Last week, the Home Secretary announced that, with all party agreement, the Data Retention and Investigatory Powers Bill – (DRIP for short) – would be introduced into Parliament. Much of that is covered in the previous post of 10th July. Since then, criticism has mounted in relation to the late introduction of the Bill prior to the summer recess.Further criticism is that the Bill is far from being just a limited Bill to close what may have been a legal gap left by the decision of the Court of Justice of the EU to invalidate the Data Retention Directive 2006/24/EC. The UK’s 2009 Regulations, implementing the directive into domestic law, could well have been at risk via judicial review even though the Home Secretary asserted in the House of Commons that the government believed they remained valid. Critics point to the Bill being a considerable extension of State power. Here are links to the draft Bill, to the provisional regulations to be made under the Bill and to the explanatory notes.
The draft Data Retention and Investigatory Powers Bill – Draft Regulations -Explanatory Notes – 15 pages
