The Web of Evil

Lord Phillips of Sudbury: Let us say that Steve sends an encrypted message to Willie and he decrypts it. He reads it and notes its contents. He does not keep it perhaps because it contains information which is too sensitive to keep. Two days later a legally entitled entity who has intercepted the message comes to Willie with a Section 47 notice and requests to be provided with the plain text. Willie cannot comply, however willing. He says, “Supply me with a copy of the protected information and I shall be happy to oblige”. If, for whatever reason, the legally entitled authority does not then supply the protected information, poor Willie is in a serious situation, which we would not want. This innocent amendment is designed to put Willie in the clear in these unhappy circumstances.

Lord Lucas: My Lords, the truth of it is that the Government’s present position leaves Willie exposed.

Lord Lucas: Surely we are seeking the production of a record here? That is the crucial element. An authorisation should be recorded so that later it can be audited, as the Minister pointed out. If I scribble an authorisation enabling someone to do something on a piece of tissue paper and that person then proceeds to eat it, a record will not have been produced. (...)

Lord Bach: The noble Lord's amendments would allow notices to be given in writing or by electronic means since the Bill already requires that authorisations or notices must be given in a manner which produces a record of their having been granted. We cannot think of any other way presently available by which notices or authorisations could be produced. (...)

Lord Lucas: What we are asking for here is that a record is made... As I said a moment ago, I could write down the authorisation on rice paper only to have it eaten or lost in a file. No requirement is in place to produce a record if the authorisation is granted in writing. (...)

Lord Bach: Obviously, the fact that an authorisation is written ensures that a record is made. What is done with the record is properly a matter for the code of practice. I think that is the best I can do on this point at this hour of night.

Lord Lucas: If I find myself coming back from holiday with my young daughter and I fail my checks at the airport because something has happened with one of my fingers, or the machine is on the blink, or I am developing some disease that means I am full of water and everything is out of size, what happens to me? Will I then be made to wait in the airport for two weeks while they identify me, or will I get sent back to Tenerife?

Lord Lucas: What concerns me in Part 2 of the Bill is what happens in an extreme case. Are we opening up our system to the equivalent of what happened in Germany in 1933, where it became possible for an extreme party to legitimately hijack a democracy and turn it into something totalitarian?

It is not that difficult to imagine what happens. Perhaps next election we will have a hung Parliament. The Liberals will join Labour, and their price will be proportional representation. In the Parliament after that, a chance for PR: you vote for who you want to make a difference. UKIP and the BNP get significant representation in Parliament. Then the Conservative party, pretty desperate for power, allies itself with UKIP and has a stand-off pact with the British National Party. The consequence of that, perhaps, is that we have an ex-Labour MP—a demagogue, shall we say? [Robert Kilroy-Silk’s name had been bandied about earlier]—who becomes a senior member of the Government, perhaps Home Secretary, and that is the price for co-operation.

This scenario does not last for very long. There are too many tensions in it, and they can never really agree on what to do about Europe. Six months later, the Labour party, sensing a real division, organises a vote of no confidence in the Commons. UKIP and the BNP are very unsure about what they will do. They disappear into a conclave of their own, which continues to last as the debate goes on. Just as the Prime Minister rises to speak, a small tactical nuclear weapon explodes on a barge outside the Houses of Parliament. The only surviving Secretary of State is the member of UKIP, and it rapidly becomes clear that the BNP are in with him. [Hansard]