Keir Starmer: he thinks the government and its agents should be above the law.
The Tories bid to allow spies working for government agencies like the Financial Conduct Authority to commit crimes like murder and rape without fear of prosecution has been foiled by the Lords.
Peers supported amendments to the Covert Human Intelligence Sources Bill as follows:
Peers inflicted two significant defeats on the government on Wednesday evening over a bill to regulate the use of undercover informants, passing amendments to stop them participating in murder and rape, and to curtail the use of children as informants.
The government was also defeated by 299 to 284 on an amendment from the peer Doreen Massey, which proposed explicitly banning those acting undercover from being allowed to participate in a list of serious crimes, including murder, torture, rape or other sexual offences as they gained information.
Ministers had ruled out introducing such a list previously, arguing that creating a list of forbidden offences could give terrorists and serious criminals ways to unmask infiltrators by asking them to engage in such banned activities.
Campaign groups welcomed the result, arguing that it would put the UK on a par with similar western countries in setting clear limits.
Sadly, this result is notable for another reason – Labour leader Keir Starmer’s unacceptable support for the Bill with all immunities against criminal prosecution intact.
If he had whipped Labour to oppose it in the Commons, it would never have got as far as the Lords. But he didn’t.
Worse still, after former shadow attorney general Shami Chakrabarti put forward an amendment to remove immunity from prosecution for crimes from government agents who commit them, saying there would otherwise be a “grave risk” of human rights abuses by undercover agents, Starmer whipped Labour peers to abstain and it failed:
Peers were debating the bill at the second day of its report stage. On Monday, an amendment from Shami Chakrabarti seeking to strike out immunity for undercover agents acting within authorised guidelines was defeated by 309 to 153, after the Labour leadership chose to abstain.
It seems clear that this former Director of Public Prosecutions thinks the government and its agents should be above the law.
It is an unacceptable attitude for any potential national leader to have.
Source: Lords inflict two defeats on government over ‘spy cops’ bill | House of Lords | The Guardian
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