Indeed, the majority of the Lords deciding the case took the view that it was lawful, justified, and indeed, in some cases, obligatory, for the executive to act on information even with the knowledge that it has been obtained through torture. The judgment refers to the ticking bomb scenario. 75 In reaching this conclusion, the Law Lords drew a worrisome distinction between executive and judicial use of torture material. In the words of Lord Nicholls of Birkenhead: The executive and the judiciary have different functions and different responsibilities. It is one thing for tainted information to be used by the executive when making operational decisions or by the police when exercising their investigatory powers, including powers of arrest...It is an altogether different matter for the judicial arm of the state to admit such information as evidence when adjudicating definitively upon the guilt or innocence of a person charged with a criminal offence. In the latter case repugnance to torture demands that proof of facts should be found in more acceptable sources than information extracted by torture.76 This distinction rests on a narrow, and ultimately mistaken, reading of the purpose of the exclusionary rule. In stressing the exclusion of torture evidence in order to ensure fair trials, the Lords ignored the predominant rationale for the rule: the prevention of torture. While the ruling in A and Others offers a strong defense of fair trial rights, it does not protect people from torture. Parliamentary examination of allegations of direct UK complicity in torture abroad have considered the passive receipt and use of intelligence from countries with poor records on torture. The Joint Committee on Human Rights (JCHR), composed of members of both houses of Parliament, conducted a special review of allegations of UK complicity in torture and the House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee (FAC) addressed the issue in their inquiry into human rights based on the Foreign and Commonwealth Office’s Annual Report on Human Rights 2008. Their conclusions, both published in August 2009, have helped to shed light on what would constitute state complicity in torture. 75 In the words of Lord Nicholls, “it would be ludicrous for [the police] to disregard this information if it had been procured by torture...[I]n cases such as these the government cannot be expected to close its eyes to this information at the price of endangering the lives of its own citizens. Moral repugnance to torture does not require this.” A and Others vs. Secretary of State for the Home Department [2005] UKHL 71, paras. 68-69. 76 A and Others, House of Lords, para. 70. 29 Human Rights Watch | June 2010