Police and Justice Bill

Even in the brief time available for the rest of the debate, I want to welcome the fact that the Home Secretary came to the House this evening to give us the benefit of his views. However, I hoped that he would use the opportunity, first, to apologise for the fact that his predecessor had concluded such a hopelessly unequal Bill. Secondly, I hoped he would say that he recognised the deficiencies of the treaty but that there was scope for renegotiation, which he was prepare to undertake, and that he would then come back to the House with a greatly improved treaty. Thirdly, I hoped he would say that he recognised the deficiencies in the House’s protocols for dealing with ratification of treaties and that he would hold talks with the Leader of the House to ensure that we had a better way of looking at treaties in future so that such things would not occur again. Sadly, we have heard none of those things from the Home Secretary, which is hardly surprising, because it was well trailled in advance that today was the day when he would lead an assault on the Tories for being soft on crime. If that is what he chooses to do, we have no means of stopping him in the context of this important consideration of Lords amendments; but if his way of exercising his choice is to present in lieu of the Lords amendments words that he admits are entirely bogus and have no effect, and to ask the House to conclude that that is a satisfactory response to those in another place who are trying desperately to improve the law of the land, he does a disservice to the House. Indeed, he holds the House and the other place in contempt, which is a most unfortunate state of affairs. As the House knows, we have always argued against the treaty because we believe that it contains fundamental inequalities. We have voted against it from the outset because we believe that it needs to be renegotiated. We have not called for its early ratification because we do not believe in ratifying a treaty based on such unequal terms, and we are no more satisfied with it now than we were in the first place. The Home Secretary has at least been prepared to consider forum, if not in his amendment at least in the assurances he gave the House, but assurances are not enough. We need a successful outcome to the negotiations, but they can be held only in an appropriate legislative framework, which is not provided by the words he urges the House to accept. Until he proposes an appropriate form of words, we can only resist his position. I want to allow some time for others to speak so this is my last point: it is preposterous to suggest that those who argue against the treaty for sound legal and constitutional reasons do so to give succour to those who break the law and avoid due process in the United States or in this country. That is not the case and it is inappropriate to suggest it. If the Home Secretary’s argument rests solely on the removal of the statute of limitations in the treaty, he needs much firmer grounds to argue his case in this place.