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Terrorism Prevention and Investigation Measures Bill

If my noble friend does not mind my saying so, I am not sure that the example that he posits is one that I recollect from my period as DPP. Let us imagine the situation that would exist here: presumably the police or the Security Service would have in their possessions something like an intercept that could not be used—for example, a suspect having a conversation with another individual about a plan to place a bomb on the Tube. With respect, that is not the end of an investigation; it is the beginning of one. The investigation that then takes place is into that individual, into the plan as described in the phone call, into the individual he has spoken to and into the associates of all. The noble Lord will know from his time as Home Secretary that the sorts of powers and abilities that the law enforcement authorities in this country have, which we will not go into here, are considerable and significant. I do not recognise a situation in which a law enforcement investigation stops simply because the deeply incriminating material that you have until that time is the only material that you have and you do not anticipate discovering more.