Oral Answers to Questions

Stuart C McDonald Excerpts

Tuesday 16th May 2023 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call the SNP spokesperson.

[Stuart C. McDonald (Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch East) (SNP)]

I start by congratulating the new Justice Secretary on his appointment: he has always come across as a measured and principled parliamentarian, and someone who is very serious about the rule of law. But what better way to trash that hard-earned reputation than by penning a joint opinion piece with the Home Secretary in defence of the outrageous Illegal Migration Bill, which blatantly trashes four international rights conventions and which the Law Society itself has warned has serious implications for the UK’s standing as a country that upholds the rule of law? Why is the Justice Secretary defending the Home Secretary instead of the rule of law?

[Alex Chalk]

The rule of law is absolutely essential to who we are as a nation. It does mean, on the one hand, that no one should be mightier than the law and we should all be accountable equally before it, but it also means that where there are those who break the law—I pause to note that arriving illegally in the UK has been against the law for decades—there must be consequences. If there are not, the rule of law is brought into disrepute. That would be bad for our country and, indeed, for the international rules-based order.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Speaker]

I call the SNP spokesperson.

[Stuart C. McDonald (Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch East) (SNP)]

If the right hon. and learned Gentleman wants to be seen as a Justice Secretary who will stand up for the rule of law and access to justice, he should be putting the greatest possible distance between himself and the dreadful pet project of his predecessor by disowning the Bill of Rights altogether. Importantly, will he stop that Bill being split up and dropped into other pieces of legislation, as we have already seen with the Illegal Migration Bill? Instead of undermining respect for international rights, why does he not work to incorporate more rights into domestic law, such as the UN convention on the rights of the child?