ACPO welcomes IOCCO report

National Policing Lead for Communications Data, ACC Richard Berry, said:

“We welcome the clarity the IOCCO report gives us on a number of complex points of law. We note the recommendations and will work with the Commissioner’s Office and the Home Office on our future approach.

“In the police service we are committed to accountable, human rights based practice and maintaining the balance between what the law says, how we implement the law and our behaviour. To that end we announced our plans for a Board of Communications Data Ethics to consider issues of public concern in an increasingly digitised world.

“Investigations into corrupt relationships between journalists and public officials will continue to be a challenge for all public agencies. Communications data plays an important part in this and other serious crime and we welcome the report’s conclusion that: ‘Police forces are not trawling communications data relating to journalists in order to identify their sources’ and ‘Police forces have not circumvented other legislation by using their powers under Chapter 2 of Part 1 of the Act to acquire communications data in these cases’.”

We also note:

• The comments in the report [para 8.6] about the need to emphasise more  detailed consideration of  proportionality, necessity and collateral intrusion within the considerations of Article 8 (right to privacy) and to include detailed considerations of Article 10 (the right of free expression);

• The ‘recalibration of RIPA’ in line with PACE and other legal principles in the report’s recommendations.  Again, we always welcome clarification of complex law;

• There remains some finer detail to work out - for example, for the exceptionally rare situation where other Human Rights such as Article 2 (the right to life) are the major consideration, any judicial authorisation process must be able to deal with the demands of operational situations including immediate availability 24/7.

The full report may be viewed here

Notes for editors:

Plans for the development of a Board of Ethics approach for digital/data intrusion issues was announced by ACPO in January 2015 is being taken forward by the National Portfolio Leads.

For any further information please contact the ACPO Communications Office on 020 7084 8948