Latest news with #SuperInjunction
Telegraph
18-07-2025
- Politics
- Telegraph
‘I'd do it again', says Grant Shapps over secret Afghan scheme
Sir Grant Shapps has said he would 'do the same thing all over again' over the Afghan data leak super-injunction. The senior Tory politician, who was defence secretary when the injunction was first put in place, said the move to keep data breach a secret was 'entirely justified' to protect the lives of thousands of Afghans. He made his first public comments on the data debacle after it emerged that the leak had also included the details of more than 100 Britons, including spies and members of the special forces. Sir Grant said he would 'walk over hot coals to protect those guys' and the super-injunction was needed in order to keep people safe. It was revealed earlier this week when the super-injunction was lifted that a dataset containing the personal information of 25,000 Afghans who had applied for the Afghan Relocations and Assistance Policy (Arap) had been released 'in error' in February 2022 by a defence official. The Tory government became aware of the leak in August 2023 and Sir Ben Wallace, the then defence secretary, made the decision to apply for an injunction. Sir Grant took over as defence secretary on August 31 2023 and the High Court granted a super-injunction at the start of September. The government established a covert relocation scheme to bring the affected Afghan soldiers and their family members to the UK, amid fears they could be targeted by the Taliban, at a cost of £7billion. Around 4,500 people have been brought to the UK or are in transit so far under the secret route. 'Would walk over hot coals to protect those guys' Sir Grant defended the decision to use a super-injunction to keep the breach and the relocation scheme a secret. He told the BBC Radio 4 Today programme on Friday morning: 'I would just make this point, that there are things that the state just has to do secretly otherwise you would get to the point where people would say 'well why aren't you releasing the nuclear codes?' 'You simply can't release everything and this was one of those times where, faced with a decision of protecting lives, both Brits and Afghanis, I would do the same thing all over again. 'I would walk over hot coals to protect those guys.' The use of a super-injunction by the government to keep something so significant a secret has prompted major questions about transparency after Parliament was kept in the dark. Sir Grant said he was 'surprised' that the super-injunction was kept in place for so long. He also said he would support the initial defence assessment of the data leak which formed the basis of the super-injunction being handed over to the Intelligence and Security Committee of Parliament for scrutiny. Asked the question about sharing the document with the committee, Sir Grant said: 'I will say two things. First of all, yes I would. And secondly this injunction, the super-injunction, was in place for longer than I was defence secretary, so it has been in place a lot longer under the current government than it was under us. 'I am surprised it has lasted quite so long. My expectation was, as the risks start to lessen over time and people are removed from the theatre, from Afghanistan, and measures are taken to protect the Brits on the list, that it would carry on quite so long. 'I'd thought that it was probably going to come to an end last summer or the autumn perhaps at maximum. 'So I am surprised it has taken quite so long and it is absolutely right that those committees are able to look into it properly.' Sir Grant said he believed the public understood that 'there are times where you simply have to act in the most maximalist way in order to stop people from being murdered and executed and that is quite simply what properly happened in this case'.
Sky News
18-07-2025
- Politics
- Sky News
Sir Lindsay Hoyle should have made ministers tell MPs about Afghan data leak, says Harriet Harman
Commons Speaker Sir Lindsay Hoyle knew about Afghan data leak and should have made ministers tell MPs, Dame Harriet Harman has claimed. Speaking to Beth Rigby on the Electoral Dysfunction podcast, the Labour peer said the Speaker - whose job she ran for in 2019 - should have asked for a key select committee to be made aware. A spokesperson for the Speaker said he was "himself under a super-injunction" and so "would have been under severe legal restrictions". A massive data breach by the British military that was only made public this week exposed the personal information of close to 20,000 Afghan individuals, endangering them and their families. Successive governments tried to keep the leak secret with a super-injunction, meaning the UK only informed everyone affected on Tuesday - three-and-a-half years after their data was compromised. The breach occurred in February 2022, when Boris Johnson was prime minister, but was only discovered by the British military in August 2023. A super-injunction, which prevented the reporting of the mistake, was imposed in September of that year. The previous Conservative government set-up a secret scheme in 2023 - which can only now be revealed - to relocate Afghan nationals impacted by the data breach but who were not eligible for an existing programme to relocate and assist individuals who had worked for the British government in Afghanistan. Some 6,900 Afghans - comprising 1,500 people named on the list as well as their dependents - are being relocated to the UK as part of this programme. Dame Harriet said: "The Speaker was warned, 'If somebody's going to say something which breaches this injunction, will you please shut them up straight away if an MP does this', and he agreed to do that. "But what he should have done at the time is he should have said, but parliamentary accountability is important. I'm the Speaker. I'm going to stand up for parliamentary accountability. And you must tell the Intelligence and Security Committee and allow them to hold you to account. "What's happened now is now that this is out in the open, the Intelligence and Security Committee is going to look at everything. So, it will be able to see all the papers from the MoD [Ministry of Defence]." Pressed on whether she meant the Speaker had failed to do his job, Dame Harriet replied: "Yes, and it's a bit invidious for me to be saying that because, of course, at that time, Lindsay Hoyle was elected a speaker, I myself ran to be speaker, and the House chose him rather than me. "So it's a bit bad to make this proposal to somebody who actually won an election you didn't win. But actually, if you think about the Speaker's role to stand up for parliament, to make sure that government is properly scrutinised, when you've got a committee there, which is security cleared to the highest level, appointed by the prime minister, and whose job is exactly to do this." A spokesperson for the Speaker said: "As has been made clear, Mr Speaker was himself under a super-injunction, and so would have been under severe legal restrictions regarding speaking about this. "He would have had no awareness which organisations or individuals were and were not already aware of this matter. "The injunction could not constrain proceedings in parliament and between being served with the injunction in September 2023 and the 2024 general election, Mr Speaker granted four Urgent Questions on matters relating to Afghan refugees and resettlement schemes. "Furthermore, as set out in the Justice and Security Act 2013, the Speaker has no powers to refer matters to the Intelligence and Security Committee."
Sky News
18-07-2025
- Politics
- Sky News
Commons Speaker Sir Lindsay Hoyle knew about Afghan data leak, claims Harriet Harman
Commons Speaker Sir Lindsay Hoyle knew about Afghan data leak and should have made ministers tell MPs, Dame Harriet Harman has claimed. Speaking to Beth Rigby on the Electoral Dysfunction podcast, the Labour peer said the Speaker - whose job she ran for in 2019 - should have asked for a key select committee to be made aware. A spokesperson for the Speaker said he was "himself under a super injunction" and so "would have been under severe legal restrictions". A massive data breach by the British military that was only made public this week exposed the personal information of close to 20,000 Afghan individuals, endangering them and their families. Successive governments tried to keep the leak secret with a superinjunction, meaning the UK only informed everyone affected on Tuesday - three-and-a-half years after their data was compromised. The breach occurred in February 2022, when Boris Johnson was prime minister, but was only discovered by the British military in August 2023. A superinjunction which prevented the reporting of the mistake, was imposed in September of that year. The previous Conservative government set up a secret scheme in 2023 - which can only now be revealed - to relocate Afghan nationals impacted by the data breach but who were not eligible for an existing programme to relocate and assist individuals who had worked for the British government in Afghanistan. Some 6,900 Afghans - comprising 1,500 people named on the list as well as their dependents - are being relocated to the UK as part of this programme. Dame Harriet said: "The Speaker was warned, 'If somebody's going to say something which breaches this injunction, will you please shut them up straight away if an MP does this', and he agreed to do that. "But what he should have done at the time is he should have said but parliamentary accountability is important. I'm the Speaker. I'm going to stand up for parliamentary accountability. And you must tell the Intelligence and Security Committee and allow them to hold you to account. "What's happened now is now that this is out in the open, the Intelligence and Security Committee is going to look at everything. So, it will be able to see all the papers from the MoD [Ministry of Defence]." Pressed on whether she meant the Speaker had failed to do his job, Dame Harriet replied: "Yes, and it's a bit invidious for me to be saying that because, of course, at that time, Lindsay Hoyle was elected a speaker, I myself ran to be speaker, and the House chose him rather than me. "So it's a bit bad to make this proposal to somebody who actually won an election you didn't win. But actually, if you think about the Speaker's role to stand up for parliament, to make sure that government is properly scrutinised, when you've got a committee there, which is security cleared to the highest level, appointed by the prime minister, and whose job is exactly to do this." A spokesperson for the Speaker said: "As has been made clear, Mr Speaker was himself under a super injunction, and so would have been under severe legal restrictions regarding speaking about this. "He would have had no awareness which organisations or individuals were and were not already aware of this matter. "The injunction could not constrain proceedings in parliament and between being served with the injunction in September 2023 and the 2024 general election, Mr Speaker granted four Urgent Questions on matters relating to Afghan refugees and resettlement schemes. "Furthermore, as set out in the Justice and Security Act 2013, the Speaker has no powers to refer matters to the Intelligence and Security Committee."
Daily Mail
17-07-2025
- Politics
- Daily Mail
Defence Secretary Healey disclosed details of secret Afghan database to Parliament - despite the Mail being blocked from reporting it
Defence Secretary John Healey disclosed details of the secret Afghan database to Parliament that the Mail and others were blocked from reporting. The Press were gagged by a new injunction earlier this week from revealing information sensitive to national security from the dataset of Afghans that put 100,000 'at risk of death'. But Mr Healey stood up in the Commons on Tuesday and said the information anyway. This morning at the High Court, a judge was told about the remarks the Defence Secretary had made to Parliament. Then he went into a 'closed' session with the Press and public being kicked out of court, so that the MoD's lawyers could address him privately. Mr Justice Chamberlain, speaking at the public part of the hearing, said he would be 'scrutinising very carefully any justification for holding any parts of this hearing in private, never mind in closed [session]'. A two-year unprecedented super-injunction, the first to be used by a government, meant there was no parliamentary scrutiny as ministers and officials made major policy decisions. Defence Secretary John Healey disclosed details of the secret Afghan database to Parliament that the Mail and others were blocked from reporting Some 18,500 Afghans have been brought to Britain as part of a secret £7billion rescue scheme It was lifted earlier this week, then the Mail, which has seen the dataset, and The Times and others were hit with a fresh injunction blocking the disclosure of some sensitive information that was on it. Today's hearing will discuss whether the Mail can now reveal that information and report what was said in Parliament.
