UK Extradition Arrangements

Debate between Dominic Raab and Richard Ottaway

Monday 5th December 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Dominic Raab (Esher and Walton) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House calls upon the Government to reform the UK’s extradition arrangements to strengthen the protection of British citizens by introducing as a matter of urgency a Bill to enact the safeguards recommended by the Joint Committee on Human Rights in its Fifteenth Report, HC 767, and by pursuing such amendments to the UK-US Extradition Treaty 2003 and the EU Council Framework Decision 2002 on the European Arrest Warrant as are necessary in order to give effect to such recommendations.

First, may I thank the Backbench Business Committee chaired by the hon. Member for North East Derbyshire (Natascha Engel) for granting this debate? Her Committee is proving to be a shot in the arm for Parliament and our democracy. I also wish to thank the cross-party sponsors of the motion, the right hon. and learned Member for North East Fife (Sir Menzies Campbell), the Chairs of the Joint Committee on Human Rights and the Home Affairs Committee, and the many, many MPs on all sides of the House who signed and support the motion.

The debate was scheduled at relatively short notice, so the right hon. and learned Member for North East Fife and the Chair of the Home Affairs Committee are not here. The right hon. and learned Member for North East Fife is leading a parliamentary delegation in Washington. The Chair of the Home Affairs Committee is also engaged but will join the debate later. Both spoke passionately in the Westminster Hall debate on 24 November. Both asked that I reiterate their firm support for the motion this evening.

The issue before us is technical and legalistic but, at its core, it is about the price we place on the liberty of our citizens, and the value we ascribe to that cornerstone of British justice, innocent until proven guilty. It is not about abolishing extradition, which is vital to international efforts in relation to law enforcement. It is about whether, in taking the fight to the terrorists and the serious criminals after 9/11, the pendulum swung too far the other way. I want to praise the Minister and the coalition for their efforts to defend our freedoms and their achievements to date, and for taking seriously the case for extradition reform. My purpose today is to encourage their best instincts and inject a dose of common sense into the blunt extradition regime that we now have in place.

What went wrong? Let us take, first, the UK-US treaty of 2003. Much has been made of the different evidential thresholds. The review by Sir Scott Baker concluded that there was “no significant difference” between the two tests, probable cause and reasonable suspicion. For my part, I do not believe there is a massive difference between the paper legal tests, but that does not mean that their operation is symmetrical. As Alun Jones QC, who represented the Spanish Government during the Pinochet case, argued and points out in The Daily Telegraph today, an American citizen who is subject to an extradition warrant in the US has the constitutional safeguard that a judge must examine the evidence. In this country, a short recitation of the allegations suffices. That is a very real and important imbalance.

[Richard Ottaway (Croydon South) (Con)]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman. He says that he believes the evidential test to be higher in the USA than it is in the United Kingdom. Will he acknowledge, however, that the United States has not refused a single request since the treaty was introduced?

[Mr Raab]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention. I will take his word on that data, but the key distinction that I am making is between the paper legal test and how it actually works. We are not going to be ivory tower academic lawyers about this. Let us understand the impact on the people affected.