European Union (Notification of Withdrawal) Bill

Debate between David Davis and Dominic Grieve

Ping Pong: House of Commons
Monday 13th March 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Davis]

I said before, and I will say it again: I take statements at this Dispatch Box as binding.

The important point here is that the idea that Parliament could force the Government to accept a bad deal will only incentivise those on the other side of the negotiating table to deliver just such a deal. As the Lords European Union Select Committee—hardly a Tory front organisation —said:

“The Government will conduct the negotiations on behalf of the United Kingdom, and, like any negotiator, it will need room to manoeuvre if it is to secure a good outcome.”

[Mr Dominic Grieve (Beaconsfield) (Con)]

No one in this House, as far as I am aware, wishes to fetter the Government’s hands in negotiations, or indeed the Government’s right to walk away from the negotiations; the issue in subsection (4) is whether the Government come back to this House to explain their plan and policy in the event of that happening. I would expect that to be inevitable, and yet, curiously, when we have sought an assurance from the Government—no more than that; not this amendment—that they would do that, which seems to me to be blindingly obvious, we keep being told that they will not give that assurance. I do find that, I have to say to my right hon. Friend, a bit odd, and I wonder whether he could clarify that.

[Mr Davis]

My right hon. and learned—and old—Friend makes a good point. The simple truth here, however, as I have said before, is that nothing can constrain this House’s right to debate and vote on anything it sees fit, and that meets this.

What I am dealing with here is subsection (4), and there are even bigger problems with it. During the debate on this issue in the other House, the author of the amendment, Lord Pannick, himself admitted he did not know what would happen if Parliament voted against leaving the EU without a deal. This uncertainty is itself a strong argument against putting this amendment into statute.

However, a significant number of Lords supported this amendment—that may not be true in this House—such as Lord Wigley and Baroness Kennedy, and they made their intentions clear: if Parliament were to vote against leaving without a deal, the UK should seek to remain in the EU and reverse the result of the referendum. I should say to my hon. and right hon. Friends that the European Union member states and the European Union institutions read the proceedings of this House very closely; they will have read that, and it will have raised their interest, because that is precisely what they would like to happen. So while this has been badged as a meaningful vote, the reality is that there are some who would seek to use it to overturn the result of the referendum. [Interruption.] “Good idea” comes from across the Floor. That is exactly, I am afraid, what concerns us.

The Government and the Prime Minister have been crystal clear. The people of the United Kingdom have decided to leave the European Union. The Government will seek to implement this decision in the way that is most beneficial to both the United Kingdom and the European Union. What we will not do, however, is accept anything that will put the intention to leave the European Union in doubt.

Article 50

Debate between David Davis and Dominic Grieve

Tuesday 24th January 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Davis]

I repeat again that the House will have that opportunity over and over and over again, on a whole series of primary legislation and secondary legislation and, finally, with the vote itself. I have not given a great deal of thought to how the timing of that will coincide with the European Parliament, but I will do so and write to the hon. Lady.

[Mr Dominic Grieve (Beaconsfield) (Con)]

My right hon. Friend will be aware that in the course of the court case the Government laid great stress on the irrevocability, in their opinion, of article 50. In those circumstances, I am sure he can understand that the problem facing the House is that in triggering article 50, that irrevocability has to be matched against the excellent words of my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister in setting out a plan that envisages a future relationship with the European Union from outside of it. Will he therefore keep in mind that the debate on article 50 is likely to be greatly facilitated if the ideas expressed by the Prime Minister are put into a White Paper, or similar document, to which reference can be made in the triggering of article 50, without fettering the Government’s discretion in their negotiations thereafter, because ultimately, as he may agree, this comes down to an issue of trust? If the Government can build that trust, they will greatly facilitate their task, and, if I may say so, those such as myself who wish to help them in what they are trying to achieve.

[Mr Davis]

My right hon. and learned Friend—my old friend—tempts me down a certain route, but I will answer him in these terms. In the case, the argument put by the Government did not depend on the irrevocability or otherwise of the legal issue in front of us; it depended on the fact that we view the irrevocable moment as being 23 June last year, and that it is not in the gift of the Government to change their mind, so we have already passed the point of no return. In terms of information, I have said over and over again that I will provide what information I can, and as much information as I can, without undermining our negotiating position, and I will continue to do so throughout the article 50 process and beyond.

The Government's Plan for Brexit

Debate between David Davis and Dominic Grieve

Wednesday 7th December 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Davis]

No, I am going to make a bit of progress. I will give way later. I normally like the badinage with the Opposition, but I have to make some progress on quite an important argument.

Dance on a pin as the shadow spokesman may, that is what the Opposition are signing up to: the Government invoking article 50 by 31 March 2017. Let us be clear about that. It has always been our intention, as I said in my intervention on him, to lay out the strategy in more detail when possible, provided it does not undermine the UK’s negotiating position.

[Mr Dominic Grieve (Beaconsfield) (Con)]

Will my right hon. Friend give way?

[Mr Davis]

If my right hon. and learned Friend will wait a little while, I will, of course, give way to him.

In fact, I have said that categorically in front of this House and the other House on a number of occasions, including just last week, and I am happy to confirm it again today. Our amendment also lays out an important challenge to those on the Benches opposite who say that they respect the result of the referendum, but whose actions suggest that they are looking for every opportunity to thwart and delay this. We will see today if they are willing to back the Government in getting on with implementing the decision made by the people of the United Kingdom. However, before I address the motion in terms, I will give way to my right hon. and learned Friend.

[Mr Grieve]

May I emphasise to my right hon. Friend that the motion must require Parliament to support the triggering of article 50 by means known to the law? He will doubtless agree that, as the law stands, that requires primary legislation. While it is possible for private Members’ Bills to be introduced, in reality it will be the Government’s duty to introduce legislation if they wish to proceed, and to do that in a timely fashion that enables proper debate on it.

[Mr Davis]

My right hon. and learned Friend, the ex-Attorney General, should know better than to tempt me to comment on a court case that is taking place as we stand here, so I will not do that, but as he well knows, we will obey the rule of law; we will obey what the Court finds. We will ensure that we do the right thing. As the spokesman for the Opposition said, one of the reasons we are waiting on the outcome is to get precisely right what it is this House has to do.

Exiting the European Union

Debate between David Davis and Dominic Grieve

Monday 5th September 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Davis]

We did—it was called the referendum Act, which was passed by a ratio of 6:1 in this Parliament.

[Mr Dominic Grieve (Beaconsfield) (Con)]

First, may I congratulate my right hon. Friend on his complete and abysmal failure over a 10-year period to avoid high office? It is a great pleasure to see him in his place. May I also reassure him that as somebody who supported the remain campaign, I see it as my absolute duty to support the Government in giving effect to the public desire to leave the European Union, including supporting the Government in their implementation of article 50? He rightly pointed out that the matter is legally extremely complex. It also concerns, as he rightly said, the acquis communautaire, which is about the conferring of private legal rights on individuals in this country which have the force of statute. I have to say to my right hon. Friend that the idea that those should simply be revoked by our exit without parliamentary approval troubles me very much and appears to me to be an abdication of the responsibility of this House. I accept that in many cases they have been created by Henry VIII clauses, which was the unsatisfactory nature of the EU, but what we will now do if we cannot scrutinise them before article 50 is invoked is allow the Government to dispose of private property rights, including intellectual property as an example, by decree. That troubles me very much, and I ask him to use his ingenuity to find ways of resolving this particular dilemma.

[Mr Davis]

It is a pleasure to hear from my right hon. and learned Friend and long-term friend, but he is over-interpreting what I have said, I think. Article 50 is the beginning of this process; it is not the end. I know there will be many opportunities for this House to scrutinise what we are about to do after article 50 takes place, but it would be somewhat futile to do so before we start the negotiations, as some of those negotiations will have a direct impact on the very rights that he is talking about. He can take it from me that I did not spend all those years on the Back Benches defending those rights to give them up now.

Report of the Iraq Inquiry

Debate between David Davis and Dominic Grieve

Wednesday 13th July 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Dominic Grieve (Beaconsfield) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow the right hon. Member for Gordon (Alex Salmond) and my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Rushcliffe (Mr Clarke). There is no doubt that they have two very clear advantages over me in this debate, in that both of them opposed the motion in the House in 2003, which initiated our military action in Iraq. I, on the other hand, supported it—something that I have come very much to regret. I supported it at the time because I was persuaded by the arguments eloquently put forward by the Prime Minister, Mr Blair. He said that, in his view, Saddam Hussein was a real and present danger in the immediate context and that that justified taking military action against him, even without going back for a further resolution of the United Nations Security Council, but relying on the previous resolutions, which, as considerable evidence showed, had been serially breached by Saddam Hussein, certainly in his non co-operation. On that basis, I voted for the motion, as did many others who are still Members and present in this House today.

Sir John Chilcot’s report highlights how the decision-making processes of government can become distorted under pressure of events. I should like to think that I am always a bit wary of that. The distortions highlighted in the report are so considerable that it highlights a dysfunctionality at the heart of Mr Blair’s Government that I hope may have been exceptional to him. For all that, there are plenty of cautionary tales for us in this House today that we can look at in the current context just as much as they would have been considered at the time.

This point seems to have been rather well made already that, and I will not repeat it, because Mr Blair had formed in his view a very strong resolution that we should support the United States, including in removing Saddam Hussein and effecting regime change, the entirety of the processes of government and of Whitehall were then skewed in order to achieve that aim and had the mischief of disregarding all the evidence that might be available to contradict the belief that that was the right course of action to take—whether it was intelligence information or the thorny problem of legality, both of which I wish to touch on briefly this afternoon.

On the question of the intelligence, those of us who have been in government, or who have served on the National Security Council as I have—indeed it is also true of my current role as Chairman of the Intelligence and Security Committee—know perfectly well that intelligence, often obtained at great risk and which is with difficulty, can only be what it is, a tool in decision making. The intelligence may be mistaken. One cannot prevent that in a human society, and one cannot guarantee that its interpretation will be correct. My impression during my time in government was that the intelligence agencies and the Joint Intelligence Committee now go to very considerable lengths to point out the limits of the use to which intelligence can properly be put—a lesson which, I suspect, they derived from this experience.

Reading Sir John Chilcot’s report, one can only conclude that the way in which intelligence was handled during the run-up to the Iraq war is, in some cases, truly breathtaking. It makes very troublesome reading. I hope very much—I am not going to say anything more about this—that those within the agencies who now do the work will read and reread Sir John’s report in order to remind themselves of how perfectly reasonable intelligence was skewed and, I have to say, misused for the purposes of justifying a theory, and then, I am afraid, misused by Mr Blair when he came to address this House in the defining moment before the war was sanctioned by this Parliament.

The certainties that were engendered were never present. My right hon. Friend the Member for Hitchin and Harpenden (Mr Lilley) made a very good intervention about this last week when he said that if we had taken the time and trouble to read some of the background information available, we might have doubted some of the certainties that were being expressed. I think he was absolutely right about that, and that is another burden that Members of this House who participated in that debate will have to bear.

So much for the intelligence. What about the process of legal advice? I was at the heart of trying to provide legal advice to Government when I was a Law Officer. My hon. and learned Friend the Solicitor General is on the Front Bench and he, too, has been involved in those processes. As Law Officers know, legal advice is often advice which cannot in any way be certain. Legal advice is exactly what it says it is. In some cases, particularly when one is dealing with international law, the question whether one is on the right side or the wrong side of international law is an intensely grey area, precisely because there is no ultimate tribunal to determine those issues. Yet at the heart of the British Government’s doctrine and ethics is the principle that we have to act lawfully at all times. It is for the Law Officers to try to steer that course.

What shines through to me, reading the Chilcot inquiry report, is not, as some critics have said, that Lord Goldsmith as Attorney General abandoned legal objectivity. Now that I have read the Chilcot inquiry report and looked at these passages very carefully, it seems to me that he fulfilled those criteria as best he possibly could, but that he was drawn into a process which in itself was utterly flawed, because it cherry-picked whatever bit of the advice that he provided suited those who wanted to present it, and then sold it in that way both to the Cabinet, who never properly inquired or scrutinised it at all, and ultimately to the public.

[Mr David Davis]

Does my right hon. and learned Friend really think that the Attorney General met all his duties? The report refers to the final question to Tony Blair, which it says was answered perfunctorily, about whether the conditions had been met. Surely he should have been a little more pressing, rather than accepting a perfunctory reply before changing his view.

[Mr Grieve]

I simply quote from paragraph 810 of the executive summary:

“It is an essential part of the legal basis for military action”—

this was written by an official in the Attorney General’s Department—

“without a further resolution of the Security Council that there is strong evidence that Iraq has failed to comply with and co-operate fully in the implementation of resolution 1441 and has thus failed to take the final opportunity offered by the Security Council in that resolution. The Attorney General understands that it is unequivocally the Prime Minister’s view that Iraq has committed further material breaches as specified in [operative] paragraph 4 of resolution 1441, but as this is a judgment for the Prime Minister, the Attorney would be grateful for confirmation that this is the case.”

It is important to understand one of the big changes that has probably taken place between 2003 and today in the way in which a Law Officer’s advice is secured. My impression from reading Chilcot—I hope I have got this right—is that, in practice, the Attorney General was provided with only sketched backgrounds of the factual analysis on which his legal opinion was being sought. The big difference now, and I can tell the House this without giving away state secrets, is that if Law Officers are asked to advise on a factual basis that involves a serious or complex problem of international law, they will receive briefing that is as good as, and—if they demand it—potentially better than, that which would be provided to the Prime Minister himself as to the intelligence and factual base that justifies it, so they have to make their own independent assessment. However, it is quite clear that, in 2003, and, I suspect, even before then—I do not think this was peculiar to 2003—that was not the practice that was adopted; it was not how Government worked. In practice, the Law Officer, Lord Goldsmith, was placed in a position where he had, reasonably, to take on trust the factual assessments made by others, and particularly the Prime Minister.

I want to make it clear that I cannot make a judgment on whether Lord Goldsmith’s advice of 7 March was right or not, but he set out—correctly, in my view—the alternative interpretations available for resolution 1441. I simply make the point, as I did in my intervention, that there are areas of international law that raise massive difficulties of interpretation. If, for example, we stuck, as some jurists would argue, to the principle that no military intervention can take place without UN Security Council authorisation, the well-established United Kingdom doctrine of intervening on the basis of humanitarian necessity, which is what led us to be able to take action in Kosovo, would never have come about. I simply chuck that into the pool of the debate the House has had in trying to understand some of the complexities.

Of course, none of that gets away from the fact that the debate would likely have been very different in Cabinet if Lord Goldsmith’s advice in its original form had been properly presented, circulated and discussed. As any of us who have been in government know, the process by which we moderate each other’s opinions is by challenging them. If we do not have a process of challenge, we should not be surprised that, at the end of the day, people simply end up rubber-stamping decisions because it appears convenient to do so. One of the interesting features, I might add, of being in coalition was that one quickly realised that because some members of, for example, the National Security Council or the Cabinet were not beholden to the Prime Minister, the level of challenge was raised in a manner that one might not necessarily have found in a single-party Government, which is an interesting reflection on some of the problems that flow from it. Of course, when one has a Prime Minister who is utterly dominant after four or five years in government and receiving a triumphant second mandate, these things become even harder.

Those, then, are my thoughts on those two principal issues. There are lots of other issues in the report, which is one of the most compelling reads I have had. I am not sure I am going to be able to get through the whole lot, but I will certainly try to read much more of it.

Let me just make two final points. First, the right hon. Member for Gordon (Alex Salmond) expressed the desire that accountability should lead to somebody being held at least in contempt of this House if Mr Blair did act improperly. I simply say to him that, just as some people were talking about impeachment, which was last used in 1806, contempt proceedings in Parliament—unless they are based on findings made in an external tribunal that meets article 6 compliance —will, in practice, be very difficult. I would strongly argue that, tempting as such a route might suggest itself to be, the practical difficulties are likely to make it impossible to follow. I say that in all sincerity.

Investigatory Powers Bill

Debate between David Davis and Dominic Grieve

Report: 1st sitting: House of Commons
Monday 6th June 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Grieve]

I think my hon. Friend makes a good point. I have an underlying confidence that the amendment we are discussing might commend itself to those on the Government Front Bench. On that basis, I do not intend to labour this point any further. I felt it was important to set it out, however, because it marked a significant shift in the Committee’s approach to this legislation. I wanted the House to understand why that change had come about after we had been given the extra classified briefing and why we came to the conclusion that we should accept this principle, alongside essential safeguards.

[Mr David Davis]

I have not read the individual amendments, so I am flying blind here. However, there is no doubt that this power is the most intrusive power in the Government’s armoury. One of the problems historically has been that the sheer volume of work being conducted means that scrutiny and oversight can sometimes slip. Would my right hon. and learned Friend’s amendment actually require the investigation of every single bulk intervention?

[Mr Grieve]

The amendment would require that

“the Investigatory Powers Commissioner must, in particular, keep under review the operation of safeguards to protect privacy.”

In our view, it is crystal clear that such a provision would meet the needs that we have expressed. As I have said, the Committee has been satisfied that the rules relating to bulk interception are adequate to provide the necessary safeguards. So, as long as we apply identical standards to equipment interference, the Intelligence and Security Committee believes that this process could be made to operate properly.

English Votes for English Laws

Debate between David Davis and Dominic Grieve

Wednesday 15th July 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Davis]

I rest my case. Let me make some progress.

[Mr Grieve]

Will my right hon. Friend give way?

[Mr Davis]

I suddenly find myself in a courtroom, rather than the Chamber, but I give way.

[Mr Grieve]

I was going to make this point later, but I may as well make it now because that is the purpose of debate. I must say that I have some slight anxiety about the justiciability of measures that we take in this House. I appreciate article 9 of the Bill of Rights, but we are certainly moving into rather uncharted territory and I do not think we can rule out legal challenges to decisions on the Speaker’s certificate.

[Mr Davis]

The House will take that on board.

My other point about what the Leader of the House has done so far is to commend him on at least attempting to address the problem of the Barnett consequentials. This is very important for the point on which I will finish. The problem started in 1998. I guess that the right hon. Member for Gordon (Alex Salmond) will remember—no one else in the House would have reason to do so—that in 1998 I argued for fiscal autonomy for the new Scottish Parliament, for a more federal solution and for proper treatment of the West Lothian question. All those things were self-evident in 1998 as long-term problems with the devolution proposal. I must say to Opposition Front Benchers, that our points were received with a completely implacable lack of understanding, let alone a lack of sympathy, from the primary driver of that, Gordon Brown.

The problem arises from the confusion in the Scotland Act and the Scotland Bill that is currently going through the House. The 1998 Act failed to create what, in my view, would have been stable fiscal autonomy for the current Holyrood Parliament. It would have done so if it had separated out the funding streams for the Scottish Parliament’s spending and the spending that emanates from this Parliament. If that had been done, we would have had very few, if any, Barnett consequentials.

We cannot of course solve everything. The right hon. Member for Gordon has quite rightly made the point about other impacts, such as in relation to tuition fees. There will be tax competition between the parts of the United Kingdom, and competition between policies of various sorts. We cannot resolve all that. We cannot necessarily give Scottish Members some sort of veto over England’s right to do the best for its citizens. This is not entirely soluble, but it would have been much more soluble if we had written the Scotland Act in such a way that it created a more rational structure than what exists in our kingdom at the moment.

All that gives us and the Leader of the House the problematic issue of how this can be done with utter fairness to all sides, because that is the test. I am afraid that the British establishment always seems to have a preference for fudge rather than clarity and for ambiguity rather than logic. We see that written through all this constitutional area, because the establishment does not want to address the problem. The establishment does not want an English First Minister who is more powerful than the UK Prime Minister. Yet if we went down a proper route of English devolution—if that is what it is—we would of course end up with an English Government who were a challenge to the UK Government.

The Leader of the House has now given us the summer to think about this. We can, I hope, deliberate about it at great length before we return in September, and I hope that he will take on board what he hears today. The only point of principle I will make to him is that the test for this is very simple. It is not whether this creates two classes of MP, but whether it creates two classes of citizen. The test is whether it deals with and removes any prospective grievance not from the Members on the SNP Benches, the Labour Benches or the Government Benches, but from the people we represent. It should take away any grievance for the English, the Scots, the Welsh and the Northern Irish, not any grievance for the Labour party, the Conservative party, the SNP or the Liberal Democrats. The test he should apply is whether it puts our citizens first.

Debate on the Address

Debate between David Davis and Dominic Grieve

Wednesday 27th May 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Grieve]

I shall make progress, if I may.

On matters concerning the Union of the United Kingdom, I am a Unionist to my fingertips. I could not be otherwise, with my family’s Scottish heritage. It has always seemed to me that the key to the Union of the United Kingdom is that the interests of an elector, be it in Belfast, Cardiff, Edinburgh, Glasgow or indeed where my family comes from, in Hawick, must be of equal importance to me as that of my own electorate in Beaconsfield, but the forms which the Union can take may be diverse. To that extent, I entirely welcome the fact that further devolution to Scotland and to Wales will take place, and I look forward to participating actively in the debates on that.

I listened carefully to what was said from the Scottish National party Benches about SNP Members’ concerns that constitutional change might take place by changing the Standing Orders of the House. This is a somewhat esoteric constitutional law point, but there are arguments that that is probably the only adequate way in which it can be done. If I can provide some reassurance, it seems to me to be central to any such change—the point was well made—that the interests of Scotland, both directly and indirectly, have to be respected, and it can apply only to those matters which pertain strictly to England, England and Wales or other parts of the United Kingdom. I look forward to having that debate, listening carefully to hon. Members’ participation and trying to make sure that we can put together a structure which is durable and, above all, fair—fair to them, but also fair to my constituents, for whom this is an issue which matters quite a lot as well.

I note the Government’s enthusiasm for continuing with high-speed rail. I am mindful that the House has expressed a determined view on this point. It is not one which commends itself much to my constituents, and the cost-benefit analysis of it has always eluded me. Nevertheless, I shall try to ensure, on their behalf, that the mitigation that they seek is provided, and in particular that there is a rigorous analysis of the costs of tunnelling under the River Colne, as opposed to the viaduct—a difference in value which seems to be narrowing by the day. I hope I may be able to interest the House in that.

Before moving on to my main topic, I want to touch briefly on the communications data Bill. In my view it is absolutely required. During my time as Attorney General I had a great deal to do with the agencies, and I am satisfied that they try to operate to high ethical standards. I am also satisfied that the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 is inadequate to meet the needs of the modern age. However, I am also mindful of the fact that the public require reassurance in relation to civil liberties. I believe that it will be possible to do those two things during the Bill’s passage.

[Mr David Davis]

How does my right hon. and learned Friend reconcile that with the fact that our primary ally, the United States, with its National Security Agency, which entirely mirrors GCHQ, is as we speak moving away from the block collection of data and treating that as wholly unconstitutional?

[Mr Grieve]

I have to say to my right hon. Friend that I do not believe that GCHQ has been engaging in the block collection and retention of data for the purpose of subjecting it to examination at a level that intrudes upon privacy. If he reads the comments made by Sir Iain Lobban when he gave evidence, he will see that it is clear what they were about. That said, my right hon. Friend makes an important point, and one that we will have to address. If there are other ways in which it can be better addressed, I for one would be only too happy to see those being looked at. However, I am also mindful, from my own experience in government, that some of the comments made in that regard seem rather far-fetched.

Let me turn to one of the key issues in the Gracious Speech: the suggestion that we will replace the Human Rights Act with a British Bill of Rights. At this stage I will simply make two or three points. First, I welcome the fact that the proposal has not been set in stone, fortunately, and that it appears we will be having a consultation. The proposal will be very difficult to implement in practice, and the reputational damage for this country could be disastrous. Let us start with the first and most obvious point, which is the fact that the devolution settlements in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland are underpinned by the Human Rights Act—it might be an inconvenient truth for some, but it is still a truth—and, in the case of Northern Ireland, by an international treaty with the Irish republic. I do not see how we can effect a change without first achieving a consensus that involves those parts of the United Kingdom, even if we have the power to do so, because it seems to me that to proceed without it would threaten the Union, which I was sent to this House to uphold.

Secondly, if we are to proceed down this route, the EU dimension needs to be considered. My hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Sir William Cash) has waxed eloquently against the charter of fundamental rights. I cannot think of anything more calculated to see the intervention of the European Court of Justice—not the European Court of Human Rights—than if we end up being non-compatible with the convention and EU citizens end up bringing claims against the United Kingdom Government that cannot be adjudicated under the convention in our own courts or in Strasbourg.

Thirdly, the United Kingdom has been at the forefront of the development of human rights on our planet; it is one of the things of which we can be most proud. If we are going to dilute those rights and present the British public with something that is, in fact, the convention shorn of some of the protections it affords citizens, the consequences for the convention will be catastrophic. But other countries that have previously been willing to improve their human rights records, as a result of our leverage, will cease to do so, and one of the most powerful tools for improving human rights on our planet will have been irrevocably damaged. I find it impossible to see how that can be in our national interest.

Having said those things, I also recognise that there are flaws in the way in which the Court in Strasbourg has operated. I have many criticisms of some of its jurisprudence, and there was a period in recent years when it was quite seriously off the rails. However, one point that needs to be borne in mind is that we have recently carried out a major reform of the way the Court operates, thanks to the efforts of my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Rushcliffe (Mr Clarke). Our judiciary has changed its stance and approach to the Court, so there is now a much more robust dialogue. Consequently, the Court has substantially changed many areas of its approach. The ultimate irony is that we might be in danger of fighting yesterday’s battle, or indeed of snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. I therefore very much hope that there can be a full consultation so that all these matters can be aired.