Police and Justice Bill

Yes, I am aware of that. The lowest threshold for such extradition to operate is £1,000. My hon. Friend is right to highlight the fact that it can apply to individuals whose criminality may not appear high at all. No system is perfect, and I fully acknowledge that there are strong reasons why countries should co-operate to combat crime: there is nothing wrong with that. In allowing for extradition and securing the reciprocity that is so desirable, we must sometimes accept minor concerns about the operation of other countries’ criminal justice systems, as long as we know that justice is the aim that they strive to achieve. However, we could have done very much better in the Extradition Act to prevent abuses such as those involved in the cases that I have described. Even if the United States does ratify the new treaty, there is a compelling case for our extending greater protection to defendants in extradition proceedings involving offences that are wholly unrelated to the United States. As I said at the outset, that is what amendments Nos. 116 and 117 seek to achieve. The Government have suggested that all this is a figment of the Opposition’s imagination—or of that of their own Back Benchers who signed the early-day motion. They have suggested that we are all getting worked up about nothing, and that the system is perfectly sensible. It is worth pointing out that many other countries provide exactly the protection that the British Government chose to avoid in the Extradition Act. Article III of the Irish-USA treaty provides for refusal of extradition when the alleged offence is regarded under the law of the requested state as having been committed in its territory. Article V of the treaty provides for no extradition when the requested state has decided to refrain from prosecuting, or has discontinued proceedings. Before it is thought that this is a piece of Euro-bashing by the Opposition and that somehow the European arrest warrant is being held up to opprobrium, I should point out that article 4(7) of the European Union framework decision, on the basis of which the European Union arrest warrant was put together, allows for precisely this kind of exemption, which the Irish have used and the Government have chosen not to incorporate. Article 7(1) of the original 1957 European convention on extradition, brought about by the Council of Europe—a model of its kind—says exactly the same. So it is not a question of a degree of Euro-scepticism; it is a question of a degree of scepticism about why the Government seem so resolute about setting administrative convenience against the interests of justice. When the Scottish Parliament debated the issue recently, disquiet was expressed by every party about the way in which the system operates. There is no need for that disquiet to continue. The Government could see sense and do two things. First, they could enable us to have a better system that provides protection when there is no proper link between the individual and the state that seeks to extradite that individual for an offence. Secondly, in the case of the United States, the House should exercise a bit of will and common sense and say to a Government who seem to be incapable of carrying out sensible diplomatic negotiations, ““You will not get what you want unless you withhold what you are offering at the same time.”” The Government’s decision—not to ratify the treaty, because it cannot be fully ratified until the United States has ratified it, but gratuitously to provide the United States with all that it sought in the treaty—is an error of judgment of monumental proportions. If the Government wish to see the advantages of the treaty, they would do well to accept new clause 8 and ensure that the United States is politely reminded that reciprocity is the absolute basis of international relations.