Alexander Litvinenko

Lord Clinton-Davis Excerpts

Monday 24th March 2014 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Lord Clinton-Davis]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether they intend to reconsider their decision not to hold a public inquiry into the murder of Alexander Litvinenko, following the judgment by the Court of Appeal on 11 February.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Home Office (Lord Taylor of Holbeach) (Con)]

My Lords, the Home Secretary has decided not to seek permission to appeal the judgment and will give fresh consideration to the exercise of her discretion to establish an inquiry. The Government continue to co-operate fully with the inquest into Mr Litvinenko’s death.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Clinton-Davis (Lab)]

I thank the noble Lord for his somewhat implausible Answer. The fact is that three eminent judges have concluded that the coroner was absolutely right, that the Government’s case was unconvincing and that a special inquiry was needed. As we have heard, the Government have not appealed against that. Why do the Government concede that a special inquiry might be adopted, not now but in the distant future? Is that sensible?

[Lord Taylor of Holbeach]

My Lords, the noble Lord is being rather uncharacteristically churlish about the Answer I gave. These are complex and sensitive issues, as I hope noble Lords will appreciate, and it is right that the Home Secretary gives proper consideration to whether or not to hold an inquiry. That is her right and we should support her in that.

Immigration Bill

Lord Clinton-Davis Excerpts

Monday 10th February 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Taylor of Holbeach]

There is no specific exemption for the small landlord or landlady any more than there is for the small employer, as noble Lords will know. None the less, we will have the opportunity to debate the detail of these provisions when we get to Committee. In introducing the Bill at this Second Reading, I am trying to present those general principles which underline it.

I was starting to talk about health insurance. On migrant access to healthcare, the current position in the UK is very generous. While temporary migrants do not qualify for state benefits, those coming to the UK for more than six months usually qualify for free healthcare on their arrival in the UK. Unlike many other countries, we do not levy access charges or require health insurance. The Bill will address this by requiring non-EEA migrants who come here for more than six months to pay a health surcharge. The money collected will be channelled directly to front-line NHS services. Visitors and illegal migrants will not pay the surcharge; they will continue, as now, to be fully liable for the full cost of most NHS treatment charges. We have exempted a number of vulnerable groups from having to pay.

The health charge has been designed to be simple and cost effective to operate, avoiding administrative complexity that would erode the financial benefit to the taxpayer.

[Lord Clinton-Davis (Lab)]

If the Bill is so perfect, why do so many organisations concerned with immigration oppose it, and oppose it with vigour?

[Earl Attlee (Con)]

My Lords, long experience shows that the best way of handling these debates is to allow my noble friend the Minister to lay out his stall, explaining how the Bill works, and then debate the Bill.

Police: Private Prosecutions

Lord Clinton-Davis Excerpts

Tuesday 4th February 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Taylor of Holbeach]

My Lords, perhaps I may reiterate what I said in my opening response. I understand the concerns raised about the police assisting in a private prosecution with a promise of a share of compensation. We expect high standards from the police; I think all noble Lords would accept that. In particular, in this case, the Met received only overtime costs, which is right and proper. As I said, we will be updating the guidance to PCCs and the Met to make it clear that such agreements should not be entered into.

[Lord Clinton-Davis (Lab)]

My Lords, did not the Lord Chief Justice urge police chiefs to give urgent—I stress that word—consideration to a practice that undermined the reputation of the police for independence? He was deeply concerned about it. Those are serious observations; they come from an impeccable source, do they not?

[Lord Taylor of Holbeach]

Yes, indeed—I hope I have given the House an assurance that we take those remarks seriously.

Police: Racism

Lord Clinton-Davis Excerpts

Thursday 25th April 2013 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Lord Clinton-Davis]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what is their response to the allegation made by the Metropolitan Black Police Association that the Metropolitan Police Service is institutionally racist.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Home Office (Lord Taylor of Holbeach)]

My Lords, the Government do not believe that the Metropolitan Police Service is still institutionally racist. It has worked hard to improve relations with communities and the representativeness of its workforce since the Stephen Lawrence inquiry. The commissioner has been clear that he will not tolerate racists in the force, and has publicly stated his determination to ensure that the force looks more like the community that it serves.

[Lord Clinton-Davis]

I thank the Minister for that reply. The Metropolitan Black Police Association has made very serious allegations to the effect that the Metropolitan Police is still institutionally racist, 20 years after the infamous Lawrence case. It has referred to the wholly disproportionate number of stop-and-search cases involving the black and Asian communities compared with the white. What is being done to address this alleged—I repeat “alleged”—situation?

[Lord Taylor of Holbeach]

My right honourable friend Damian Green, the Minister for Policing, recently met the National Black Police Association to discuss its concerns about race in policing and offered to work in partnership with the College of Policing because, as noble Lords will know, that new institution will be important in strategies such as this. There have been suggestions that elements in policing, as with other institutions, still sustain racist attitudes, but it is clear from the comments of the commissioner of the MPS, Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe, that he is determined, and he is supported by the Government in this regard, to stamp it out.

Justice and Security Bill [HL]

Lord Clinton-Davis Excerpts

Monday 19th November 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Clinton-Davis]

I have a great deal of sympathy with this amendment, but I cannot understand why the Prime Minister should be asked for formal consent. Consent, yes, but I do not understand the argument for formal consent.

[Baroness Williams of Crosby]

If the noble Lord, Lord Clinton-Davis, will allow me, I will finish the argument I am trying to make—I will not be lengthy—and then endeavour to address his question.

I want to go back for a moment to the other source of considerable concern about intelligence, one with which I have fairly close acquaintance: the doubts that were raised about the intelligence used as the basis for the British involvement in the invasion of Iraq. At the time, the question was whether the intelligence we had about the possibility of Iraq having nuclear and other weapons of mass destruction was sufficiently sound for us to rely on. It was my view and that of my party that it was not; it was the view, equally honestly held, of other Members of this House, that it was. There was uncertainty, which has left behind it a strong desire to seek greater accountability. We would be very foolish not to recognise that that is still a live issue.

I come back to the issues concerning the particular proposal that we have made and that my noble friend has put before your Lordships. The proposal that the House of Commons as such should be entitled to elect a chairman of such a key committee will enable it to take into account its experience of committees of this kind. I have a good deal of sympathy with the proposal of the noble Lord, Lord Gilbert, which was supported by the noble Lord, Lord King, that the chairman should normally be drawn from the opposition Benches. That seems to be a kind of double guarantee that the committee would seek to be objective and not to protect people who should not be properly protected.

The second argument for the House of Commons as such to appoint the chairman, subject to a veto of candidates by the Prime Minister, is that that would essentially make the committee the creature of the House as a whole. The committee would no longer report specifically to the Prime Minister; it would report generally to Parliament. That is an excellent idea because it brings all parties—indeed, both Houses of Parliament—together in supporting the intelligence committee.

I conclude by saying a word about formal recognition. That is simply to indicate how seriously the proposal of the Prime Minister’s ability to draw the line at particular candidates must be taken. It would require him to agree in writing that that candidate should not be allowed to go forward in a certain, limited number of cases. I say as loudly and clearly as I can that this amendment meets the needs for greater accountability and what the noble Lord, Lord King, and the noble Baroness, Lady Manningham-Buller, said about the need for evolution of the committee to make it more accountable and democratic, in the broadest sense of the word. It is a proposal that the House should consider very carefully before making any final decision about it.

Queen’s Speech

Lord Clinton-Davis Excerpts

Tuesday 15th May 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Clinton-Davis]

The criticisms that I make of the Home Office are but mild by comparison with what we have just heard.

I believe that this Queen’s Speech is dreary and largely irrelevant to the needs of this nation. It fails to focus on real public concerns. Public works, increased economic growth and youth unemployment are but three of the issues that are highly relevant at this time. I have attended many Queen’s Speeches, but I cannot recall one that had so many deficiencies.

Tonight, I propose to concentrate on home affairs and law and justice. As far as home affairs are concerned, I will make several criticisms of the Home Office, but I say at once that we are delighted to see the noble Lord, Lord Henley, who is a friend of many of us, in his place. The Home Office is often regarded as the ministry of the non-living. Whether that description is well merited is by the way. Mistakes can all too readily prove irrecoverable. That is not necessarily the fault of the Secretary of State, but it is the Secretary of State who carries the can. Of course the Home Office is too large and delegation often occurs, often with fatal, or near fatal, results, and it is the Secretary of State who is held responsible.

Prison policy is a good example of this deficiency. For the most part, prisoners can be obdurately unyielding. My experience as a defence solicitor is that frequently prison guards and prisoners do not begin to comprehend the other’s problems. Admittedly, I go back a long way, but I doubt whether there has been much change. I realise that work is often undertaken in uncongenial circumstances, leading inevitably to an inbuilt resistance to change, but there have been some shining examples to the contrary. The noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, is one of them. He made every effort to detect and tackle mistakes during his tenure of office.

Terrorism, frequently having an international dimension, clearly falls within the Secretary of State’s responsibility. Terrorism can often be accompanied by a messianic ideology. The Secretary of State has to reconcile effective defensive measures with democratic standards, and that is by no means easy, as the Secretary of State has clearly demonstrated, but surely some humility is called for rather than something we hear too often: an irritatingly abrasive mood of “I know best”. I am only too well aware that the Secretary of State has numerous other responsibilities. Is it not time therefore for this vast ministry to be split up, for a ministerial inquiry to be established and for this to be effected immediately?

As far as law and justice are concerned, this House—

[Lord Henley]

It might be helpful if I get to my feet and interrupt the noble Lord to remind him that his party split up the Home Office. Prisons and criminal justice have gone to the Ministry of Justice. We are a much smaller department than we ever were.

[Lord Clinton-Davis]

That may be but it is still too large. I do not know whether the noble Lord had any responsibility for that—

[Lord Henley]

My Lords, I could not have had any responsibility for it because it was done by the previous Government. I think the noble Lord will remember that I was not a Minister in the previous Government; they were a Labour Government.

[Lord Clinton-Davis]

That may be but I still regard the Home Office as much too large.

Although the House devoted a great deal of its time in the previous Session of this Parliament to examining a Bill that got scant attention in the House of Commons, I fear that the system will prove to be far more expensive than our present one in the long term; and that the changes envisaged by the Government will prove to be divisive and largely ineffective. They will also have a deleterious effect on people seeking to undertake civil cases.

In my day—I speak of a very long time ago—criminal cases seldom lasted beyond around three months. Nowadays it is common practice for serious criminal cases to last for a year or more. How, then, can we revert to a more acceptable time limit without adversely affecting justice and the civil components of legal aid? Even though this is a desirable goal, I wonder how much time the Government have devoted to resolving this vast problem. I will readily give way to the noble Lord, who is intent on intervening in my speech at all times.

We have spent much time in the Lords trying to resolve some of the more serious dilemmas on the civil side. Defeats were inflicted on the Government but they remained resolute to be irresolute. Justice will undoubtedly have suffered as a result. I fear that I will be disappointed in my quest for the Government to conduct a further inquiry into this matter. However, an inquiry is called for and ought to begin immediately.

Piracy

Lord Clinton-Davis Excerpts

Monday 26th March 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Clinton-Davis]

Is there a time limit for the further work that is being undertaken by the Government?

[Lord Henley]

My Lords, there is no time limit and it would be wrong to impose one at this stage. All I can make clear is that the Prime Minister has asked for further work to be done.

Abu Qatada

Lord Clinton-Davis Excerpts

Tuesday 7th February 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Henley]

My Lords, my noble friend is right to point to the development of modern means of communications over the past 20 or 30 years and the advantages that they give to extremist preachers of this sort, which was never the case in the past. That is one reason why it is very important that we have very tight controls on what forms of communications will be available to Qatada in his house, with his family, when he is subject to bail.

My noble friend asked about other countries and rightly pointed to the problems of deporting individuals to a large number of countries throughout the world because of their human rights record. That is something that we are simply stuck with; there is not much that we can do about it, because of the nature of the countries that we are talking about and the nature of what goes on. Certainly, that imposes enormous costs on us. I cannot give my noble friend precise figures of the costs of Abu Qatada over the past 10 years. However, I think all noble Lords will be pretty sure that they must have been fairly large costs considering that he has spent some five years in prison and is now going to be living at home, presumably surviving on benefits of some sort, along with his wife and five children. The same was true beforehand and there are all the costs of supervision that my noble friend mentioned, which are also very great indeed. Yes, keeping the security of this country is not a cheap option.

[Lord Clinton-Davis]

Is it not clear that this man has made outrageous and bloodthirsty comments about a variety of circumstances, particularly concerning the Jewish community? Is there any evidence that those threats have been resiled from? If not, that is highly relevant in the circumstances which the Government have to consider.

[Lord Henley]

My Lords, I am not aware that those have been resiled from but I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Clinton-Davis, for emphasising the particularly nasty nature of this man and the sort of threats he has made, to Jewish people and to a great many others. That significant fact ought to be taken into account and I am grateful to the noble Lord for bringing it to the attention of the House.

Police: Custody

Lord Clinton-Davis Excerpts

Tuesday 29th November 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Henley]

My Lords, I accept my noble friend’s point and share her concerns on these matters. On policing, for which the Home Office is responsible, we are committed to delivering a police service that promotes equality, does not discriminate against anyone because of their race and is effective in rooting out and tackling racism. Where there are disproportionate numbers in one group as opposed to another, that invites further research. That is something we should do. However, at this stage I would not want to comment on why there are, as my noble friend puts it, more black people in prison than there are at the Russell group universities.

[Lord Clinton-Davis]

Would the Minister say that racism of any kind is unacceptable in our society, especially as far as the police are concerned? Would he distance the Government from the racism practised by certain sections of the police today?

[Lord Henley]

My Lords, I do not accept that the police act in a racist manner. I do accept that where one group is disproportionately involved in crime it deserves some degree of analysis and is something that we need to look at. However, I totally reject the noble Lord’s complaint about racism in the police force. That allegation has been made in the past. It is something that the police have addressed over the years and something that they have dealt with themselves.

Police Reform and Social Responsibility Bill

Lord Clinton-Davis Excerpts

Wednesday 14th September 2011 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hamwee]

I will come to that if the noble Lord can contain his patience.

Local elections should be about local issues and very often they are not. What I wrote down without having to be prompted by the noble Lord is that the first elections for anything tend to set the tone. There could be a debate about having elections every four or six months for different things throughout the year, although that might be going a little far.

This debate has referred quite a lot to the convenience of campaigners. I am sure that many noble Lords have gritted their teeth and hung their canvass sheets on radiators to dry throughout the year. The convenience of campaigners is the least of the factors in this. But decoupling the elections should help avoid the diversion.

[Lord Clinton-Davis]

The noble Baroness said that the first elections in November will set the tone. Why and how?