Brexit: Northern Ireland Backstop

Debate between Baroness Chakrabarti and Baroness Goldie

Tuesday 19th February 2019 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Goldie]

The Government have been very clear about two things. One is that we respect the integrity of the United Kingdom: we have been very clear that we do not want any form of hard border. The backstop would effectively provide a customs union of which the UK would be part, and that would protect Northern Ireland and the Republic’s activities as well. We are in these negotiations, and I repeat the Government’s commitment to avoid a hard border and to support the Belfast agreement.

[Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)]

My Lords, I would not dream of tempting the Minister into the labyrinth. However, because of the importance of these matters and the anxiety that continuing uncertainty about the backstop is causing to so many people, even beyond this House, will she clarify whether it is still the Government’s policy to ensure a legally binding change to the withdrawal agreement over the backstop—not just an exchange of letters or assurances but a legally binding change to the backstop? As we are told that my opposite, the Attorney-General, is closely involved in negotiations and will soon set out his legal tests to ensure that the backstop cannot be used to trap the UK, will she please tell us a little more?

[Baroness Goldie]

I fear that my answer is bound to disappoint the noble Baroness: I apologise in advance for that. Let me say by way of introduction that the Prime Minister has been very clear that she is investigating a negotiation in which we can achieve legally binding changes to the backstop. That is the Government’s position. Where do we go from there? We are in negotiations. The Attorney-General and the Cabinet Secretary were meeting the EU last night and the Prime Minister is to meet President Juncker tomorrow evening. These discussions are at a vital stage and we shall have to await their outcome. I understand that the Attorney-General will propose in due course to make a statement about the progress that has been made, and I cannot pre-empt that.

Detainee Mistreatment and Rendition

Debate between Baroness Chakrabarti and Baroness Goldie

Monday 2nd July 2018 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)]

My Lords, it is a customary courtesy on occasions such as this for me to thank the Minister for repeating an Answer but this evening those thanks are very much heartfelt, as are my thanks to Kenneth Clarke, the Father of the House of Commons, for putting this Question. My thanks to the Minister are for two words in that Answer: “60 days”. They are for the promise to come back within 60 days with an answer on whether we are finally to have a judicial inquiry into what is perhaps the darkest part of the so-called war on terror, as far as this country is concerned. I am very grateful for that.

However, when the Minister returns with that answer and, I hope, to deliver the judicial inquiry that the agencies, victims of kidnap and torture and the wider public need to close this chapter and move forward, will that inquiry be truly independent and autonomous, bearing in mind that the first of the two ISC reports highlighted the fact that Mr Grieve and his colleagues were not able to summon witnesses, including those involved in the agencies at the pertinent time? Will that inquiry also look into the operation of the Justice and Security Act—the so-called secret courts Act—which I suspect Mr Clarke and others on all sides of both Houses might have thought twice about in 2013, if they had known what was to be revealed subsequently? Finally, can the Minister say whether the consolidated guidance will be reconsidered in the light of full public consultation, since the contemporaneous report—the second of the ISC reports—said that Ministers still lack a common understanding of what they may and may not authorise? Rendition, the transfer part of this terrible practice, is still not dealt with in current guidance.

[Baroness Goldie]

I thank the noble Baroness for her response to the reply to the Urgent Question. She welcomed the agreement that the Government will respond within 60 days and update the House on what they consider the position to be. I obviously do not want to pre-empt that by anticipating what may or may not be within the Government’s response. On the particular matter of an inquiry the Government, as I said, will give careful consideration to calls for another judge-led inquiry. One would imagine that implicit in that phrasing is a degree of independence, if it is indeed the Government’s decision to go down that road.

On the matter of the consolidated guidance, I think there is universal recognition that its introduction in 2010 saw a major step forward in how the Government—and the state, for that matter—deal with these sensitive and delicate issues. It was interesting that the committee acknowledged that very few countries in the world have attempted to set out their approach to these matters and let themselves be held accountable in the manner in which the United Kingdom does. That was a welcome acknowledgement by the committee of the strength of CSG. Clearly, however, the invitation to Sir Adrian Fulford to make proposals to the Government about how the consolidated guidance could be improved, taking account of the committee’s views and, importantly, those of civil society, will obviously inform the Government’s thinking in relation to that guidance.