Rwanda: Memorandum of Understanding

Lord Morris of Aberavon Excerpts

Monday 6th February 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Morris of Aberavon (Lab)]

My Lords, I fully support the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, who has set out the case so well. In 1924, Arthur Ponsonby, then an Under-Secretary of State at the Foreign Office in a Labour Government presided over by one of my predecessors as Member for Aberavon, pledged that the Government would inform Parliament of all agreements, commitments and understandings that may in any way bind the nation.

The argument now is whether that commitment should include agreements that are not treaties, such as, in this case, a memorandum of understanding. I believe the general understanding of the reasons for the Ponsonby rule was that the knowledge of such issues should be made fully available to Parliament and that the public mind should be prepared for any action necessary. I am not particularly concerned with the minutiae of the argument about the extent of the rule; I am concerned about the substantial lacuna in parliamentary scrutiny in respect of significant MoUs.

Our committee reported that it was unacceptable that the Government should be able to use the prerogative to agree important arrangements with other states that have serious human rights implications without the scrutiny of Parliament. It is timely for the use of prerogative powers, with their origins in the mists of time, to be examined. The late Lord Mayhew and I, as former law officers, persuaded a parliamentary Select Committee that the use of the prerogative to authorise going to war was outdated. We should look at this again. Hardly any issue is more important to an individual seeking asylum than transfer to a foreign country without his agreement and, in this case, the scrutiny of Parliament.

I invite the Government to consider the development of policies in Spain and the USA which show that legislative scrutiny of non-binding agreements is not incompatible with the effective conduct of foreign affairs.