Home Office (overview)

The Home Office plays a key role in the Undercover Policing Inquiry, whether in procedural terms or as part of the disclosure and evidence in relation to the undercover units. It both sponsors the Inquiry and is a core participant in its own right due to its historic role in providing direct funding outside of the normal police budget for the SDS.

The UCPI was established and funded by the Home Office, who set its Terms of Reference. It is also the Home Office to whom it is due to make its report and recommendations. 

Part of the Home Office’s remit is to oversee the management and funding of police forces. In particular, it was the Home Office which oversaw and directly funded the Special Demonstration Squad (1969 to 1989), and which was recipient of a summary of the contents of the Annual Reports and other undercover-derived intelligence reports. Special Demonstration Squad Annual Reports The SDS Annual reports started in 1969 and continued until at least 1994. They reviewed, listed and offered justifications for the groups infiltrated during the previous year. They also contained some analysis and forecasts for the coming year. The SDS senior management authored them. They were internal Metropolitan Police documents, with only a summary of the contents forwarded to the Home Office. They should not be confused with Special Branch Annual Reports. Full page: Special Demonstration Squad Annual Reports The one known exception to that practice was n 1983, when the Home Office asked for and recieved more details of SDS' operations via the unit's annual report for that year.  

It was likewise one of those providing funding for the National Domestic Extremism Unit and the National Public Order Intelligence Unit. National Public Order Intelligence Unit (overview) The National Public Order Intelligence Unit, or NPOIU, was a public order policing unit which existed from 1999 until 2011. It was most notable for running undercovers and maintaining a database on political campaigners it categorised as ‘domestic extremists’. It was based in London and officers were seconded from around the UK. It deployed EN12 Mark Kennedy, who as ‘Mark Stone’ infiltrated environmentalists and conducted multiple sexual relationships. Full page: National Public Order Intelligence Unit (overview)  As such, it provides historical disclosure and witness statements to the Inquiry and has core participant status.

Importantly. The Home Office also responsible for MI5 and its most senior civil servants sat on secret 'subversion' committees. Often, it was the same civil servants approved the funding and continuation of the SDS. Some of these civil servants have given written evidence to the Inquiry, such as Gerald Hayden-Philips and Roy Harrington. First Witness Statement of Sir Gerald Hayden Phillips (civil servant), given in the UCPI, Tranche 1, Phase 3, Module 2b, Module 2c, 13 Oct 2022.View Document First Witness Statement of Roy Alastair Harrington (retired civil servant) incl. questions added by UCPI, given in the UCPI, Tranche 1, Phase 3, Module 2b, Module 2c, 8 Nov 2022.View Document

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The Home Office also commissioned the Stephen Lawrence Independent Review (Ellison Report) and the Taylor Report, the former being an important factor in the run up to the announcement of the Undercover Policing Inquiry. The Taylor Report specifically looked at the Home Office’s relationship with the SDS, and described a mainly hands-off approach, reliant on ‘headline’ points provided by the Metropolitan Police Special Branch to justify continuing the special funding arrangements.