This amendment is in my name and the names of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Judge, and the noble Lord, Lord McNally. It is concerned with persons who are designated in this country because they have been placed on the UN sanctions list. It raises a very troubling rule-of-law issue, to which the noble Baroness, Lady Northover, referred in one of our earlier debates this afternoon.
Clauses 21(2) and 21(4) provide that a person who is designated here because they are on a UN list may request the Secretary of State to use best endeavours to secure that their name is removed from the UN sanctions list. My concern is that what Clause 32 means —and indeed is intended to mean—is that, in relation to such a case, a court in this country has no power other than to overturn a decision of the Secretary of State not to use such best endeavours, and to ask the Secretary of State to use best endeavours at the UN. What the Bill appears to deny the person concerned is the right to say to the court: “I have been listed in this country—designated in this country—because I am on a UN list. But I am on a UN list as a result of procedural unfairness, as they have never told me why I am listed, or as a result of a substantive defect. There is no basis whatever for my listing, therefore the court in this country should quash the domestic designation”.
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After Second Reading, the Minister said in his letter to me, which was circulated to other interested noble Lords, that our courts cannot be given a power to quash the domestic listing because this country has an international obligation to designate where a person is on the UN sanctions list. I have three responses to that.
First, we are considering domestic law powers to designate. No one should be designated in this country if our courts are satisfied that the designation is as a result of an unfair or unjustifiable decision. In those circumstances, the Minister cannot shelter behind the decision of another person, whoever they may be, in order to deny justice to the person affected in this country, especially given the gravity of the consequences for that person of a listing in this country. In my view, it is simply unacceptable that persons who are subject to a designation order in this country should be denied an effective judicial remedy in this country, however defective they can show the designation to be. That is unacceptable, and for the Bill so to provide is a flagrant breach of the rule of law.
Secondly, Clause 32 denies any effective judicial remedy in this country because of listing by the UN. I cannot be persuaded that the rule of law in this
country should be subcontracted to the United Nations. This is, noble Lords will recall, the organisation which earlier this year voted Saudi Arabia on to its Commission on the Status of Women—a body which is,
“dedicated to the promotion of gender equality and the empowerment of women”.
This body, the UN, decided last week that there was no room for Sir Christopher Greenwood on the International Court of Justice. He failed to win reappointment after a most distinguished nine-year term, for reasons which had nothing to do with the international rule of law and everything to do with the popularity of a former Lebanese ambassador to the United Nations and the political attraction of an Indian candidate.
I know the Minister is well aware of the circumstances, so I think he will understand that I cannot accept that the rule of law in this country should be subcontracted to a body which displays such ignorance of the international rule of law. The nations of the United Nations are not united on the importance of the rule of law. We cannot deny remedies in this country in the hope that justice will be done at the international level.
Thirdly, despite the international law obligations of European states, including the United Kingdom, the Court of Justice in Luxembourg is prepared in an appropriate case to set aside a listing based on a UN listing, where such a listing breaches legal standards. Indeed, I would suggest that the very best way to ensure that UN listings are legally robust is for the courts of this country to have the power to quash a domestic listing based on a UN listing.
I say to the Minister that the amendment raises a fundamental issue of the rule of law. The Bill should not deny our judges the power to quash, where appropriate —and I hope it will rarely if ever be appropriate—a designation that is based on a defective UN listing. I beg to move.