Investigatory Powers Act 2016

Um, murders being planned, uh, firearm dealing, uh, drug importations, and, uh, thousands of people literally were arrested.

But it, it, these cases took about five years, some of them, to come to trial because of one important piece of legislation, which was Section 56 of the Investigatory Powers Act, which meant that if you do a live intercept, an au- police authority, if they did a live intercept of a phone, they couldn't use it in evidence.

It was a sort of covert technique that could never become evidence.

And so there were these legal arguments that went on for years about whether this was a live intercept or, as was eventually decided by the Court of Appeal, no, it's not a live intercept, it was, the evidence was being taken from the handset itself, and therefore the evidence was ad- admissible in court to convict these people.