Coroners and Justice Bill

It is puzzling, to say the least, to be having to discuss in this Bill amendments to RIPA to allow intercept as evidence in coroners’ courts as proposed in Amendments 30 and 31. It is puzzling because the committee of distinguished privy counsellors, chaired by Sir John Chilcot, comprising my noble and learned friend Lord Archer, Sir Alan Beith MP and the noble Lord, Lord Hurd, reported to the Government in January 2008, which I want to make clear to the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay. They did that after six months of detailed investigation, having taken written and oral evidence from an impressive array of those who know about interception. They reported that nine conditions would have to be met before intercept evidence could be used as evidence in courts. My right honourable friend the Prime Minister made it clear in the House of Commons in February 2008 that the Government accepted the report in its entirety, including the report's conclusion that if the conditions were not met, intercept as evidence should not be introduced. The intercept as evidence implementation unit—quite a mouthful of a title—has been set up in the Home Office. It has not yet completed its detailed work. Anyone who knows anything about interception and all its complexity of operational and other problems is not surprised that such a task takes time. Anyone who thinks otherwise fails to appreciate the importance and enormity of the problems. Nobody I know has ever been against using intercept as evidence as a matter of principle; the practical problems and dangers of its implementation have always been the problem. In this context, therefore, I find it baffling that anyone feels that they can—excuse me for saying this—cavalierly barge in and try to use intercepts in coroners’ courts in this way with apparently no regard to the painstaking expert work that has been and is going on to try to allow this to happen without endangering invaluable national assets. I find myself wholly in agreement with the final sentence of a letter that quite a few of us have received from the Mobile Broadband Group, which represents the UK businesses of 02, Orange, T Mobile, Virgin Mobile, Vodafone and 3. The mobile operators form a significant constituent part of the communications service providers—CSPs in the jargon—whose importance is frequently recognised in reports of interception commissioners. The last sentence of the letter states: ""If Intercept as Evidence is to be introduced into any Court (Criminal, Civil or Coroners), it should be done in a comprehensive way, meeting the nine conditions of the Privy Council Review in their totality, including a detailed implementation plan which incorporates safeguarding the critical interests of partners’ legitimate needs"." I very much agree with everything in that sentence and I therefore think that these amendments should be rejected.