Category Archives: Society

Britain, Government, Human Rights, Intelligence, National Security, Politics, Scotland, Society

Protecting privacy requires Government action…

SURVEILLANCE

In the early 1990s a Scottish newspaper exposed the details of a routine police practice known as ‘metering’. This involved a senior detective and police officer requesting from British Telecom (BT) one of their customer’s phone records. Such records detailed the telephone numbers that person was calling, when the call took place, and the call’s duration. British Telecom handed these details over under a ‘private agreement’ it had formulated between itself and the police.

Not only did the newspaper reveal this practice, but divulged how little political or judicial oversight there was of it. Later, the Secretary of State for Scotland at the time, Ian Lang, announced new guidelines on metering for Scotland’s police forces, and a new reporting system was introduced to keep track of the practice. Details came to light following the theft of metering surveillance documents from the Headquarters of Lothian and Borders police in Edinburgh, in a saga that came to be known as Fettesgate.

More than two decades on one could be tempted to change the word ‘metering’ to ‘metadata’. In recent months, Edward Snowden, a former US intelligence officer with the National Security Agency (NSA), revealed the phenomenal scale of surveillance of the public’s phone, text, e-mail and social network communications, carried out by the NSA in joint collaboration with Britain’s GCHQ in Cheltenham. Matters arising now are the same issues that applied in 1992. Unlike the actual listening into telephone conversations, much of this surveillance focusses around metadata in the reading of e-mails and electronic texts but does not require ministerial permission and oversight.

The Scottish Government appears to accept the current democratic oversight may be insufficient. It suggests the scope of the practices used in surveillance may need to be reviewed in the event of Scotland becoming an independent country.

Some may say, however, that this is not good enough – arguing, that if the legislation needs to be reviewed then it should be done now: issues of public accountability, improved oversight and privacy apply regardless of Scotland’s constitutional future.

Privacy, of course, is one of the biggest issues of the day. Electronic and digital communications have opened up channels for people in a way that would have been hard to imagine just a generation ago. Undoubtedly, though, this has been achieved at a price. One of the biggest challenges facing our parliamentarians is to balance the needs of the police and security services with the personal liberties and rights of law-abiding citizens who are entitled to enjoy a private life. Of particular concern is the apparent comfortable relationship that has evolved between the authorities and some of the large telecommunication companies, many of whom are already under intense criticism for being condescending with their customers’ privacy.

Scotland’s Justice Secretary, Kenny MacAskill MSP, must accept that his task is not only facilitating Police Scotland in their fight against crime, but also involves protecting ordinary citizens in Scotland from undue and unwelcome scrutiny of their private lives by the authorities. Mr MacAskill has remained silent on this issue despite surveillance being a major issue in the current era. The Justice Secretary must speak up and demonstrate that he has this balance right.

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Britain, Government, Human Rights, Legal, Military, Society

Iraq war crimes denied by the British Government….

INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL COURT

Earlier this month, the human rights lawyers PIL (Public Interest Lawyers) lodged an application with the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague, said to represent more than 400 Iraqis who have called for an investigation into alleged war crimes carried out by the British Army. The application lodged with the ICC has been made under Article 15 of the Rome Statute.

The legal dossier poses serious implications well above those allegations embedded within the document. For example, it seeks to know whether leading figures in the army and UK government should be called to account.

The submission to the ICC refers to ‘thousands of allegations of mistreatment amounting to war crimes of torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment’. The dossier also alleges that some ‘at the highest levels’ were mostly responsible, including head of the army General Sir Peter Wall and ex-defence secretary Geoff Hoon.

Following the lodging of the document with the court Foreign Secretary William Hague was quick in responding with a firm statement that the allegations are either already under investigation or have been dealt with in previous government inquiries and rulings. Mr Hague insists that any bid to prosecute British politicians and senior military figures for alleged war crimes in Iraq should be rejected. The speed with which Mr Hague reacted and contested the claims is perhaps reflective over concerns the UK government has over the potential damage to Britain’s reputation.

Some 11 years on, the political sensitivity of the UK’s involvement makes the prospect of an international criminal court inquiry highly explosive. The government’s defence is that intensive inquiries have already been held at UK level. It says that some cases of abuse have been acknowledged with appropriate levels of compensation paid and apologies offered. An interim report on an extensive inquiry by Sir Peter Gibson was published last month. Rejecting the allegations of systematic abuses the Foreign Secretary said that the British armed forces ‘uphold high standards and they are the finest armed forces in the world’.

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Yet, there are two problems here for the government. The first is the increasing importance accorded to human rights in international relations. While such investigations into military operations in theatres of war have been questioned on the premise that they would underestimate the intense dangers and pressures which troops were operating under, concerns over human rights abuses has grown. The UK is a signatory to international human rights conventions.

The second problem is that there is a long history of domestic inquiries into the conduct of military operations that were subsequently found to have been inadequately deficient or incomplete. Any external investigation by an international court would spark concern within the Ministry of Defence, which has presided over numerous errors and shortcomings.

What is more, a failure to enforce compliance with the rules of war would be a grave allegation for the MoD to face. But unless such compliance is enforced from the top down with the level of robustness needed, such charges are only likely to be repeated.

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Britain, Government, Human Rights, Legal, Media, Society

More transparency needed for the Court of Protection…

COURT OF PROTECTION

Intro: A court which has the power to jail people and make life and death decisions in secret could be made more transparent

The highly sensitive work of the Court of Protection often sits uneasily with the notions of freedom and transparency upon which the state rests. Judges sometimes make decisions on behalf of those individuals incapable of running their own affairs. The right to a dignified private life for society’s most vulnerable must certainly be protected, but the default position in which hearings are conducted behind closed doors and in secret does not reconcile with the central tenet of the law in Britain being based upon open justice.

The Court of Protection has made advances in recent years. Successive presidents of the Court have, for example, acknowledged the need for a special register in which nominated journalists become more acquainted with the workings and decisions of the Court – decisions which range from care arrangements to family access and to the disposal of assets.

The test case for others to campaign was in 2010, when the Court of Appeal ruled in favour of the media to have access to hearings about whether a blind and profoundly autistic pianist, Derek Paravicini, should continue to perform. That case set legal precedent, and since then access has been granted in a handful of other cases. However, it is still only in instances involving invasive medical treatment or a life-and-death decision that the presumption applies. Even then, the press and public are often not acquainted with the case until the hearing has already been heard.

Last May, the case of Wanda Maddocks sparked a national debate about transparency after she was sent to prison for five months after she tried to remove her 80-year-old father from the care of Stoke on Trent city council. Ms Maddocks had not been present or even represented in court.

She was thought to be the first person to be imprisoned by the court, which settles the affairs and appoints deputies to act on behalf of people who are unable to make decisions about their personal health, finance or welfare.

The current Court of Protection president, Sir James Munby (Lord Justice Munby), has been working tirelessly to resolve the issue. During the summer of 2013, he issued draft published guidance for judges in which he explicitly stressed the need for ‘greater transparency in order to improve public understanding and confidence’. Sir James also resolved that, as far as is possible, the Court of protection should be governed by the same rules that apply to the family courts (of which he is also president). In a written ruling on a long running case last week, Sir James put the theory into practice; he said the judgement would become public, but the family would not be named.

Despite the welcome steps forward that have been made, there is still much to be done. Sir James is due to release a second tranche of guidance, expected imminently, and it can only be hoped this will go further, by giving accredited reporters automatic access to the Court of Protection as they have in the family courts. If permitted, the usual proviso of cases being aired publicly being subject to negotiation with the presiding judge would apply.

There are wider issues, too. Leading lawyers, for instance, are warning of a ‘marked variation’ in the willingness of judges to talk directly to those who are the subject of proceedings as well as to the appointed solicitor representing their interests. This not only raises concerns over the possibility of human-rights violations, but questions of judicial consistency also arise.

The Court of Protection delivers rulings on some of the most difficult, sensitive and contested questions of modern life, and makes decisions that may define the course and circumstances of a person’s life. Public confidence is needed in such a powerful institution, and to ensure that happens the procedures and practices must be standardised and applied with uniformity and better consistency. The justice the Court dispenses must be as open as it can be.

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