard a great deal this evening. The House will have noted the support for the measures from the Royal College of Nursing and others, and I commend the work of the Home Office team on this issue. The right hon. Member for Leicester East (Keith Vaz), who is no longer in his place, seemed to imply that it was necessary to criminalise health workers who did not report cases of FGM to the police. I urge the Minister to be cautious about that. Health workers are in a very difficult position as they have a duty of confidentiality as well as a duty to support victims who may turn to them for help. I hope that the Minister agrees with me that we should not leave health workers feeling exposed in that area.

The Bill also contains provisions on the protection of children from sexual communications. The Prime Minister has made clear his commitment to child safety over several years, and I welcome the fact that it will be made illegal for an adult to send a child a message with sexual content. I know, from looking at the area in some detail, that there is a mishmash or patchwork of law that is lacking in several areas. I look forward to examining the detail of the Government’s proposals in Committee.

I urge the Minister to consider how she can make sure that teachers have clear messages about their work in this area. The most recent education legislation contained provisions giving teachers the power to delete sexually explicit texts and images on students’ mobile phones or in their e-mails. No data are available on how widespread such actions are, although anecdotally it would appear that most schools have undertaken them. It is unclear how many such incidents are then reported to the police, even though the guidance is clear that any indication of coercion should trigger a report. We may need to tighten up the guidance, because it is unclear whether teachers are getting the support they need to make good decisions on which images and texts should be deleted.

I welcome the indications from those on the Front Bench about further provisions on coercive control and domestic violence. For many years the Home Secretary has been a robust and effective campaigner on the issue of domestic violence, and it is her personal commitment to tackling domestic violence in all its forms that has meant that we have come so far in such a short time. I am glad that Women’s Aid has welcomed the introduction of this new criminal offence.

This is an important Bill and I am pleased to support it. The Government are right to act on these issues and I am glad that they have the support of the whole House.