Category Archives: security services

Child Sex Abuse: Failings in the Peter Wanless and Richard Whittam Review

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Peter Wanless: Some failings in his inquiry PicCredit: www.thirdsector.co.uk

Peter Wanless: Some failings in his inquiry
Pic Credit: http://www.thirdsector.co.uk

Yesterday Theresa May, the home secretary was rightly called before Parliament by her shadow Yvette Cooper, to answer questions about the findings of the Wanless and Whittam Review into the missing dossier naming VIP paedophiles given to her predecessor, Leon Brittan by the late Geoffrey Dickens MP. If Yvette hadn’t done it, Tessa Munt, one of the” magnificent  seven” MPs who called for an overarching inquiry was already planning to do so.

The report with its 12 annexes was rushed out at 11.30 am leaving MPs of the House of Commons Home Affairs Committee precious little time to digest it before questioning both authors in a session truncated because of the timing of May’s statement. No wonder Keith Vaz, its chairman, might have been a bit tetchy during May’s statement.

In conducting a meticulous search inside the Home Office  both  Wanless and Whittam did a thorough job – as far as they could – to try and find any references to  what appears to be a long destroyed document. They also exposed the chaotic state of the Home Office’s record keeping and if you look at the annexes to the report shed a little more light on other cases.

So far so good. They then seem to have asked other Whitehall organisations to conduct a search on their behalf but as Zac Goldsmith, the MP for Richmond, quizzed her over the failure to find anything at the old Director of Public Prosecutions, where the dossier was sent, still left a question in this area whether the work had been thorough.

They also seem to have spent some time chasing officials who held documents at the time they have been destroyed in  the hope that they might get them. This is important – even though their report is sceptical about it – because in one of my investigations for Exaro  official documents have turned up because someone kept them in their attic.

They also questioned the Home Office whistleblower who came forward to Tom Watson MP with his fears that a senior civil servant,Clifford Hindley, may have been involved in the funding of the notorious Paedophile Information Exchange.

But where they failed – and this was taken up by Steve McCabe, Labour’s shadow social services minister, – was in pursuing civil servants who were around at the time. The lame response from Theresa to appeal to people to come forward was not good enough.

Wanless and Whittam would have seen a lot of documents with civil servants’ names on them because of the way Whitehall has a distribution list for almost every document.Some may be dead, most will have retired.

But they missed an opportunity to be proactive and chase them up. For they must be accessible. They will all be on final salary pensions paid out by Whitehall. It would not be too difficult, to contact the semi privatised agency and get their names and addresses and ring them up. They might be a little outraged about their personal data being accessed – but this is an official inquiry to get to the facts. People do talk to each other – and also someone at the DPP at the time also got that dossier who may not want to disturb a pleasant retirement going on cruises and playing golf.

The result is that we have unsatisfactory verdict of ” not proven ” from this investigation which takes us little further than the Home Office’s original findings.

To get to the truth over child sexual abuse we are going to need a lot of lateral thinking and a sceptical investigative state of mind to prise out information. I hope the overarching child abuse inquiry takes this on board and treats the Wanless review with some forensic scepticism.

Child Sex Abuse Inquiry: A job half done by Theresa May

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Job half done:Theresa May, home sercretary. Pic Credit: conservatives.com

Job half done:Theresa May, home sercretary. Pic Credit: conservatives.com

Will the second attempt  by Theresa May, the home secretary, to restart the process  of setting up an overarching inquiry into child sexual abuse fall into another elephant trap?

Within days of her appointment Fiona Woolf, the Lord Mayor of London and  lawyer, to chair the inquiry questions about her suitability have surfaced in  the Mail on Sunday because of her links with the family of Leon Brittan.

Survivors who might be tempted to give evidence will be alarmed at any link with Leon Brittan  for many reasons.The row about the loss of papers by the Home Office sent in by the former MP the late Geoffrey Dickens which are alleged to named paedophiles during his watch in the early 1980s is one.

He is also- even though he vehemently denies the allegation –  still the subject of a Met Police investigation into the rape of young woman before he became an MP.

Fiona Woolf needs to clarify exactly what the relationship with her neighbours, the Brittans is- not for prurient interest in her private life – but to assure worried  survivors that no friendship will cloud judgements. Frankly it shouldn’t. If it is purely tenuous there should be no problem, if it isn’t there could be one.

But why are we back to this?

Given the furore over the appointment of first chair, Baroness Butler- Sloss, who resigned after Exaro revealed the conflict of interest because her late brother, Lord Havers, a former attorney general, had been involved in restricting the terms of the inquiry into the Kincora scandal in Northern Ireland, you would have thought every avenue would have been followed to avoid a similar problem.

As I reported over the weekend on the Exaro website indeed  at least 60 candidates were considered and  it was said to have been properly vetted by home office officials.

But before a final judgement is made we need to see the full picture – the full terms of reference, the rest of the people appointed to the inquiry, and then pass judgement.

This is because the rest of  the appointments – some of them brave –  do ensure there will be independent voices on the panel.None of the rest can be connected with the Establishment.

Graham Wilmer, whom followers of this blog will be familiar,is no push over. He is a survivor himself, a  vigorous campaigner against abuse in the Salesian order, and also runs the Lantern project in the Wirral which helps survivors, though has not received the money that is needed to really tackle the problem. He also sits on a committee about safeguarding survivors chaired by the Bishop of Durham, which is currently looking at what more work it should do.

Barbara Hearn, the former deputy chief executive of the National Children’s Bureau, whom I have also met, has been wrongly traduced on Twitter just because in a previous age the body was associated with the  paedophile Peter Righton. At the moment she is providing campaigning MP Tom Watson – who raised the Righton scandal in Parliament- with expert help on how to help and counsel the many survivors who come to him.. For the record she is doing this on a voluntary basis, the antithesis of the view that anyone in Parliament must be on a gravy train.

Then there is Professor Alexis Jay, who as expert adviser, to the committee, record speaks for itself. She is the person who exposed the unbelievable scandal in Rotherham – a fount of knowledge of the exploitation of young people by sex abusers.

Finally there is the counsel, Ben Emmerson, He is not only a human rights lawyer but the UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights and Counter Terrorism. He is currently looking at the use of drones  to kill terrorists and more often innocent citizens in places like Pakistan and Afghanistan.. His work is not exactly going to please the US and UK governments and campaigning MP, Tom Watson, is also backing him to the hilt over this issue as well.

Now he is going to devote his considerable legal expertise to tackling child sexual abuse and whether there have been cover ups in this country.

All this means – if there is another row over the setting up of this inquiry – we must not throw everything out.

Now is the time for careful thought and analysis not rushed judgements -Theresa May’s job is only half done.

 

 

 

 

Child Sex Abuse Inquiry: Theresa May’s more sensible way forward

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Theresa May, home sercretary. Pic Credit: conservatives.com

Theresa May, home sercretary. Pic Credit: conservatives.com

After the complete debacle over the rushed appointment  and swift resignation of Baroness Butler-Sloss to  head the overarching inquiry into child sex abuse, Theresa May met six of the ” Magnificent” seven MPs again.

An account taken from a  couple of them appears on the Exaro site today suggests that the Home Office has now reverted to the way it has followed in setting up all other independent panels, including the Daniel Morgan and Gosport hospital inquiries which means consulting people before appointing people.

From my own sources I always thought Theresa May was rushed into making a decision by a Downing Street panicked by newspaper headlines.

The good news is that the six MPs were unanimous that a survivor MUST sit on the panel and  the home secretary  was open to names. It was also clear that the government will not be rushed again to announce a new chair of the inquiry. MPs also stressed the need for proper help for victims

As important will be the terms of reference for the inquiry, how the inquiry gathers evidence, how far it can investigate and whether the police and the security services get immunity in passing over information.

Here the Home Office will have to do some hard thinking to make sure that the inquiry panel;  must be both seen  to act without fear or favour or people  will lose confidence in its ability to  get to the real facts.

It must be able to go anywhere and tackle the issues in places where there are still secrets like Jersey and Northern Ireland.

It must not just be a lessons learned exercise from previous work – even though that  is all-encompassing in itself – given the large number of inquiries and police investigations.

This is a once in a lifetime chance to sort out the sordid history of child sexual abuse in the United Kingdom and make recommendations – from the investigation of the scandals to proper after care for survivors. The government – and any future government after 2015 – must not blow it this time.

Child sex abuse:The audio file that names an ex Tory Cabinet minister

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An audio  recording that names a former Tory Cabinet minister in connection with alleged child sex abuse is expected to be heard by MPs shortly.

This latest dramatic development is reported fully on Exaro’s website is of an interview with a customs officer who witnessed seeing the minister on a seized videotape at Dover,

The video is political dynamite. Customs and Excise seized it, along with other “indecent or obscene” films and videos of children, from Russell Tricker, a businessman, as he attempted to bring the material into the UK from Amsterdam.

Senior managers took over the case at the time, and are understood to have passed the video cassette to the Security Service, MI5. Tricker was released, and no further action was taken.

The fact that MPs want to hear this should mean that the police will have take this latest claim seriously as they will have to decide whether to hand over the tape to the new child abuse inquiry, summon the customs officer to give evidence to Parliament  or press the police to follow up this incident properly.

Yet another fast moving development in a story that is not going to go away.

 

Have the security services succeeded in censoring the MPs report on the murder of Lee Rigby?

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Lee Rigby; Pic courtesy of AP Press

Lee Rigby;
Pic courtesy of AP Press

Very shortly before Parliament rises for the recess the newly strengthened Intelligence and Security Committee will produce their report on the circumstances that led to the atrocious murder of Lee Rigby in Woolwich.

This report is very significant because it is the first to be completed where the MPs have had the powers to compel MI5 and MI6 to release all their information on the case.

Therefore it is not surprising as I have reported in Exaro  that the security services have hit back and  made robust demands for  redactions in what the MPs might have to say about their conduct.

We should be able to see how successful they have been if the report acknowledges where there have been redactions.

The soldier, a drummer in the Royal Fusiliers, was hacked to death in May last year in Woolwich, south-east London as he returned to his barracks. His killers, Michael Adebolajo and Michael Adebowale, are understood to have been known to MI5 for several years.

Adebolajo’s relatives say that MI5 had even approached him in 2011 to become an agent after he was deported from Kenya. He is said to have rejected the approach.

I understand the row between the intelligence officials and parliamentarians is understood to centre on UK’s intelligence operations in Kenya. The officials say that the report contains too much detail of these operations.

What alarms me is that security services appear to be involved in a spin operation in the  mainstream media to cover up their failings by demanding new extra powers and even emergency legislation to allow them to read anyone’s website on the back of any informed criticism of their actions

Let me make it clear to any bored  security operative who might be reading this blog that I have not seen or read a word of the MPs report. But I am aware that there is a fierce battle going on- and while I respect the role of the security services in fighting terrorism to keep us safe – I don’t want to see a blanket removal of our civil liberties or our right to privacy.

 

Phone Hacking Trial: Summing up, Coulson made no effort to inquire into extent of phone hacking at NoTW in 2004 – Martin Hickman

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The judge makes two very important points re Andy Coulson revealing David Blunkett’s affair with Kimberley Quinn – first a public interest justification that he was breaching security was never revealed in the public article- and secondly when he realised Blunkett’s phone had been hacked – he made no further inquiries way back in 2004 to find out whether phone hacking was widespread at the News of the World. One can only wonder why.

INFORRM's avatarInforrm's Blog

Phone hacking claimsDay 117: Andy Coulson made no attempt to inquire into the extent of phone hacking at the News of the World in 2004 after the chief reporter eavesdropped the messages of the Home Secretary, the Old Bailey was told today.

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Lee Rigby atrocity: The acid test facing the MPs who hold the security services to account

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Lee Rigby; Pic courtesy of AP Press

Lee Rigby;
Pic courtesy of AP Press

Britain’s only body that holds MI5 and MI6 to account is soon to produce a report on one of the most savage terrorist killings in this country – the hacking to death on the streets of Woolwich in south London of drummer Lee Rigby.

I am told that the security services have had to hand over highly sensitive material to Parliament’s Intelligence and Security Committee about the security services knowledge of his killers as changes in the law last year stopped our spies duping the committee by pretending they don’t have it. This duplicity came to light after the inquiry by Sir Peter Gibson  Dame Janet Paraskeva and Peter Riddell, a very through journalist, discovered information on the treatment of detainees  who are alleged to have been tortured abroad which had been withheld from MPs on the committee.

His report is here .

The committee has had a very bad press and been attacked by MPs on the Commons home affairs committee. In a report on counter terrorism published at the end of April, the committee was scathing about its role.

It said; ”  We do not believe the current system of oversight is effective and we have concerns that the weak nature of that system has an impact upon the credibility of the agencies accountability, and to the credibility of Parliament itself. The scrutiny of the work of the security and intelligence agencies should be not the exclusive preserve of the Intelligence and Security Committee. ”

There have been some key reforms. As I reported in an article on Exaro   the committee has both new powers and new resources. What I am questioning is whether they will use them so the public have the unvarnished truth.

As well as the power to compel the security services to hand over information, the committee, in an age of austerity, has seen its budget nearly doubled from about £750,000 to £1.3m after a Parliamentary debate  (contribution by Julian Lewis MP)  revealed it was the worst funded scrutiny committee of the security services in the western world. This has enabled the committee, I am told, to employ competent ex spies to quiz existing spies, to avoid cover ups. Credit should be given to former Tory Cabinet minister, Sir Malcolm Rifkind, the chairman, for pushing for these changes.

This means that the inquiry into the Lee Rigby atrocity will be the first to be properly funded and with new powers to get to to the truth. There still is a  long stop which enables David Cameron, who appointed all existing members (though this will change), to censor part of its report if he wanted to. We will have to hope there is no self  censorship before it reaches him.

What is disturbing is that there are already signs that the security services – mindful that they might be trashed for failing to keep full tabs on Rigby’s killers- are  briefing the mainstream media as part of a damage limitation exercise. A recent article in the Sunday Times  where their solution was to demand even more intrusive monitoring of the internet is an example.

As I reported on Exaro : ” The UK’s Security Service, better known as MI5, faces claims that it failed to realise the threat posed by his killers, Michael Adebolajo and Michael Adebowale, who were jailed for life in February after being convicted of murder…

Relatives of Adebolajo say that MI5 had even approached him in 2011 to become an agent after he was deported from Kenya.

According to Kenyan police, Adebolajo led a group of eight young men who were trying to travel to Somalia to fight for al-Shabaab, an offshoot of al-Qaeda.”

What must be clear is that the report from MPs must concentrate on practical ways the security service can protect us, not giving them even more powers – after the revelations over the scale of the monitoring of us all through the  whistleblower Edward Snowdon- to obtrusively check every internet site. It will be acid test to see what is released and whether the committee- now properly resourced – can do a good job.

It is time for the intelligence services to be intelligent in chasing terrorists. It is not their job to want to be an overarching snooping body on the whole nation.