Wallace: I make no apology for Afghan data breach injunction and it was not a cover-up
Former Defence Secretary Sir Ben Wallace has said he makes "no apology" for applying for an injunction blocking reporting about the leak of data on Afghans who supported British forces.
Sir Ben said the decision to apply for the gagging order was "not a cover-up" and that if the leak had been reported, it would have "put in peril those we needed to help out".
Thousands of people are being relocated to the UK as part of a secret £850m scheme set up after the breach.
It came as the current Defence Secretary, John Healey, said the person involved in the leak was "no longer doing the same job".
A dataset containing the personal information of nearly 19,000 people who applied for the Afghan Relocations and Assistance Policy (Arap) was released "in error" in February 2022 by a defence official.
The Ministry of Defence only became aware of the breach when excerpts from the dataset were posted anonymously on a Facebook group in August 2023. A superinjunction was later granted at the High Court in an attempt to prevent the Taliban from finding out about the leak.
Sir Ben said that when he was informed of the "error" he was "determined that the first priority was to protect all those that might be at risk".
"I make no apology for applying to the court for an injunction at the time. It was not, as some are childishly trying to claim, a cover-up," he said.
"I took the view that if this leak was reported at the time, the existence of the list would put in peril those we needed to help out.
"Some may disagree but imagine if the Taliban had been alerted to the existence of this list. I would dread to think what would have happened."
Sir Ben left office shortly after the then-government became aware of the breach, having announced some time earlier that he intended to step down from his defence secretary role.
The leak led to the creation of a secret Afghan relocation scheme – the Afghanistan Response Route – in April 2024.
The scheme is understood to have cost around £400m so far, with a projected final cost of about £850m.
A total of around 6,900 people are expected to be relocated by the end of the scheme.
It is understood that the unnamed official emailed the data outside a secure government system while attempting to verify information, believing the dataset to only have around 150 rows.
However, more than 33,000 rows of information were inadvertently sent.
Mr Healey told the News Agents podcast that the official involved in the breach is "no longer doing the same job on the Afghan brief" and "this is bigger than the actions of a single individual".
Pushed on whether anybody had lost their job, Mr Healey said: "I'm actually not going to get into the personnel matters."
The injunction was in place for almost two years, covering Labour and Conservative governments.
Mr Healey offered a "sincere apology" on behalf of the Government in the Commons on Tuesday, and said he had been "deeply uncomfortable" being unable to speak about it in Parliament.
Tory leader Kemi Badenoch also apologised on behalf of the Conservatives.
Speaking to LBC, she said: "On behalf of the government and on behalf of the British people yes, because somebody made a terrible mistake and names were put out there… and we are sorry for that.
"That should not happen. And this is one of the tough things about, you know, being a minister, which is why even the Government – the Labour Government, now this didn't happen when they were in power – they are apologising as well."
Between 80,000 and 100,000 people, including the estimated number of family members of the Arap applicants, were affected by the breach and could be at risk of harassment, torture or death if the Taliban obtained their data, judges said in June 2024.
However an independent review, commissioned by the Government in January 2025, concluded last month that the dataset is "unlikely to significantly shift Taliban understanding of individuals who may be of interest to them".
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