The Rt Hon Theresa May, MP
Home Secretary
The Home Office
2, Marsham Street
London
SW1P 4DF

20 September 2011

Dear Theresa,

I am very concerned about reports that the Metropolitan Police Service has applied for a Production Order under the Police and Criminal Evidence Act, and citing the Official Secrets Act, because it believes that an offence may have been committed under either or both Acts when information was given to the Guardian newspaper regarding the hacking of Milly Dowler's mobile phone. I am sure you read the reports in Saturday's Guardian and in the Observer, and share my concern that such a move risks further damaging the Metropolitan Police Service's reputation following the wider phone hacking scandal.

As you will know, leading journalists have raised serious concerns. John Kampfner, Chief Executive of Index on Censorship, has said that "Scotland Yard's outrageous and unjustified attempt to force the Guardian to reveal its sources in its phone-hacking investigation is a direct attack on a free press." Furthermore, Bob Satchwell, Executive Director of the Society of Editors, said: "The Official Secrets Act is designed to protect national security, so there is no justification in this case. The law, and particularly the Human Rights Act, is supposed to protect journalists' sources."

In addition to these concerns, John Cooper, a leading human rights lawyer and visiting professor at Cardiff University, has suggested that this would be a "a misuse of the 1989 act, [which] is very likely to conflict with article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which protects freedom of speech."

I find it incredible, given the importance of the Guardian's revelations, and their impact on political, legal, and media life in the UK, that Metropolitan Police spokespeople have suggested that there was no public interest in publishing the revelation that Milly Dowler's phone was hacked by the News of the World. I simply do not understand how the Metropolitan Police Service could ever describe this as a "gratuitous release of information that is not in the public interest."

Furthermore, I am concerned that the approach reportedly being undertaken by the Metropolitan Police in this case adds to a pattern of apparently confronting the Guardian over its exposure of the Metropolitan Police's failings on phone hacking. As you know, the former Commissioner Sir Paul Stephenson held an ill advised meeting with the Guardian in 2009, where he asked the paper to drop the phone hacking story. The Metropolitan Police Service has also helped to pay for legal action by John Yates against the Guardian for defamation.

This sequence of events could, I fear, be seen by many as a failed attempt by the Metropolitan Police Service to protect its own reputation during the phone hacking scandal, rather than supporting all efforts to find the truth. I would, therefore, ask you to urgently discuss with the incoming Commissioner, Bernard Hogan-Howe, the possibility of the Metropolitan Police Service withdrawing this application. This discussion should, I believe, take place before the inevitable reaction to this heavy handed approach grows, further weakens the public's confidence in the Metropolitan Police service.

I look forward to your urgent reply.

Yours sincerely,

Caroline Lucas, MP, Brighton Pavilion

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