MR JUSTICE BURTON
Approved Judgment
applied an obligation which the Court considers is particularly
important in the context of the powers and duties of the
Commissioner and the IPT.”
We have not cited paragraph 162, because that did not relate to the conclusions of
the Court which are common to both s.8(1) and s.8(4) warrants.
124.
There is no call for us to reconsider those conclusions. We need to deal only with
any matters which have been freshly contended before us. Amendments to the
Code have been proposed and published. Mr Farr refers to their origin as follows:
“161. In March 2010, the Home Office published on its website a revised
draft of the Code . . . the draft was subject to a targeted consultation,
lasting 3 months. The aim, in response to the Liberty v UK judgment was to
make public, to the extent possible, further information as to how material
gathered under s.8(4) warrant comes to be examined following
interception. The proposed changes were mainly to chapters 5 and 6.
Some minor corrections and updates were also made.”
In the event, the amended Code was never brought into force. The Claimants, while
recognising that there were thus some proposed changes, do not assert that those
changes would resolve their complaints against the existing Code. We have
considered the amendments, and although they may constitute improvements in
methodology and supervision, which we encourage, we do not consider that the
additions call into question the adequacy of the existing Code.
125.
In the light of our careful consideration of the decisions of the ECtHR and our
conclusions in paragraphs 117–124 above, we conclude that, as was the case with
the Prism Issue, we need to be satisfied that there are adequate arrangements in
place to ensure compliance with the statutory framework and the Convention and to
give the individual adequate protection against arbitrary interference, that they are
sufficiently accessible, bearing in mind the requirements of national security, and
that they are subject to oversight.
126.
The Respondents have agreed at and after the closed hearings, in the circumstances
described in paragraph 10 above, also to make the following further Disclosures, by
way of a summary of the evidence in Closed (the numbering continues from that in
paragraph 47):
3.
Those of the Intelligence Services that receive unanalysed intercepted material
and related communications data from interception under a s.8(4) warrant
have internal “arrangements” that require a record to be created, explaining
why access to the unanalysed intercepted material is required, before an
authorised person is able to access such material pursuant to s.16 of RIPA.
4.
The internal “arrangements” of those of the Intelligence Services that receive
unanalysed intercepted material and related communications data from
interception under a s.8(4) warrant specify (or require to be determined, on a
system-by-system basis) maximum retention periods for different categories of
such data which reflect the nature and intrusiveness of the particular data at
issue. The periods so specified (or determined) are normally no longer than 2