§ Mr. Tony BanksTo ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department (1) what sums of money were charged to Government by British Telecom or other telephone companies for interception services in the last financial year; and what was the average cost per interception;
(2) how many telephone lines in total were intercepted by authorised warrant in 1987;
(3) for all telephone interceptions in 1987, what proportion were authorised for (a) criminal investigation and (b) domestic surveillance for security purposes;
(4) what has been the average duration of an authorized interception warrant during the past two years; who monitors them; and to whom the monitoring information is reported;
(5) how many requests have been received from the police to have telephone lines monitored for traffic frequency in the past 12 months;
(6) how many individual telephone lines have been intercepted on average per authorised warrant in the last two years.
§ Mr. HurdThe Interception of Communications Act 1985 sets out the purposes for which a warrant may be issued and makes provision for the monitoring of interception under the Act by an independent judicial figure, the right hon. Lord Justice Lloyd. The commissioner's annual reports, presented to parliament by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister, comment on the results of that monitoring.
The figures for the number of interceptions warrants issued by the Home Secretary and the Secretary of State for Scotland in force on 31 December 1987 were given in an annex to the report of the commissioner, which was presented to Parliament in March 1988 (Cmnd. 351). I do not intend to publish statistics additional to those in the commissioner's reports. Nor would it be consistent with the practice of successive Governments to give information about the costs relating to interception warrants.