Police and Justice Bill

Non-lawyers such as I tread into these areas with some hesitation. The danger of being caught out on a finer point of law is ever-present. In considering the Lords amendments before us today, it is important to look a little at the history of how we came to be in the position that we are in. There is no doubt that the emotion that runs around this set of Lords amendments is, unfortunately, coloured by the way that the Extradition Act 2003 and the treaty, and the unilateral arrangements in respect of the USA, came into being, rather than by merely the merits of the issues that we are addressing. It is important that we make that distinction, and also that we record some proper concerns about the process that has led to where we are today. Let me give some key dates. On 28 November 2002, the Home Affairs Committee—chaired by my predecessor, my hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, South (Mr. Mullin)—reported on the Extradition Bill. Its Second Reading took place on December 2002, the treaty was agreed at the end of March 2003, and the legislation was enacted at the end of that session. The USA was added to list 2 of the legislation at the end of 2003, and, by that, the unilateral decision was taken to drop the evidence requirements on the USA. The Senate has only now ratified the treaty. There should be some concerns about the speed at which those events took place. When—before I chaired it—the Committee reported on the Extradition Bill in 2002, it reported the Home Office position at that time. The Home Office had stated that"““there is a case for removing the prima facie evidential requirement from certain Commonwealth countries and bilateral treaty partners””" but"““there are no current plans to negotiate bilateral extradition treaties with any new countries””." That was reported in November 2002, and the treaty was finalised and agreed at the end of March 2003—a very short period later. The Extradition Act has always worried me because I was the Minister of State who moved the Bill’s Second Reading on 9 December 2002. Since that time I have been unable to remember anything that was under way with the USA in respect of these matters. Short-term memory loss is always a possible explanation in this place, but parliamentary protocol requires that if a Bill is not introduced by a Secretary of State, it is introduced by a Minister of State rather than an Under-Secretary of State, so I was not the sponsor-Minister of the Bill; I picked it up, as it were, at the last moment, to move it. There was almost no reference at all in that debate to the United States of America. Indeed, about the only one I can find was made by the right hon. Member for Witney (Mr. Cameron), who asked for an assurance. He said:"““As the Minister is aware, many important extraditions have not gone ahead because of…article 3 of the European convention on human rights””," and he referred to"““the Soering judgment, in which someone accused of murder could not be extradited to the United States””" because of that convention, and he asked:"““What will the Bill do to try to streamline such cases and make the extraditions go ahead?””—[Official Report, 9 December 2002; Vol. 396, c. 40.]" So to the extent that any interest was shown in the United States in that debate, it concerned speeding up extraditions from this country to the USA, and the point was made by the right hon. Member for Witney, who is now the Leader of the Opposition. That was the tone of the discussion.