Government Expects Parliament to Swallow an Iceberg

The new draft surveillance bill is like an iceberg, with a vast bulk of technical change obscured beneath the surface, according to civil liberties organisation NO2ID, the national campaign against the database state.

Theresa May presented the Investigatory Powers Bill to parliament today as a measure "consolidating and updating our investigatory powers, strengthening the safeguards". NO2ID say that it amounts to a dramatic alteration in the powers already available not just to the intelligence services, but to police, tax inspectors, and officials and regulators in almost every department of state. Hundreds of official bodies have access to communications data and other surveillance powers, including bugging - which does not count as interception and does not need a warrant for an authorised agency. The new Bill replaces several pieces of complex and technical legislation.

Guy Herbert, General Secretary for NO2ID, said:

"I would have more sympathy for the Home Secretary if she did not resort to glib hypotheticals about kidnapped children. This is not a proposed bill that is easy to understand or straightforward in effect.

"The much trumpeted change in oversight focuses on a tiny portion of cases, the handful of warrants issued by Secretaries of State every day. The real issue is the tens of thousands of surveillance actions a day carried out by officials.

"The Bill is an iceberg. It is easy to focus on the sunlight glinting on a few peaks, it is harder to grasp the important bits beneath the surface. What is clear is that Parliament is expected to deal with all of this before the expiry of the Data Retention and Investigatory Powers Act at the end of 2016 - to swallow the iceberg before its dimensions can be fathomed."