Lord Chancellor’s Oath and the Rule of Law

Anthony Browne Excerpts

Wednesday 14th October 2020 Westminster Hall

[Anthony Browne (South Cambridgeshire) (Con)]

I congratulate the hon. and learned Member for Edinburgh South West (Joanna Cherry) on securing this important debate.

I should say at the outset that, like my hon. Friend the Member for Aylesbury (Rob Butler), I am not a lawyer, but as a journalist I have written a lot about international law, the making and breaking of international treaties, and EU law in particular, as Europe correspondent for The Times. I have also instructed a lot of lawyers. I spent perhaps tens of millions of pounds instructing lawyers on international legal disputes—some with foreign Governments—and I am proud to say that I have won every single case in which I have been involved. Dealing with all that is a painful experience, and I have quite a lot of experience.

I will make just two points because my comments have to be brief. I will start with the United Kingdom Internal Market Bill, which prompted the debate, but I will not address all the points that the hon. and learned Lady made, as my hon. Friend the Member for Aylesbury answered some of them. Secondly, I will address the impact that the Bill has on the UK’s standing, which we have not talked about much today, even though that was very much part of the political debate.

On the question whether clause 5 of the Bill breaks international law, I draw the attention of hon. Members to article 6(2) of the Northern Ireland protocol of the withdrawal agreement, which states:

“Having regard to Northern Ireland’s integral place in the United Kingdom’s internal market, the Union and the United Kingdom shall use their best endeavours to facilitate the trade between Northern Ireland and other parts of the United Kingdom”.

The lawyers present will know that “best endeavours” is a legal term and a much stronger requirement than just doing one’s best to agree.

The Government included clause 5 as an explicit response to the threat from the EU’s negotiator, Michel Barnier, that the EU would not actually recognise the UK as a third country for agricultural produce, which would effectively have made it illegal for the UK to sell goods into the single market area, particularly Northern Ireland. That would have meant a ban on trade in agricultural produce from England and Scotland to Northern Ireland, which was unconscionable.

If the Government had immediately used the powers granted by clause 5, that would have been a breach of international law, but that is not what they did. There are three triggers for using those powers: first, if no deal is reached, which we do not yet know, although I certainly hope, as does the whole House, that one is reached; secondly, if there is no agreement of the Joint Committee on the border controls in Northern Ireland; and thirdly, after a vote in Parliament, if the EU breaches best endeavours and carries out its threat not to recognise the UK as a third country for agricultural produce.

If the EU did carry out that threat, I think it would be in breach of its treaty obligations, which would release the UK from its obligations, as my hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Sir Robert Neill) mentioned. If we ever used those powers in those circumstances, in no way would they be a breach of international law. I am grateful that the Government recognised the importance of a parliamentary vote to ensure that that does not happen. I really do not think that the Bill is a breach of international law.

My second point is about the impact on the UK’s standing, which is what a lot of the political debate and concern have been about. I have written a lot about international law, and the UK has been one of the bastions of law abiding in the international community for centuries—certainly for decades—and is very well regarded by other countries.

One issue that I wrote about was the Maastricht treaty in 1992, which Sweden signed before holding a referendum on joining the euro. Sweden was committed by international treaty to joining the euro, but unfortunately, the people of Sweden said no in the referendum. Sweden said, “No, we are not going to join the euro,” and it is in permanent breach of its international treaty obligations, but that does not make Sweden a pariah state. One has to be grown up about these obligations.

I really do not think the Internal Market Bill breaches international law. I have taken advice from lots of legal friends about it, and they have reached the same conclusion. Even if it did break international law, it would not affect the UK’s international standing.

[Derek Twigg (in the Chair)]

Thank you for your brevity.

Prisoners (Disclosure of Information About Victims) Bill

Anthony Browne Excerpts

2nd reading & 2nd reading: House of Commons
Tuesday 11th February 2020 Commons Chamber

[Anthony Browne (South Cambridgeshire) (Con)]

It is an honour and a pleasure to follow so many thoughtful and compassionate speeches, and to see such cross-party consensus. I pay tribute to the hon. Member for St Helens North (Conor McGinn) for his campaign, and to the Home Secretary and fellow Ministers for bringing the Bill to the House.

On 10 September 2001, I was in New York and had lunch with my wife at the World Trade Centre. The next morning, I saw the twin towers collapse. I was a journalist at The Observer at the time, so while others were fleeing ground zero, I went down there and saw the world’s worst terrorist incident close up. The reason I mention this is that the biggest impact of that terrible tragedy on me was the response of the relatives of victims. From Tuesday lunchtime—a few hours after the attacks—pictures of people started popping up around Manhattan, stuck to lamp posts and railings, with messages asking, “Have you seen this person?” By the evening, whole areas in New York, such as Union Square, were covered with pictures of faces of people who were missing, put up by relatives who were desperately searching for them.

I spoke to many relatives of the missing, as they went from hospital to hospital, visited known favoured places, went to work and called friends to see if they could find their missing husband, wife, brother, sister, son or daughter. There were literally thousands of people, all looking—looking even when, really, there was no longer any hope. The relentless energy they put into it was astonishing. The one thing that they could not do was what they were told to do, which was to stay at home and wait for a phone call. There were thousands of people with missing loved ones, and all their reactions were fundamentally the same. As the hours turned to days and the days turned to weeks, it remained all-consuming: the need to know; the need for some form of closure.

When reading the case of Helen McCourt, this is what I was reminded of. The circumstances are different from what we are discussing today, but this most powerful and natural human reaction—this psychological imperative in response to loss—is what motivates the legislation that is Helen’s law.

As we have heard, on 9 February 1988, Helen McCourt, a 22-year-old insurance clerk, went home after work and got off a bus just 500 yards from her house in Merseyside. She was never seen again. Her body has never been found. She had worked as a barmaid in the local pub, the George and Dragon, which was next to her house and where she was also a regular. The publican, Ian Simms, was convicted of her murder on overwhelming evidence. Her blood and fingerprints were found in his flat above the pub. Part of her earring was found in the boot of his car. He was imprisoned, but has always refused to say where her body is. He has just been released from prison, but is still refusing to say where the body is.

Helen’s mother, Marie McCourt, has campaigned relentlessly since her daughter’s murder. I want to join the tributes that we have already heard to Marie McCourt and to that campaign, without which this legislation would not be here today. Without the body of her daughter, Marie McCourt cannot bury her. She cannot have full closure with a funeral. She cannot visit her daughter’s grave to lay down flowers and to remember her daughter. She cannot properly grieve.

Not knowing the location of the body does not just mean that the victim’s family suffer even more than they already are. For the murderer, not revealing the location of the body means that he retains some control over his victim’s family. Those involved have talked about how it can give the murderer gratification. It certainly shows that the murderer has not properly taken responsibility for his crime or felt remorse. If the murderer is released without revealing the location of the body, it compounds the family’s suffering. The family do not know where their loved one’s body is, and the one person who does know is walking around freely and refusing to say. It is unconscionable. But this is what has now just happened.

Ian Simms may insist that he is innocent, but that is simply not the case: the evidence was utterly conclusive. He is still refusing to let Marie McCourt have a proper funeral for her daughter. That is why I support Helen’s law and why over half a million people signed a petition to for it to be made law. That is why I support this Bill. I regret, as some said earlier, that the Bill did not come in time to stop Ian Simms being released from prison.

The number of cases that the Bill affects may be small, but the injustice it corrects is huge. The issue of murder without a body has a long and difficult history. Courts used to be very reluctant to convict someone of murder when there was no body. But more recently, forensic science has become far more sophisticated, and, as with the case of Helen, courts are now more willing to pass convictions for murder even when there are no bodies. Cases like this are bound to become more frequent.

This Bill does not go as far as some campaigners have called for: an automatic ban on release from prison for murderers who do not reveal where the bodies are. But it does impose a legal requirement on parole boards to take into account the fact that a murderer has not revealed the location of their victim’s body. That sends a very clear message to parole boards of what society and Parliament expect of them. Putting that into law will ensure a more consistent and fairer approach.

I agree with the Government that we cannot automatically impose a ban on the release of murderers who refuse to reveal the location of the body. What happens in cases where the murderer would be willing to reveal the location of body but genuinely does not know where it is? What if the murderer cannot remember, perhaps because of dementia? The variety of cases means that parole boards have to have some discretion, and I think this Bill gets the balance right.

I have always believed that justice needs to focus far more on the rights, wishes and needs of victims, and for that reason I commend this Bill to the House.