Leaving the EU: Security, Law Enforcement and Criminal Justice

Richard Arkless Excerpts

Wednesday 18th January 2017 Commons Chamber

[Robert Neill]

I accept that that is a significant issue, but the two amendments achieved two things. First, they removed any risk of extradition before commencement of proceedings; and, secondly, they introduced in the UK a proportionality filter. It would be better if all other countries that use the European arrest warrant had a proportionality filter, too. From the evidence we heard from Professor Wilson of the Northumbria University’s centre for evidence and criminal justice studies, it seems that even Poland, which has resisted a proportionality filter in the past, is now moving in that direction. The situation is improving there.

The fact that we have those two important safeguards is significant, and it is also important that the European arrest warrant system is a court-driven system, which is subject to judicial supervision rather than being an executive act of extradition. That is why it would be undesirable for us to lose the advantage of the European arrest warrant and have to fall back to the 1957 extradition convention, which was a purely administrative act, carried out through diplomatic channels, without the protection of court intervention or review. It was also much more cumbersome.

[Richard Arkless (Dumfries and Galloway) (SNP)]

It is indeed a privilege, as mentioned by others, to serve on the Justice Committee under the hon. Gentleman’s chairmanship; he is making a fine speech. Will he respond to some of the comments made by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Edinburgh South West (Joanna Cherry)? Notwithstanding her clear desire to stay within the European arrest warrant, there will be difficulties as a result of different data-sharing regimes in the European Union and the UK. How is it possible to reconcile the two, following the UK’s leaving the EU?

[Robert Neill]

It is certainly clear from the available evidence that the Government will need to take that necessity on board. We will have adhere to European standards of data protection for other member states to be able to share the information with us, according to their law. We may also want to share information with other third-party countries, so both we and they will have to be prepared to adhere to international standards. As my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Beaconsfield (Mr Grieve) rightly said, that might involve some form of international adjudicative process to deal with disputes between member states. I am not going to tie anyone down on how best to solve that, but there are serious issues that we will have to bear in mind from day one of our negotiations.

Equally, when we talk about involvement with some of the other agencies—we referred to ECRIS, the European criminal records information system, to Prüm and to a number of other valuable tools—we need to recognise that there is a financial cost to the development of the databases. I would certainly encourage the Government not to be afraid to continue to make a financial contribution to the development and maintenance of them. That would be a small price to pay in view of the advantage of protection for the British public. I think there is common ground on the objective of the European arrest warrant. I just wanted to raise some of the practical issues that we will have to grasp if we are to succeed in achieving our continued full access to it as a non-EU member state.

I want to refer to other matters of concern—co-operation between the courts, which involves our continued membership or association with Eurojust. There is a precedent for non-member states continuing to co-operate with Eurojust. Norway has a co-operation agreement and has liaison prosecutors based at Eurojust. If we leave the EU as it stands, we would have to move from being national college members, but we could have a Norwegian-style status. Perhaps we should be bold and try to argue that we should remain as national college members on some sort of basis if the constitution permits it. That would be preferable.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Jones]

The position, as I understand it, is as I have just stated, but now that the right hon. Lady has raised the question, I shall pursue and investigate it.

My hon. Friend the Member for Bath asked whether the UK would be putting human rights at the forefront of our negotiating agenda. The UK has a long-standing tradition of protecting our rights, traditions and liberties, and we see no reason to depart from that.

[Richard Arkless]

The Ministry of Justice has responsibility for the Crown dependencies. I have just spent two days with the Justice Select Committee speaking to the Government of the Isle of Man, and they have a simple message—no demands or list of conditions: will a Minister come to the Dispatch Box and say that the Crown dependencies will not be forgotten throughout this process or in any agreement reached with the rest of the EU?

[Mr Jones]

I can certainly give the hon. Gentleman that assurance. In fact, there have already been many meetings with representatives of the Crown dependencies, and that will continue throughout the process of exiting the EU.

My hon. Friend the Member for Kingston and Surbiton (James Berry) rightly reminded us that many security arrangements are agreed largely on a bilateral basis and that the UK has significant strengths in this regard, and of course those arrangements will continue undisturbed by our departure from the EU.

The right hon. Member for Leeds Central (Hilary Benn), who chairs the Exiting the European Union Committee, congratulated my Department on its speedy response to his most recent report, at least in two respects. I am glad to see that we are giving satisfaction. He asked whether the Department would be publishing the economic analysis underpinning the plan that the Prime Minister outlined yesterday, and if so when. I can assure him that the analysis continues and will continue for some time. However, he must understand—I am sure that he does understand—that going into too much detail about that analysis at this particular stage could compromise our negotiating position. I give the right hon. Gentleman the assurance he has had before: as time passes, we will consider and reconsider the issue of how much information should be passed to his Select Committee.