---

Terrorism Bill

My Lords, I am very grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Henley, for moving what he described as this late amendment—a bit of an afterthought—as it allows us to cast a watchful eye over Clause 15, which might not otherwise have attracted too much attention. The clause increases the penalty for failing to comply with a notice issued under Section 53 of the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 in national security cases from two to five years. RIPA, at the Act is known, put in place a system of notices requiring those who hold the key to encrypted data relating to criminal investigation to hand it over. Failure to do so constitutes an offence which currently, as the noble Lord carefully explained, carries a maximum penalty of two years. Thus far, we have had a high degree of co-operation concerning the way in which the legislation works. As the noble Lord also described, the Bill increases that penalty to five years in cases where the interests of national security have led to the notice being issued. The amendment would apply that change to all offences. My first reaction is that the amendment is not really appropriate for a terrorism Bill, and I think that the noble Lord, Lord Henley, half-accepted that in his comments. The change in question is, by definition, concerned only with cases unrelated to terrorism and, for that reason, it probably would not be appropriate for your Lordships to accept the amendment. There may be some merit in the amendment well outside the confines of the Bill, but that is for consideration or debate in the future. The Bill is concerned largely with the UK’s response to the very real and current threat of terrorism. At this stage, I argue that we need to be focused, considered, determined and disciplined before we start considering adding other, unrelated matters, however worthy they are, and the noble Lord gave a hint of some of the areas of concern. We brought forward Clause 15 because we recognise that national security cases are in a special and uniquely serious category and that the higher penalty can be justified for them. The argument for a higher penalty in cases not related to national security has not yet been made, although, as I acknowledged, it is something to be considered in the future. We can debate that another day. Were we to consider going along that path, clearly we would want to have discussions with the IT industry and consult it very carefully—perhaps the noble Lord has had some of those discussions. I understand why the noble Lord has moved the amendment but it is outside the scope of the debate that we have been having today, which concerns interests relating to national security. Although the amendment may be worth while in another context, I think that it is somewhat premature and I hope that, having heard that, the noble Lord will feel happy to withdraw it.