CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION
Objectives of this Report
1.12.
Even so limited, DRIPA 2014 s7 presents me with a very broad canvas. In seeking
to cover it, my objectives have been two-fold:
(a)
to inform the public and parliamentary debate by providing the legal,
technological and operational context, and by seeking to encapsulate the views
of the main stakeholders; and
(b)
to offer my own proposals for change, based on all the evidence I have heard
and read.
Though I seek to place the debate in a legal context, it is not part of my role to offer a
legal opinion (for example, as to whether the bulk collection of data as practised by
GCHQ is proportionate). A number of such questions are currently before the courts,
which have the benefit of structured and opposing legal submissions and (in the case
of the IPT) the facility to examine highly secret evidence, and which are the only bodies
that can authoritatively determine them.
1.13.
Deciding the content of the law in this area is for Parliament, subject only to any
external legal constraints; and there are wide issues of principle on which the views
of one individual (or even one committee) could never aspire to be determinative.18
But I am invited to opine on a variety of topics, some of them quite technical in nature,
and hope that by basing my conclusions where possible on evidence, MPs and others
will at least be in a position to judge whether my recommendations are worthy of being
followed.
Not limited to terrorism
1.14.
This Review overlaps only slightly with my work as independent reviewer of terrorism
legislation.19 In that (part-time) capacity, I report regularly to Ministers and to
Parliament on the operation of laws directed specifically to counter-terrorism, but not
on laws relating to investigatory powers, which are within the competence of others.20
The subject matter of this one-off Review is therefore quite distinct from the normal
work of the independent reviewer.
1.15.
I would emphasise that:
(a)
18
19
20
Investigatory powers vary greatly in their impact. Broad powers of bulk
collection are used by GCHQ to identify threats to national security from vast
quantities of data. But highly targeted communications data requests are used
See e.g. the issue of whether the retention by service providers of data capable of revealing web
browsing history constitutes an acceptable intrusion into privacy, which the Joint Committee on the
Draft Communications Data Bill [JCDCDB] after its own thorough investigation felt compelled to leave
to Parliament: Report of the JCDCDB, HL Paper 79 HC 479, (December 2012) [JCDCDB Report],
para 294.
I remain a Q.C. (self-employed barrister) in independent practice. Full details of the role of
independent reviewer, and of the reports I have produced in the course of it, are on my website:
https://terrorismlegislationreviewer.independent.gov.uk/.
In particular, IOCCO. Other forms of surveillance are reported upon by the Intelligence Services
Commissioner [ISCommr] and by the Office of Surveillance Commissioners [OSC].
20