§ 8. Mr. WinnickTo ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department when he will reply to the Home Affairs Committee's first report of Session 1992–93 on accountability of the security services.
§ Mr. Kenneth ClarkeThe Government will publish their response shortly.
§ Mr. WinnickIs the Home Secretary aware that we hope that he will accept the recommendation of the Home Affairs Select Committee that the security service should be subject to proper parliamentary scrutiny? If other countries, no less democratic than our own, have decided over a period of time to have such scrutiny, why should this country be an exception? Is it not the case that the sooner the security services are subject to proper scrutiny, the better it will be?
§ Mr. ClarkeI gave my views to the Home Affairs Select Committee and they have not changed from those in the evidence that I then gave. The important issue of parliamentary accountability will be dealt with again by the House when we debate the Bill relating to the secret intelligence service and GCHQ, which the Government have announced they intend to introduce in due course. We shall then have a proper and serious debate about how the security service can be subject to some accountability without damaging its operational effectiveness.
I remind the hon. Gentleman that we already have a commissioner for the security service for which I am responsible and he has just produced a report for this year. There is also a commissioner who regulates our use of the Interception of Communications Act 1985. I commend both commissioners' reports to the hon. Gentleman because they, like me, are satisfied that the security service is acting only for the purposes for which it is intended to act and within the strict legal constraints that legislation places on it.