14. Delivery up rather than destruction of any such documents was sought by the
Claimants. The Tribunal refers to its duty set out at paragraph 5 above. An order for
delivery up of documents would in effect be a disclosure of information which might
give an indication of the means by which the information was obtained by the
Intelligence Agency, or enable a person who is legitimately subject to surveillance or
interception to take measures to make such surveillance or interception more difficult
to achieve in the future. In this case the deletion of the material fully protects the
rights of the Third Claimant in ensuring that the information cannot be used in the
future and, as noted at paragraph 9 above, the material held by GCHQ was not
actually disclosed or used for the purpose of the Third Claimant’s civil claim, which
has now settled. We are satisfied that there is no legitimate need for the Third
Claimant to have access to the material held by GCHQ. In these circumstances the
Tribunal has decided not to make any order for delivery up of any document
containing the LPP material.
15. It is necessary to record that the Tribunal invited the Respondents to give their
consent (pursuant to Rule 6(3) of the Investigatory Powers Tribunal Rules, 2000) to
disclosure of information other than in relation to the Third Claimant contained in
paragraph 8 above, which they gave on the express basis that such consent and such
disclosure should not be seen as a precedent for future cases