I entirely agree with the right hon. and learned Gentleman; hence the reason the Government have taken the approach they have.
Let me turn briefly to amendment 55, which concerns the ISC’s ability to oversee operational matters. With the amendments, the Bill now provides for three routes by which the ISC may consider particular operational matters. The first is where the Prime Minister and the ISC are agreed that the matter is of significant national interest and not part of any ongoing intelligence and security operations. The second route is where the Government request the ISC to consider a matter notwithstanding the fact that those criteria are not met. The third is where the ISC’s consideration of an operational matter is limited to considering information provided to it voluntarily by the agencies or another Department.
That additional route was provided to meet a further concern of the ISC—that the requirement that both the ISC and the Prime Minister should be satisfied that the criteria for oversight of operational matters had been met risked slowing the provision of information to the ISC on routine operational matters. Obviously that already happens now; the concern was that not framing the third limb might hinder it. We therefore made an amendment in Committee to address that third point. The key issue is that, as has been highlighted, for the first two categories there is the ability to require further information to be given, whereas for the third limb—because, in essence, information is provided without being compelled—those further requirements did not operate. That is why the structure has been framed in this way.
My hon. Friend the Member for New Forest East expressed some concern about the term “voluntarily”. I think his point was that this was in some way a presentational issue—that we understood what we were talking about when it came to information that would ordinarily be provided to the Committee. We have reflected on that point; hence the reason for a further amendment to try to clarify rights of access.