Police and Justice Bill

My Lords, the amendment deals with the case where it is not practicable to secure a warrant. However, it should always be practicable to secure one because there is a 24-hour opportunity to do so. One gets the warrant; the piece of paper may come later, but the warrant should always be immediately available. I respectfully suggest that that is not something which need be an impediment. How these things work in practice is always fairly opaque, and I am happy to clarify the position for the noble Baroness. I am sure that the noble Baroness, Lady Anelay, who I see is in her place, has probably granted many such applications when sitting as a magistrate. Section 17 of PACE is also relevant because it provides that a constable may enter any premises for the purposes of arresting a person for an indictable offence. This provision would be relevant in any case involving an ongoing offence such as, for example, false imprisonment. Again, as with Section 8, there must be reasonable grounds to believe that the person being sought is on the premises. For the purposes of these provisions, an aircraft would be a premises. That is a somewhat interesting legal construction, but it is where we are. This means that if there was credible intelligence that a person was on an aircraft and was being unlawfully rendered to places where there were substantial grounds to believe that they would face a real risk of torture, there would be a legal basis to intervene under Section 17 as well Section 8 of PACE. Section 23 of PACE confirms that the references to ““any premises”” in Sections 8 and 17 do include an aircraft. Noble Lords have already referred to the convention. This of course is paragraph (c) ofArticle 3 of the Chicago Convention which permits state aircraft to overfly territory of other states only with permission and on the terms of the state whose territory is to be used. Any flight of whatever nature not taking place on these terms would be contrary to the convention and could, at least in theory, be required to land and be searched under the powers I have mentioned. I hope that I have been able to satisfy your Lordships that there is no legal gap in police powers to investigate suspected acts of unlawful rendition. But of course the real question may be practical rather than legal, as I tried to explain on 4 July when the Bill was being examined in Committee. That is at col. 217 of the Official Report. I shall not repeat the points I made then. With your Lordships’ indulgence, suffice it to say that if the security and law enforcement agencies ever received intelligence that could give rise to the types of action envisaged in the amendment, and on a timescale which would permit such an action, they would already be able to undertake it. But the chances of that happening are negligible. I am conscious that we have spent a great deal of time discussing this issue. However, I felt that I needed to give my noble and learned friend Lord Archer a specific answer on the Al-Rawi and El-Banna question. First, I am pleased to note that the Court of Appeal has confirmed the propriety of the Government’s actions with regard to its decision. Secondly, as regards the point raised by my noble and learned friend, I can confirm that the UK did not request the detention of Mr Al-Rawi or Mr El-Banna in the Gambia and played no role in their transfer to Bagram and Guantanamo Bay. I hope that that satisfies the House. I am conscious that this issue has caused concern and I am grateful for this opportunity to better explain our position and why we think the anxieties expressed by the House—although we understand them—are not founded in fact. I therefore hope the noble Baroness will feel content to withdraw her amendment.