UK: Surveillance warrants: up again
01 May 1994
The number of warrants issued for telephone tapping and mail- opening in 1993 was one of the highest since records began in 1937. A total of 998 warrants were issued in England and Wales (covering telephone tapping and mail-opening) to the Metropolitan Police Special Branch, the National Criminal Intelligence Service (NCIS), and HM Customs and Excise.
The figure allegedly also includes those issued to the Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) in Cheltenham but the number of warrants issued by the Foreign Secretary - who is responsible for GCHQ - are not published this is misleading. Past evidence of massive trawling by GCHQ suggested that they monitor over 35,000 communications a year (telephone, faxes etc). Nor are the figures for warrants issued by the Northern Ireland Secretary of State published.
The figures for 1993 published in the annual report of the Commissioner for the Interception of Communications Act 1985, Sir Robert Bingham, show that 893 warrants were issued for telecommunications tapping and 105 for mail-opening - as these figures relate to "warrants" these may refer to an individual or an organisation (through which many individuals may be surveilled).
The table below gives the figures for the past five years and the past top numbers for warrants. This shows that the 1993 total was the highest outside of the Second World War (1939- 1941) and the 1948 dock strike.
1939: 1002
1940: 1682
1941: 1042
1948: 973
1989: 458
1990: 515
1991: 732
1992: 874
1993: 998
The figure for Scotland was an all-time high since the number of warrants issued was first published in 1967. The number of warrants issued by the Secretary of State for Scotland in 1993 was 112 for telecommunications and 10 for mail-opening, a total of 122 warrants. This surpasses not just the 92 warrants in 1992 but also the post-1967 high of 75 during the 1984/5 miners strike. The figures for Scotland are:
1984: 75
1985: 68
1989: 64
1990: 66
1991: 82
1992: 92
1993: 122
The Commissioner reports states that there had been in the "past a reluctance on the part of some [Scottish] police forces to apply for warrants" - this has, the report says, now been rectified. The Secretary General of the Scottish Trades Union Council, Campbell Christie, commented: "this report will never cover interceptions without warrants..[it] does not reflect the true extent of interceptions taking place". Mr Christie has begun a legal action against the UK government in the European Court of Human Rights after a former official in the Joint Intelligence Committee (JIC) based in the Prime Minister's office said that in 1992 he was the target of mail and telex interceptions.
The report states that there has been a significant increase in the number of warrants issued to HM Customs, the National Criminal Intelligence Service, MI5 (because of the anti-terrorist work it has taken over from the Special Branch) and the Northern Ireland Office. It also says, like the past two years, that no individuals and "only a very few organisations" are placed under surveillance on the grounds that they are "subversive" (that they are a threat to "parliamentary democracy or national security").
A disturbing omission from the report is that, for the first time since the Commissioner was appointed, no figures are given for the number of complaints made to the Tribunal by the public are given.
Report of the Commissioner for 1992 Cm 2522 HMSO March 1994; Tapping the Telephone POEU pamphlet; Interception of Communications in the UK Cmnd 9438 1985; State Research no 18, June/July 1980; see also Statewatch vol 1 no 4, vol 2 no 5, vol 3 no 5.