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Russia report: UK Government ‘actively avoided looking for evidence’ of Kremlin meddling in EU referendum

Nicolas Cecil|Sophia Sleigh, Political Correspondent @SophiaSleigh|Ewan Somerville
21 July 2020

Ministers were today accused by Britain’s intelligence watchdog of failing to probe whether Russia sought to interfere in the EU referendum.

MI5 was also criticised for its response to Parliament’s Intelligence and Security Committee as it investigated whether Moscow sought to sway the outcome of the 2016 Brexit vote.

In response to the ISC’s long-awaited report, the Government said: “We have seen no evidence of successful interference in the EU referendum.”

However, two committee members, Labour’s Kevan Jones and the SNP’s Stewart Hosie, stressed that no evidence had been found because Theresa May and Boris Johnson’s governments had not looked for it

They said: "No one in Government knew if Russia interfered in or sought to influence the [EU] referendum, because they did not want to know.

"The UK Government has actively avoided looking for evidence that Russia interfered. We were told that they hadn't seen any evidence, but that is meaningless if they hadn't looked for it."

The ISC also questioned whether successive governments “took [their] eye off the ball” on Russia when faced with the growing threat from Islamist extremists including Islamic State.

Teh Committee held a press release on Monday
BBC

It concluded: “It has been clear for some time that Russia under Putin has moved from potential partner to established threat, fundamentally unwilling to adhere to international law — the murder of Alexander Litvinenko in 2006 and the annexation of Crimea in 2014 were stark indicators of this.

“We therefore question whether the Government took its eye off the ball because of its focus on counter-terrorism.

“It was the opinion of the Committee that until recently the Government had badly underestimated the response required to the Russian threat — and is still playing catch up.”

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The ISC also suggested action should have been taken to protect Britain’s democracy given controversy over possible Russian influence in the 2014 Scottish independence referendum.

“There has been credible open source commentary suggesting that Russia undertook influence campaigns in relation to the Scottish independence referendum in 2014,” the report said.

The report was released after being written up 18 months ago (BBC )
BBC

The ISC asked MI5 if there was any secret intelligence to support unsubstantiated claims that Russia was seeking to influence the referendum in favour of Brexit, a claim Moscow denies.

“MI5 initially provided just six lines of text,” the report states.

The shortness of the response indicated “extreme caution amongst the intelligence and security agencies at the thought that they might have any role in relation to the UK’s democratic processes, and particularly one as contentious as the EU referendum”.

The report continued: “We repeat that this attitude is illogical; this is about the protection of the process and mechanism from hostile state interference, which should fall to our intelligence and security agencies.”

In a section on the EU referendum, the committee report said: “The written evidence provided to us appeared to suggest that [Her Majesty’s Government] had not seen or sought evidence of successful interference in UK democratic processes or any activity that has had a material impact on an election, for example influencing results.”

The Russia report was released today (BBC )
BBC

Asked for the committee’s views on whether Russia did influence the 2016 referendum, Mr Jones said: “There was no evidence that we saw. The reason why there was no evidence was because no one asked the work to be done.”

The report, drawn up nearly 18 months ago, said that Russia “poses a tough intelligence challenge and that MI6, MI5 and GCHQ “must have the tools they need to tackle it”.

It added: “In particular, new legislation must be introduced to tackle foreign spies: the Official Secrets Act is not fit for purpose and while this goes unrectified the UK intelligence community’s hands are tied.”

The ISC questioned why UK intelligence agencies did not seemingly fully look into alleged attempts to influence the EU referendum in contrast to the US in the wake of their 2016 election.

“The UK Intelligence Community should produce an analogous assessment of potential Russian interference in the EU referendum and that an unclassified summary of it be published,” the report said.

In other key findings the report:

  • Warned of the risk of “complacency” over protecting Britain’s democracy, emphasising that this appeared something of a “hot potato”, with no one organisation taking a lead.
  • Questioned whether the security services knew how many Russians in Britain were “at risk”.
  • Warned of the cyber threat from Russia and that the UK is clearly a target for Russian disinformation. 
  • Said Russian influence in the UK is the “new normal”. “Successive governments have welcomed the oligarchs and their money with open arms, providing them with a means of recycling illicit finance through the London ‘laundromat’”. It went on to warn this had led to a growth industry of “enablers”, including lawyers, accountants, and estate agents who are, wittingly or unwittingly, “de facto agents of the Russian state”. 
  • Stated: “While the mechanics of our paper-based voting system are largely sound, we cannot be complacent about a hostile state taking deliberate action with the aim of influencing our democratic processes.”
  • Said social media companies must take action and remove covert hostile state material and that the Government must “name and shame” those who fail to act.
  • Urged other nations to “step up with the UK and attach a cost to Putin’s actions”. It added: “Salisbury [the Novichok poisonings] must not be allowed to become the high water mark in international unity over the Russia threat”.

The report was published just days after British security chiefs accused cyber group APT29, linked to Russian intelligence, of targeting Covid-19 vaccine research in the UK, US and Canada.

Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab also said other Russian “actors” sought to interfere in last year’s election in Britain. Moscow denies both allegations.

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