Police Act 1997 (Authorisations to Interfere with Property: Relevant Offence) Regulations 2025

Motion to Approve

17:00:00

Moved by

That the draft Regulations laid before the House on 29 October be approved.

In moving this Motion, I also ask that the House approves the National Security Act 2023 (Consequential Amendment of Primary Legislation) Regulations 2025. Both these instruments, which were laid before this House on 29 October 2024, relate to the National Security Act. This Act, which received Royal Assent in July last year under the previous Government, includes a number of measures to protect the public, modernise our counterespionage laws and disrupt the full range of modern-day state threats. Among those measures is a prohibited places regime, including a suite of tools and offences to protect and capture harmful activity in and around some of the UK’s most sensitive sites, including by modern threats such as unmanned aircraft, which noble Lords will recognise colloquially as drones. It is essential that we make these two amendments, to ensure consistency of approach to the consequential amendments in both English and Welsh versions of related legislation and to ensure that our law enforcement bodies have the right tools to do their critical work. It might help noble Lords if I outline the first instrument, the Police Act 1997 (Authorisations to Interfere with Property: Relevant Offence) Regulations 2025. This adds drone-specific offences under the National Security Act 2023 to the list of relevant offences in the Police Act 1997, which provides police and other authorised officials with the legal authority to employ counter-drone equipment to detect and prevent the use of drones in the commission of relevant offences. The amendment is essential to enforce the National Security Act, as it ensures that police and other authorised officials can authorise the appropriate technical tools to tackle and combat drone misuse. If we do not proceed with the legislation, there may be instances where an offence under the National Security Act 2023 is committed but the police are unable to authorise the use of their equipment. The second instrument, the National Security Act 2023 (Consequential Amendment of Primary Legislation) Regulations 2025, amends the Welsh language version of the Public Services Ombudsman (Wales) Act 2019. Last year, when changing the English language version of the Act through the National Security Act 2023 (Consequential Amendments of Primary Legislation) Regulations 2023, an oversight took place, as happens occasionally, and the corresponding change was not made to the Welsh language version. It will be with this order today. The instrument will correct this oversight, ensuring that there is no misunderstanding when consulting the Welsh language version of the Act regarding the ability to disclose information obtained in the course of an investigation by the Public Services Ombudsman, if required in relation to a prosecution for offences under the National Security Act 2023. I hope that that is relatively clear. These are two simple amendments, and I hope that I have made it clear from these remarks that the regulations will ensure the correct application and enforcement of primary legislation, supported by the previous Government, which has already been agreed by Parliament. Passing them will be an important step to correcting an inaccuracy and giving powers to enforce legislation.

My Lords, there is no doubt that our laws need to be kept updated to reflect the evolving security threat, the speed at which technology is developing, and the increasingly unstable global situation. So, on balance, we accept that both these instruments are proportionate and will support them. Our concerns around the National Security Act regulations relate to the knowledge test for these offences, given the steep penalties involved. Does the Minister recognise that the sensitivity of a site might not always be obvious, and that a site’s sensitivity can be fluid, particularly in the case of military vehicles? Could he provide some clarity around the kinds of restricted areas the legislation will apply to, and give assurances that a reasonable person—for example, innocently flying a drone in the countryside—will be protected? In relation to the Police Act regulations, my understanding is that these allow the police to use counter-drone measures against an unmanned aircraft flying over sensitive military sites, and I have a number of questions in this area. Who has responsibility to deal with unidentified drones around these sites? The military already has its own counter-drone capability; will the police powers run alongside that? Last year, there were almost 400 police drones operating, of which more than two-thirds were made by DJI, a Chinese firm that the US has linked to the Chinese military—although the company denies this. The previous year, the Biometrics and Surveillance Camera Commissioner warned that the UK police estate was “shot through” with Chinese-made surveillance drones, used by 23 of the 31 police forces operating drone cameras. At that time, the National Police Chiefs’ Council said it would carry out the necessary review to ensure that national security standards were being met. Perhaps the Minister could say whether that review was carried out. Just five months ago, West Midlands Police told a magazine that its current drone fleet included 12 DJIs, as well as two made by Autel, another Chinese-based company. Autel was also supplying drones to Nottinghamshire Police and Wiltshire Police, before it was sanctioned by the British Government last month for arming Russia to fight in Ukraine. In light of this, is the Minister satisfied that the police are working with drone providers which can be trusted and whether there are measures in place to ensure that these drones cannot be used to monitor or collect information on critical UK infrastructure? The drone industry is booming, with estimates that there could be over 76,000 commercial drones in UK skies by 2030—so these security concerns will not go away. China is currently way ahead of everyone else in this area, with DJI the world’s largest commercial drone manufacturer. So it is vital the Government do all they can to support the UK drone industry, which is already responsible for several world firsts. We support the legislation, but our focus must be on ensuring that our police have the right tools and expertise to counter these threats, wherever they arise. We should heed the lesson of the Trojan horse and ensure that any “spy in the sky” is not already in our midst, starting with the security of our own police drones.

My Lords, we welcome and support both these orders. The first statutory instrument adds offences under the National Security Act to the list of relevant offences in the Police Act 1997, enabling the use of counter-drone powers by police and other authorised officials. This means they will have the power to use counter-drone technology and to take action against unmanned aircraft or drones which are being operated in an area around a prohibited place or a cordoned area without authorisation. As has already been noted by noble Lords, we have seen an exponential increase in the use of drones in crime. It makes perfect sense to empower the police to tackle this rising threat. It is consistent with the evolving threat reflected in the debates on the National Security Act, which passed through this House last year. I turn to the draft National Security Act 2023 (Consequential Amendment of Primary Legislation) Regulations 2025, which are also supported on this side of the House. As the Minister explained, this is a consequential amendment to the Public Services Ombudsman (Wales) Act 2019. One can understand how these incidents occur, and it is clearly appropriate to make the order that is sought. The National Security Act was a landmark achievement for the previous Conservative Government and passed with a good measure of parliamentary support across both this House and the other place. It reflected the evolving national security threat that our country faces. It places Britain at the forefront of efforts to protect our citizens, businesses, institutions and defence establishments from the ever-changing threats posed by hostile actors, cyber threats and covert intelligence measures. The only question I have for the Minister is: when does he estimate that the National Security Act will be fully in force?

I am grateful for the contributions from His Majesty’s Official Opposition and the Liberal Democrat Benches. I am grateful for the Opposition’s support for both orders, which are relatively straightforward and, I hope, totally uncontroversial. I hope that this House today, as well as the House of Commons in due course, will support them. I will start with the extremely important and valid points raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Doocey. The first relates to the potential for individuals not to know about a site or for the site sensitivity not to be obvious. The Government have considered that, where appropriate, steps should be taken to ensure that all prohibited places are clearly signposted for the benefit of the public. They will remain discretionary for a time, because it will not always be appropriate or practical for security reasons, but the prohibited places offences under the National Security Act 2023 take account of this. Whether or not signage is in place depends on the circumstances, and that would then determine whether or not an offence has been committed. For most places, signage is in place. There will be a limited number of places where there is no signage—but, again, it is not appropriate, even today, to talk about what types of prohibited places they may be, for reasons that are obvious. The National Security Act 2023 protects our most sensitive sites against activity, which is why we welcomed it when it was introduced by the previous Government. Section 7 of the Act sets out what the prohibited places are, including certain Crown land in the UK, the sovereign base areas, defence establishments, and areas for the defence of a foreign state or the extraction of material for UK defence purposes, as well as sites owned or controlled by the UK intelligence services and used for their functions. Such prohibited places are inherently sensitive and therefore may be at risk. An offence might be committed under Section 5 if a person carries out unauthorised conduct in relation to that prohibited place. As has been mentioned, there would be a defence under legislation for that. The noble Baroness asked, quite rightly, who has the responsibility of dealing with unidentified drones around these sites. The police forces play a major initial part in protecting UK defence sites from drone misuse, but responsibility for that misuse will depend on the site and its specific circumstances. The Home Office is trying to support the development of the national police counter-drone capability, which has taken place over the last five years. The SI provides greater assurances and outlines circumstances where action can be taken in relation to cordoned-off drone areas. The noble Baroness specifically mentioned Chinese matériel. The National Police Chiefs’ Council is looking at, and collaborating with, military partners and other state drone operators to make sure that we align security standards. That means that we are looking at a national procurement framework that includes drones as part of this, and we are engaging with police forces to ensure that the suppliers added to the framework meet the required security standards. Again, that will determine whether drones of any particular provenance are allowed to be used by UK police forces and others. That security assessment will, I hope, reassure the noble Baroness. The final question, from the noble Lord, was about the full implementation of the National Security Act. I have to say to him: when parliamentary time allows and when government decisions have been taken. I will inform him when that moment is due to arrive.

Motion agreed.