I do think that, but I was focusing on the security element, and I do not think that the security argument stands up.
Amendment 12, in my name, would remove clause 9 from the Bill. That would not take away the Home Secretary’s right of rejecting citizenship, but it would take away her right to do so without notification. Of course, that matters. I go back to judicial rights. Say that someone does not know that they have had their citizenship withdrawn. They cannot appeal the matter for as long as they do not know, and that might be a long time.
Clause 9(2) says that the requirement to notify
“does not apply if it appears to the Secretary of State that”—
and there is a series of conditions, one of which is that notice should not be given if that is
“in the interests of the relationship between the United Kingdom and another country”.
I cannot think of a weaker reason to withhold the rights of one of our citizens than to favour our diplomatic relations with another country. I do not think we are on the same page on that.
2.45 pm
On the right of citizenship in this country, I think A. J. P. Taylor said that Palmerston’s 1850 “Civis Romanus sum” speech on the Don Pacifico affair was the greatest speech in Parliament. In that speech, Palmerston talked about the rights of a British citizen. In those days, of course, that meant rights to be protected around the world, rather like American citizens are now. It does not mean that any more, but it does mean rights under a democracy, which are: rights to access to a Member of Parliament who can stand up for you; rights to freedom under the law; and rights to the judiciary, the courts—I know that this is unfashionable—and the operation of British justice. That is one of the most valued things in the world, and that is what we are defending in contests in the middle east and elsewhere. It is entirely inappropriate that we should make it one of our strategies to be able to take away citizenship from people who have often
lived here since they were one or two years old. Often, if they are sent to the other country—a country that they have never been to and where they no longer speak the language—they will face summary execution. At least one case therein applies. Where stands our belief against capital punishment, which most people in this House espouse?
This is an uncivilised, legally disputable removal of the rights of people. They may not be good people; if so, we should put them in front of our courts and punish them. That is how British justice should work. That is how British democracy should work. That is what we should do today.