Safety of Rwanda (Asylum and Immigration) Bill

Lord Howard of Lympne Excerpts

Report stage
Wednesday 6th March 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Howard of Lympne (Con)]

I agree with the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope—this is not the time to go back over the arguments we previously had. However, will the noble Lord and the noble Lord, Lord Alton, not accept that the one ground on which they cannot rely in support of their arguments is what Winston Churchill and the founding fathers of the convention said? They specifically considered whether the court should have the right to make an interim ruling, and they decided that it should not have that right.

[Lord German (LD)]

I deal with matters which are within my lifespan, I am afraid. It is certainly the case that the court—at present, the ECHR—operates on the basis of the decisions taken jointly by the range of countries within it. That is where we stand. We are being asked, as the noble Lord, Lord Deben, just said, to give permission to the Government to flout the legislation of which we have been a part, and the court of which we have been a part in making it.

Let us look very briefly at our record. The United Kingdom has always complied with Rule 39 interim measures and has publicly declared the need for other states to comply with them. In 2023, the court received 61 requests to make an emergency intervention against the United Kingdom, only one of which was granted as a genuinely necessary intervention. In 2021, it was the United Kingdom that urged Moscow to comply with one of the court’s Rule 39 orders, demanding the release of the now deceased jailed opposition leader Alexei Navalny—which was absolutely the right thing to do. Last year, another order helped to save the lives of two British fighters in Ukraine who had been taken captive by Russian forces. Those measures are important to us. We stand by them, and giving permission to the Government to ignore them runs counter to the principles under which we operate.

Safety of Rwanda (Asylum and Immigration) Bill

Lord Howard of Lympne Excerpts

Committee stage
Monday 19th February 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Kerr of Kinlochard (CB)]

The noble Lord is well aware that the Strasbourg court has decided to pass various reforms and the anonymity of the judge is a thing of the past. I am not an expert on the Strasbourg court. However, I am a believer that if we maintain that we believe in the rule of law, we cannot pick and choose which bits of international law we comply with. That is a point I put forward at Second Reading and one I feel very strongly about. I do not see how we can, in good conscience, pass Clauses 5(2) and 5(3), which is why I added my name to Amendments 57 and 59 as moved by the noble Lord, Lord Scriven.

[Lord Howard of Lympne (Con)]

My Lords, the words that I am about to utter are largely not mine. They are the words of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hoffmann, who I am delighted to see in his place, in the preface he wrote to a paper on Rule 39 written by Professor Richard Ekins, professor of law and constitutional government at Oxford, and published by Policy Exchange last year.

The noble and learned Lord, Lord Hoffmann said:

“A ruling of a court such as the European Court of Justice”—


though I think he probably meant, if noble Lords will forgive me, the European Court of Human Rights as his words certainly apply to it—

“is binding upon the parties only if the court had jurisdiction to make it. If it did, a party must comply and cannot complain that it was wrong. If the court did not have jurisdiction, the parties can ignore it.

The European Convention on Human Rights confers upon the Strasbourg Court jurisdiction in all matters ‘concerning the interpretation and application of the Convention’: article 32. It exercises this jurisdiction by the judgments of its Chambers, which, after submissions and argument by the parties, become final in accordance with articles 42 and 44. In this paper, Professor Ekins demonstrates that the Convention does not confer upon the Court, still less upon one of its judges, a power to make orders binding upon a Member State which require it to do or refrain from doing something on the ground that it might at a later stage be held to have been an infringement of the Convention. Not only is there nothing in the language of the Convention which expressly confers such a power but the usual aids to the construction of a treaty – the travaux preparatoires, the subsequent practice of the court – reflect a clear understanding that no such power exists.


What has happened is that one of the rules which the Court has itself made to regulate its own procedures has included a power to ‘bring to the attention of the Parties any interim measure the adoption of which seems desirable’ to avoid a violation of the Convention. The existence of a power to fire such a shot across the bows is practical and sensible. It does not involve the assertion of any jurisdiction to impose a legal obligation. But what has happened in the court’s recent jurisprudence is that this advisory power has been assumed to be a power to grant legally binding interlocutory relief. As Professor Ekins demonstrates, a court cannot in this way enlarge its jurisdiction by its own bootstraps. And if the Court had no jurisdiction to make such an order, Member States are free to ignore it”.


The noble Lord, Lord Scriven, referred to Article 32, which gives the court the power to interpret and apply the convention. It does not, however, give the court the power to add something to the convention which simply is not there. As Professor Ekins said in the concluding words of his paper:

“In rejecting the Strasbourg Court’s actions in excess of jurisdiction, the UK … would not be failing to honour its international legal obligations; it would be inviting the Court to honour its own legal obligations”.

[Lord Hannay of Chiswick (CB)]

My Lords, I would like to follow those who have supported some of this group of amendments. I do not want to follow on to the territory of the European Court of Human Rights. A number of previous speakers, though not the most recent one, have expressed my views perfectly well.

I take issue, briefly, with the lamentable use of the phrase “foreign court” by the Prime Minister, which I regard as an extraordinary breach of British diplomatic history and practice. When he winds up, I would like the Minister to answer the following questions. We accept the compulsory jurisdiction of the International Court of Justice. We have no member of that court at the moment, lamentably, due to diplomatic ineptitude. Is that a foreign court? We accept the International Court’s compulsory jurisdiction, do we not? We are delighted when the International Criminal Court indicts Mr Putin for abducting Ukrainian children. Do we accept it? Is it a foreign court? We are pretty pleased when the Tribunal for the Law of the Sea rules that the Chinese are ultra vires in seizing large chunks of the South China Sea. Is that a foreign court? I could go on. We have been trying to sustain the dispute settlement procedure of the World Trade Organization against the worst efforts of our closest ally, the United States. Is that a foreign court? We accept its jurisdiction. Could we please stop talking about “foreign courts”, and realise that it is in the interests of this country to stick with the obligations it has undertaken to obey such tribunals?

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[The Lord Bishop of Chelmsford]

My Lords, I cannot speak on behalf of the Church of England. We are not whipped on these Benches, and I speak for myself. I do not know for certain whether Rwanda is safe or not, and our courts seem to think they cannot state whether it is safe or not. I suggest that we need to review that in two years when we have more evidence.

[Lord Howard of Lympne (Con)]

My Lords, I am sorry to detain your Lordships at this late hour. I shall try to be very brief. This amendment, particularly proposed new subsection (6), is remarkably similar to an amendment put forward earlier in Committee by the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, which I characterised as outsourcing decision-making to the UNHCR. I had a little spat with the noble Lord, Lord Kerr, about that and the right reverend Prelate, who spoke in favour of the amendment, denied that it was outsourcing. Very graciously, the noble Baroness intervened to say that that was the effect of her amendment and that she would consider making it, in her words, less rich when she brought it forward on Report.

This amendment falls into exactly the same trap. In proposed new subsection (6), on the renewal of the Act after two years, the decision is again outsourced to the UNHCR. I will not go through all the reasons I gave in my earlier speech as to why that is entirely inappropriate but, for those same reasons, this amendment is also completely inappropriate.

[Lord Faulks (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I will briefly comment on the relationship between Rwanda and the United Kingdom contained in the treaty. A lot has been said about the treaty being inadequate and how it depends on what happens in future. The noble and learned Lord took a certain amount of flak during earlier debates in Committee when he was asked what the treaty is doing if Rwanda is safe. He suggested that it might make it safer. The rather scornful response to this observation was somewhat unfair. The treaty contains a number of obligations and is entirely typical of treaties in that respect. These obligations use the word “shall” and are directed to future activity.

The general principle of international law is that a treaty is binding on the parties and must be performed in good faith. That principle is embodied in the maxim “pacta sunt servanda”. We take that very seriously. If a party breaks the terms of a treaty, provided there has been a fundamental change of circumstances, as the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties makes clear, the treaty in effect comes to an end. The noble Lord, Lord Clarke of Nottingham, spoke of the possibility of a coup and seemed to suggest, as the proposer of this amendment did, that because Parliament had determined that Rwanda was safe, we would be stuck with that determination.

I respectfully disagree. The treaty bears close reading. I will not refer to it at this stage of proceedings, but Clause 8(1) makes its nature clear, Articles 14, 15 and 16 concern the arrangements for monitoring and Article 22 provides a dispute mechanism. Further, the treaty will end on 13 April 2027 in any event. These seem to me to be sufficient safeguards built into the treaty, but if there is a coup or a fundamental change of circumstances, or any Government think that Rwanda is unsafe, the treaty can be brought to an end, at least until a subsequent agreement has been reached. To suggest that Parliament must somehow not be satisfied that there are obligations in international law seems to me unreal.

Safety of Rwanda (Asylum and Immigration) Bill

Lord Howard of Lympne Excerpts

Committee stage
Monday 12th February 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)]

My Lords, we commence the vital work of this Committee with amendments that address a fundamental dispute of fact: that the Government’s attitude to checks, balances and the rule of law now threatens our unwritten constitutional settlement. Having failed to convince our highest court that the Republic of Rwanda is currently safe for asylum seekers and refugees, the Executive seek to overturn the Supreme Court’s recent factual determination, ousting the jurisdiction of domestic courts to reconsider those facts in the light of further developments, including the Rwanda treaty on which the Government rely. The Government further purport to take powers to ignore interim orders of the European Court of Human Rights. Thus, they threaten both the domestic rule of law, especially the separation of powers, and the international rules-based order.

I remind noble Lords not just of the Supreme Court’s decision of 15 November last year but of subsequent reports of your Lordships’ International Agreements Committee, endorsed by an overwhelming vote in your Lordships’ House; of the Constitution Committee, including three former Conservative Ministers and a former No. 10 chief of staff; and now the majority report of the Joint Committee on Human Rights. I will assume that some members of those committees will speak, so I will leave them fully to outline the clear results of their deliberations.

None the less, as your Lordships overwhelmingly decided to give this Bill a Second Reading, I will approach the task of amendment in the spirit of constitutional compromise, seeking to amend the Bill in line with the Government’s desired policy of offshoring asylum decisions while also seeking to comply with the Supreme Court’s decision and the unequivocal advice of your Lordships’ International Agreements Committee and Constitution Committee—this notwithstanding my personal objection to transporting human beings for processing, which will no doubt be subject to further political and legal scrutiny in the months and years ahead.

For present purposes, I take the Government at their word—even if that word has been put rather belligerently to the Supreme Court and your Lordships’ House. I will assume that the Government do not want to put the Executive of the United Kingdom on a collision course with our Supreme Court or our international legal obligations, so amendments in this group seek to offer a way through the stalemate for people of good will from all sides of your Lordships’ House. Amendments 1, 2, 5 and 34 in my name are supported by the most reverend Primate the Archbishop of Canterbury, the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Hale of Richmond, and the noble Viscount, Lord Hailsham. I have signed Amendments 3 and 7 tabled by the noble Viscount. The noble Lord, Lord German, has Amendments 11 and 12.

Your Lordships’ Constitution Committee warned of a number of concerning trends in the present Government’s approach to our constitution and our courts, which seeks, for example, to disapply the Human Rights Act for particular unpopular groups rather than repeal it wholesale for everyone. I observe another new fashion in adding a lengthy introduction to a relatively short Bill that deems facts changed, making its purposes so clear that the courts should be wary of interpreting the legislation as they might otherwise do. However, since the arrival of this Bill in your Lordships’ House, the Prime Minister has stated—by a press conference, but stated—that his Rwanda Bill was designed to assuage the concerns of the Supreme Court.

Therefore, Amendments 1 and 2 add a secondary but essential purpose to the primary purpose of preventing and deterring what the Government see as unlawful migration. This purpose is to

“ensure compliance with the domestic and international rule of law by providing that no person will be removed to the Republic of Rwanda by or under such provision”

unless two conditions are met. The first condition is that there is advice from the UNHCR that Rwanda is now safe; for example, as a result of the successful implementation of promised reforms and safeguards to the asylum system there. The second condition is that this advice has been laid before both Houses of Parliament.

Now, some may balk at what they regard as a foreign body having any role whatever in the assessment of facts on the ground in Rwanda. However, as the Joint Committee on Human Rights noted, our Supreme Court’s concerns about the lack of safety there were in no small part in the light of unequivocal expert evidence from the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, with its special expertise and role under the refugee convention.

If the Executive is now asking Parliament to become complicit in overturning findings of fact by our Supreme Court—this is made explicit by Amendments 3 and 4 in the name of the noble Viscount, Lord Hailsham—it should at the very least allow Parliament to hear advice from the expert body that the Supreme Court found so authoritative before allowing facts to be deemed as having changed. Accordingly, Amendment 5 replaces the edict that Rwanda “is” safe with that belief that it “may become” so, because it should be our unanimous aspiration that the whole world becomes a safer place for persecuted and displaced people.

Further, as even an independent expert body should never usurp the fact-finding jurisdiction of our courts, especially in dangerous and fast-changing times, Amendment 34 makes it clear that even clear and positive advice from the UNHCR would create only a “rebuttable presumption” that Rwanda is safe. In keeping with earlier legislation, as observed by the Constitution Committee of your Lordships’ House, it would not hobble our courts with an absolute conclusion. Yet, if the Government are really so confident that that Rwanda treaty, unlike the refugee convention so long before it, will be implemented so as convincingly to render that country safe, they have nothing to fear from either these amendments or our courts. I beg to move.

[Lord Howard of Lympne (Con)]

My Lords, I must begin by apologising for the fact that I was abroad at the time of Second Reading and was therefore not in my place at that time. Much was made at Second Reading of the notion that the Bill in some way contravenes our constitutional principles, is an affront to the separation of powers, and infringes on the power of the judiciary. Those allegations are thoroughly misconceived but they are highly relevant to this amendment.

The plain fact is that we are a parliamentary democracy. That means that Parliament is sovereign and the reason why so many of us cherish that overarching principle is that we attach high importance to something called accountability. Accountability was not a word which featured very large in your Lordships’ debate at Second Reading. The courts are accountable to no one; they proudly proclaim that fact. Many of the bodies to which Parliament has in recent years outsourced some of its responsibilities have little, if any, accountability. But Parliament itself, or at least the other place—the House of Commons, in which I was privileged to serve for 27 years—is truly accountable. It is answerable to the British people at regular intervals and its Members can be summarily dismissed.

There are those who seem uncomfortable with our system and it is indeed true that there has been something of a whittling away at it in recent years. The courts have extended their power. Parliament itself has contributed to it by the outsourcing to which I referred. I often think it is a pity that those who praise these developments failed to come up with some suggested alternatives to parliamentary democracy, but there it is.

These amendments, if passed, would mark a new jump in this process. I ask those who support them to address the question of accountability. To whom is the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees accountable? They might say to the General Assembly of the United Nations, perhaps. To whom is that body accountable? Neither the high commissioner nor the General Assembly have any responsibility for securing our borders. They have no responsibility for the safety of those who make the perilous channel crossing. They have no duty to take into account the resentment felt by so many against the sheer unfairness of illegal immigration and the way in which it gives preference not to the most deserving, but merely to those who can afford to pay the people smugglers.

Our elected Government and this Parliament bear those responsibilities, and the House of Commons is directly accountable to the electorate for the way in which those responsibilities are discharged. These amendments would prevent our Government and Parliament discharging those responsibilities. They seek to outsource those responsibilities to an unelected body with no accountability. The acceptance of these amendments would constitute nothing less than an abdication of the responsibilities of government. I note without surprise—

[Lord Kerr of Kinlochard (CB)]

I do not understand the argument that the noble Lord is making. As I understand the amendment in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, the responsibility laid on the UN High Commissioner for Refugees would be to advise the Secretary of State. I do not see how that makes him accountable; it would remain the Secretary of State, surely, who was accountable to this Parliament for the decisions that he decided to take in the light of the advice he received.

[Lord Howard of Lympne (Con)]

I fear not. The easiest way of replying to the noble Lord is to read from the Member’s explanatory statement on the amendment:

“The amendments require positive UNHCR advice on the safety of Rwanda to be laid before Parliament before claims for asylum in the UK may be processed in Rwanda”.


If there is no positive advice from the UNHCR, those claims cannot be processed in Rwanda. I think that will aid the noble Lord’s understanding of what I am saying.

[Lord Kerr of Kinlochard (CB)]

I was referring to the text of the amendment.

[Lord Howard of Lympne (Con)]

I think it is perfectly reasonable, if one wants to know the intention of the amendment, to look at the Member’s explanatory statement. That is, indeed, the purpose of the explanatory statement.

I note with interest, but not with surprise, that none of these amendments is signed by any member of the Opposition Front Bench. I am not surprised because no party that aspires to government could support the abdication of the responsibilities of government, which these amendments would achieve.

I will just say a word about Amendment 7 in the name of my noble friend Lord Hailsham and others. It asserts that the decision of the Supreme Court was a “finding of fact”. But it was not; it was a finding of opinion—the Supreme Court’s opinion that the removal of asylum seekers to Rwanda would expose them to the risk of refoulement. It is an opinion on which men of good faith and true can disagree. Indeed, it is an opinion on which distinguished judges disagreed.

The Divisional Court, one of whose two members was a Lord Justice of Appeal, came to the conclusion that what the Government were proposing was entirely lawful. The Court of Appeal, by majority, disagreed, but the then Lord Chief Justice dissented. In my view, when the Supreme Court reaches a conclusion on a matter of opinion, it is entirely legitimate and proper constitutionally for Parliament—the House of Commons is democratically accountable to the people, and the Supreme Court is not—to substitute its own opinion. That is what the Bill does, and that is why I support it.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Howard of Lympne (Con)]

As I said in answer to the noble Lord, Lord Kerr, it is not simply a question of seeking advice from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. The amendments clearly state that, unless positive advice is obtained, no one can be removed to Rwanda. So the decision will no longer be the decision of the Secretary of State; it will be the decision of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. That is the point. It is not just advice; it is advice which would be binding, according to these amendments, on the Government.

[Lord Hannay of Chiswick (CB)]

I thank the noble Lord for that point. He interrupted me before I got to the answer to his question—but that is fine. I had been going to say that the doctrine, according to the noble Lord, Lord Howard, is that every member that has signed the refugee convention—well over 150, I think—and ratified it, including our sovereign Parliament, has the right to reinterpret the convention as it wishes. You have only to stop and think for one minute what that implies to realise that it implies complete chaos and the law of the jungle. If all 150-plus members of the United Nations refugee convention are able to stand up and say, “Well, actually, this is what I think the convention means, and I don’t care a damn what the High Commissioner for Refugees says”, then we are living in chaos. It is to avoid that that these amendments are being put forward.

I strongly support the arguments of the noble Baroness, Lady Helic, who expressed extremely eloquently the reason this country has a real interest in paying attention to these matters.

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[Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)]

I am grateful to all Members of the Committee from around the Chamber for the constructive manner and tone with which these proceedings on the first group have been conducted. Noble Lords will forgive me if I do not mention every excellent contribution; they will understand that is not a discourtesy to Members of the Committee, but, I hope, a bit of kindness to those who have amendments to follow this evening.

I am particularly grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Howard of Lympne, for following immediately, because he was able to crystallise some key issues between us, on my suite of amendments as well as on all the others in the first group. In essence, he had two points: one that I can embrace to some extent, and another that I cannot. I think that he was the first to point out that, in the way that I have formulated my suite of amendments, I have given perhaps too determinative a role for the UNHCR. I explained the reason for that: it was because the Prime Minister said that he was going to assuage the concerns of the Supreme Court. None the less, I take the noble Lord’s point—which was echoed by subsequent speakers, if less robustly—so I hope not to create a determinative role for the UNHCR in the next stage of proceedings, although I also note that many Members of the Committee, including the Minister, referred to the important part that the UNHCR plays in the world on refugees and the convention.

However, the second crucial point—

[Lord Howard of Lympne (Con)]

Before the noble Baroness goes to the point where she disagrees with me, I thank her for her response to the first point I made. Of course, I do not speak for the Government, but no doubt we will consider the matter further when we get to Report.

[Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)]

My Lords, I am again grateful to the noble Lord. However, his second central point was the big constitutional one: that Parliament is sovereign—that is pretty much it—and that the Supreme Court’s decision on 15 November was mere opinion rather than a determinative finding of fact in our system. I am afraid that I must disagree with him on that, in essence for the reasons outlined later in the debate by my noble and learned friend Lord Falconer. He in turn echoed some of the points made by the noble Lord, Lord Clarke of Nottingham, at Second Reading about the dangers that lie in the future should it be possible, in our country, for Governments with large majorities, of whatever stripe, to use legislation to change not only any old finding of fact but a finding of fact that was made recently by our highest court. That is not only silly, to echo the noble and learned Lord, Lord Garnier, but very dangerous in a democracy that is built, fundamentally and first, on the rule of law. Parliamentary sovereignty follows, but Parliament, and the Executive in particular, must have a little respect for the independent referees of our democratic system.

I was grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Helic, for making the international point that follows from that: that the domestic rule of law is the bedrock of our system, but a quarter of the way into the 21st century, so is the international rule of law. All sorts of terrible consequences come when we do not respect that. She cited wars of aggression and war crimes that, in turn, drive a displacement of people that is leading to the refugee crisis that Governments around the world are trying to respond to. Therefore, she is a great proponent of the international rules-based order, as we know from her other work.

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[Lord Falconer of Thoroton (Lab)]

I am very interested in the amendment tabled by the noble Lord, Lord German. On one view, it is saying that the Secretary of State makes his or her decision only after properly considering all the relevant factors. It may be that what he has in mind is that, thereafter, there can be appropriate review of that by the courts. I assume that he has in mind judicial review. Therefore, it would be the decision of the Secretary of State that was judicially reviewable. It is worth thinking about whether, once that decision had been made and then upheld by the courts because there was a proper basis on which a Secretary of State could reach that decision, in general terms the question of whether the country was safe would not thereafter be open to consideration by the immigration office.

I would not be in favour of that as a matter of principle, but if one is looking for a compromise—this is something that the noble Lord, Lord Anderson of Ipswich, touched upon, and it may be dealt with in later amendments—I would be very interested to hear what the view of the Government is in relation to a situation where, in effect, the Secretary of State had to make a proper decision addressing the proper considerations and that decision was then open to judicial review. Could that be a compromise?

[Lord Howard of Lympne (Con)]

My Lords, I had not intended to speak on this group, but the noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer, has just raised an extremely interesting point. He suggested that a decision by the Secretary of State, having considered the factors referred to by the noble Lord, Lord German, should be subject to judicial review. The principles of judicial review are clear: the court does not substitute its own view of matters; it assesses whether the Secretary of State came to a reasonable decision.

Departing somewhat from the Government’s view, one of the problems that I have with the Supreme Court decision is that it was not based on the principles of judicial review. The Divisional Court did approach it on that basis and the Supreme Court said that that was wrong. The Supreme Court, relying on precedents that had never received the authority of Parliament or statute, decided that it should not apply the principles of judicial review, but should decide these matters for itself. That is a very important distinction between what happened in this case, which gave rise to this legislation, and the procedure now being proposed by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, I rise with some hesitancy, in the middle of a rather technical debate, but I would like to make a couple of points on this group. The Committee has already heard from my noble friend Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb who, in her inimitable way, made it very clear that the Green Party remains utterly opposed to the entire Bill and greatly regrets that we gave it a Second Reading—but we are where we are.

From listening to the debate on the first group, a word that came up again and again, which might be surprising to people listening from outside the Committee, was “silly”. Of course, what we are talking about is deadly serious, but the definitions of “silly” are interesting, if you look them up. One is “showing a lack of common sense or judgment”. Common sense and judgment are two things that this group of amendments seeks to introduce to the Bill, so I commend the noble Lord, Lord German, for introducing it so clearly and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer, for his excellent assistance in presenting the argument.

It is a statement of the obvious that Parliament, and certainly your Lordships’ House after our vote on the Rwanda treaty, does not believe that what the Bill states is common sense. It is not based on the evidence and has been disproved. More than that, these amendments are making a person, the Secretary of State, responsible for making a judgment. If we are to have the rule of law, a person has to be identified and held responsible for making that judgment. We are introducing a sense of responsibility and evidence here, which would at least be a step forward.

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[Lord Stewart of Dirleton (Con)]

As I say, this is now a matter of a treaty commitment by that country. We surely accept the possibility that countries have changed. We know the trauma Rwanda has gone through in the comparatively recent past, and we support and acknowledge the work it is attempting to do as a forward-looking African country, looking to provide solutions as opposed to exporting problems.

[Lord Howard of Lympne (Con)]

These questions have ranged far and wide, but was not the one issue, as I understand it, on which the Supreme Court came to its decision the risk of refoulement? That is covered in the treaty, and anybody would be able to see and know whether anyone was refouled in breach of international law and the concern expressed by the Supreme Court.

[Lord Stewart of Dirleton (Con)]

I am grateful to my noble friend. The matter is entirely patent on the Supreme Court’s decision. It is about refoulement. We now have a treaty commitment preventing that happening.

Illegal Migration Bill

Lord Howard of Lympne Excerpts

Report stage
Wednesday 28th June 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Howard of Lympne (Con)]

My Lords—

[Baroness Kennedy of The Shaws (Lab)]

Let me complete a sentence. We put our names at the bottom of the refugee convention saying that we would provide asylum to people, but you need a decision-making process to decide those who are legitimate and those who might purely be economic migrants. We will deny people that due process and the rule of law. That is where I disagree so sincerely with the noble Lord, and where I say that a process has to be put in place that is speedy and effective, and that it should be allowed for.

[Lord Howard of Lympne (Con)]

I am grateful to the noble Baroness for giving way. Does she not recognise that those who apply through the legal, safe processes, and whose applications are rejected, will not still try to get to this country and will not be able to pay the people smugglers to put them on boats that cross the channel?

[Baroness Kennedy of The Shaws (Lab)]

We had a very good asylum process. Over the years of austerity, it was cut to the bone, including cuts to the number of people with the skills to assess those asylum applications. Now, the way to reverse that is to put in place, once again, good people making those assessments on the applications being made by people seeking asylum in this country and immediately, promptly, making decisions. Then, if the applications are not properly made, people can be deported to other places—but we cannot deny them due process, and that is what we are doing in this business of not letting people make an application and treating everybody the same. That is an affront to the rule of law.

Northern Ireland Protocol Bill

Lord Howard of Lympne Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 25th October 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Judge (CB)]

My Lords, I apologise to the House for being unable to speak at Second Reading. I put my name down but realised that I could not be present at the end of the debate. If noble Lords will accept my apology, I assure them that I will not now make a Second Reading speech; I will simply summarise what I believe to be the case: that, as proposed legislation, this is a lamentable Bill.

If we want a careful, detailed analysis of the issues in and chronology of this case—I recommend that we do, if I may say so—the report from the House’s Library is absolutely magnificent. I personally thank those who prepared it; I recommend it to your Lordships. Everybody wants to have a say, so I am not going to add to the long list of things that are required, but can I suggest three more?

First, the Constitution Committee has just reported. The power of its report is not merely in that it repeats the concerns expressed by the delegated legislation committee on the Henry VIII aspects of the Bill; it directly addresses the Government’s contention that there is no problem with the lawfulness of the Bill. The Government have so far treated the report from the delegated legislation committee with scant respect. We have not had an answer to it. We should not proceed with this Bill until such time as there is an answer to the delegated legislation committee’s report and to the Constitution Committee’s report. These are our committees. They are cross-party, and the reports speak for the committees as a whole.

My second concern is that there is litigation afoot. A judicial review of the protocol has been taken and is due to be heard in the Supreme Court on 30 November. My question is this: has any attempt been made to expedite the hearings so that they can come on more quickly and we can have the Supreme Court’s answers to the issues raised instead of saying, “Well, we’re going to have to wait for that decision so we must act quickly because we’re having to wait too long”?

Thirdly, a number of infringement processes have been taken against us by the EU. It would helpful if we could see our responses to those. We need to know where we stand in the formal proceedings taken by the EU that we are in contravention of our treaty obligations. They are not a matter of privacy. I understand that negotiations must be conducted privately and there is confidentiality attached to them, but surely not for our Government’s response to the EU’s requests for infringement processes to be looked at.

In the end, I am very glad that this issue will not be taken to a Division today. That is sensible, particularly because all sides of the House need to understand what the problems are with the Bill and why it is, in the word which I used at the time of Second Reading, which I did not take part in, a lamentable Bill.

[Lord Howard of Lympne (Con)]

My Lords, the effect of these amendments, whether one agrees with their precise wording, is to give the new Administration time to pause, to reflect, and to consider the best way of dealing with the issues that arise from the protocol. The new Administration need that time. There is no doubt that the way that the protocol is being implemented causes considerable practical difficulties for Northern Ireland, particularly for trade between Northern Ireland and the rest of the United Kingdom. These difficulties, which would be exacerbated if the protocol were to be implemented in full, are real. A solution to them must be found.

There is agreement across the House that the best solution could be an agreement between the United Kingdom and the European Union. We are told that discussions are taking place. I hope that the new Administration will give fresh impetus to those discussions, and that it will not take what might be described as a theological approach to those negotiations. It appears to be the position of His Majesty’s Government that changes to the text of the protocol are essential. However, it may be that a solution to the practical problems which exist can be provided by other means. The European Union has a long history of creative interpretation of the texts of agreements, which has often stood it in good stead in arriving at practical solutions in one field or another—and it should be encouraged to do so here.

We all hope that those negotiations succeed, but we must face up to the possibility that they may not succeed. If that turns out to be the case, I hope that the Government will look again at the possibility of dealing with the practical difficulties by invoking Article 16 of the protocol rather than through this Bill.

I think that my noble friends on the Front Bench will recognise on reflection that the explanations that they gave at Second Reading for not proceeding by Article 16 were—how can I put it?—rather less than convincing. Presumably it was precisely to deal with difficulties of this kind that Article 16 was inserted into the protocol. It is a perfectly legal route if the preconditions in the article can be satisfied. If they cannot be, there is certainly no justification for this Bill.

I do not need, or propose, to repeat the arguments against the application of the doctrine of necessity in these circumstances, which I and others advanced at Second Reading. I urge the Government to think again. I hope these amendments will prove to be unnecessary.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Bew (CB)]

I thank the noble Baroness for her intervention. Of course I take the point, but I was saying that nationalist Ireland basically does not like this Bill. That is not the point. The point is that it is not in any way stopping or infringing or slowing up the negotiations. The point is that the equality of esteem doctrine, which we are supposed to be following with the Northern Ireland protocol, means that the House is bound by international law to pay attention and to try and do something. On whether this Bill is precisely right, there are amendments starred in the normal way to be discussed, but we are not in the situation where we are talking about amendments.

I have great sympathy for the noble Lord, Lord Howard, who raised the issue of Article 16. However, when I look at the noble Lord, Lord Frost, who was in a critical position on this matter for quite long spells in recent times, I think that he is bound to be surprised by the sudden outbreak of support for the implementation of Article 16, because at any time when he voiced the same civilised opinion in this Chamber, noble Lords were totally against it and regarded it as outrageous—of course it never was.

There is even a case now for the implementation of Article 16, made by Professor Boyle, who was professor of international law at Edinburgh, to both the House of Commons Select Committee on this matter and our own Select Committee on this matter. He is actually open to the argument for the importance of the prior international agreement and the importance of protecting it. He is a very distinguished international lawyer. What I understand him to be saying is that, first, you must apply Article 16; that is a perfectly reasonable argument that I am open to. In addition—I look at the noble Lord, Lord Howard, in engaging on this point—the other point that I very much agree with him about is that there is no need to ask the EU to change its negotiating mandate; it has to live up to its commitment to the Good Friday agreement.

The context is one in which—Members of this House do not read the Irish media as I do, and Irish books, articles and so on—there is a fairly consistent admission on the part of the Irish Government’s negotiating team that, when Theresa May was on her knees in November 2017, the advantage was pushed very hard in that agreement, and that they took sole ownership, or sole guardianship, of the Good Friday agreement. In many ways, what is happening here is an attempt by the British Government to say, “Well, actually, that is not really the Good Friday agreement. First of all, you do not have sole ownership. Secondly, we have responsibilities as a sovereign Government not held by the Irish Government and”—as I have tried to explain—"we are trying to move back to deal with this in some way.”

This does not mean that every clause in this Bill is particularly wise, but it does mean that we should not take the attitude that in principle we should not be doing it, or that we must stop now because otherwise the EU will stop negotiating—that is clearly not true. I agree that the Irish Government do not like the Bill and that they believe that it infringes international law. I absolutely accept that point, but the point is that we have to follow our obligations under international law, which means that the long-term alienation of one community must be avoided. Unless the Government do something substantive such as this—

[Lord Howard of Lympne (Con)]

Does not the noble Lord think that it is slightly odd that his justification in law for supporting the Bill is not the Government’s?

[Lord Bew (CB)]

The noble Lord has a point—but not as deep a point as he might imagine, because the Government have been consistent in saying that the primacy of the Good Friday agreement is the core of their position, in both the House of Commons and in this House. There are other details; there is phrasing. For example, as is well known, I am not as convinced of the need for language in this Bill about the Act of Union. I understand why it is there, but I am not convinced that it is relevant. There are other aspects that we will discuss, in the normal way, on amendments. There is detail that will come up later tonight, and there are things that need to be said, in the normal way. But this is not a normal discussion—

Northern Ireland Protocol Bill

Lord Howard of Lympne Excerpts

2nd reading
Tuesday 11th October 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Howard of Lympne (Con)]

If the Government wish to take action to remedy the situation the Minister has identified, why do they not take that action by invoking Article 16 of the protocol, which provides a perfectly legal route for such action to be taken?

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)]

My Lords, I know that my noble friend has raised this point. As I have indicated, there are parts of the protocol that we believe are working. I have already alluded to the common travel area, for example. While Article 16 remains a provision that the Government obviously know is at their disposal, and can enact it if so required, we believe that the Bill seeks to present a solution to the exact issues that we are identifying and need to be addressed, but not by removing the protocol altogether. I have cited two or three reasons that are currently operational and work within the existing protocol.

To continue, we also believe that the current protocol creates new, cumbersome processes and bureaucracy for traders. It undermines Northern Ireland’s position within the United Kingdom internal market and, as I said, has contributed to the diversion of east-west trade. Most urgently, it has provided an obstacle to the restoration of the devolved Government in Northern Ireland, undermining the important power-sharing institutions established by the Belfast/Good Friday agreement. The Government are continuing, again, as I said earlier, to engage in constructive dialogue with our EU partners to find shared solutions to these problems. I have referred to the discussions under way on current technical decisions between the UK and EU officials, which are a positive forward step.

Let me say again, as I said at the start of my remarks, that our strong preference remains to have a negotiated solution. However, we cannot stand by and allow the current situation to continue. We must ensure that the United Kingdom Government have the powers they need to address these urgent problems and enact lasting solutions to the problems inherent in the protocol, given any scenario. The Bill ensures that we have covered all the bases to implement what we believe are durable solutions while, to reiterate the point on the issue raised by my noble friend Lord Howard, preserving those parts of the protocol which are currently working.

I am confident that once the Bill has received Royal Assent, we will be well on our way to restoring the balance between the communities in Northern Ireland, which is integral to the Belfast/Good Friday agreement. I assure your Lordships that we continue to engage directly on the ground with businesses and communities in Northern Ireland; importantly, we continue discussions with our EU partners. The purpose of the Bill is to ensure that we have all the tools available to the Government to deal with the scenarios that we currently face, but we remain committed to finding a lasting solution.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Howard of Lympne (Con)]

My Lords, I am genuinely grateful for the opportunity to follow the noble Lord, Lord Dodds, for whom I have much respect, and indeed I have a good deal of sympathy with the concerns which he has expressed. But, as I hope to explain, this Bill is not the way to alleviate those concerns.

I also echo those who have paid tribute to my noble friend the Minister and expressed pleasure that he remains in his post, and of course I share the hope and aspirations, which have been widely expressed, that the difficulties we face can be solved through negotiation—and I welcome the fact that those negotiations are now under way. But the Government have asked your Lordships’ House to give this Bill a Second Reading today, and it is our duty therefore to consider its merits.

The Government seek to justify the provisions of the Bill, which would otherwise be a clear breach of international law, by reference to the doctrine of necessity. That doctrine is set out in Article 25 of the relevant treaty, which states that the doctrine cannot be invoked unless it

“is the only way”—

I stress: “the only way”—

“for the State to safeguard an essential interest against a grave and imminent peril”.

Even if it is assumed that all the other requirements of the article are met—and there are of course many reservations about that—it cannot possibly be argued that this Bill is the only way in which the state’s interests can be safeguarded. It is not the only way because the protocol itself provides a way, a perfectly legal way, in which that objective can be achieved. It is to be found in Article 16.

I did not properly hear the answer which my noble friend the Minister gave in response to my intervention, but if he really suggested that the problem with Article 16 was that it could apply only to the whole protocol, and that therefore freedom of movement provisions would be affected, I have to tell him as gently as I can that there is absolutely no basis for that interpretation of Article 16, which gives the Government a wide discretion as to the measures which they could take. I am genuinely bewildered by the Government’s decision not to proceed by invoking Article 16. Your Lordships may be interested in the explanations for its rejection which were given to me by the Home Secretary when she was Attorney-General.

My noble friend the Minister had asked me to speak to the then Foreign Secretary, now of course the Prime Minister, about this issue. When the conversation turned to the legality of the Government’s proposals, she referred me to the Attorney-General, which your Lordships may think is in itself not entirely insignificant. The then Attorney-General told me that the decision not to invoke Article 16 was a political one. The reason, she told me, was that Article 16 permits only measures which are proportionate. I should repeat that, although it will not take long for the implications to sink in: Article 16 was not invoked because it permits only measures which are proportionate. To put it very mildly, this of course reinforces the unanswerable argument that the Government simply cannot contend that the Bill is the only course open to them. It must follow, therefore, that it constitutes a clear breach of international law.

Why does all this matter? It matters because, although I acknowledge that Parliament can legislate in breach of international law, it should not do so—and it especially should not do so at the present time. Of course it is the case that, on the scale of iniquity, the Bill, for all its flaws, does not begin to compare to the invasion of Ukraine. But Ministers—our Ministers—frequently criticise that invasion on the ground that it is a breach of international law. My noble friend did it in the course of his opening remarks. The Defence Secretary, for whom I have great respect, did it in a newspaper article on 25 September. He said of Vladimir Putin:

“We take everything he does seriously, because this is a man without any scruples and any regard for international law.”


The thing about the law, whether it is domestic or international, is that you cannot pick and choose. You cannot pray it in aid in one context and have no regard for it in another, so I urge the Government to think again. They can achieve their objectives perfectly legally by invoking Article 16, but if they persist with the Bill, I shall vote against it—not, of course, today—and I urge your Lordships to do likewise.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Stewart of Dirleton (Con)]

I hear the noble Lord and will revert to him in due course. It is not possible to equiparate international law with domestic law. There is simply not enough of it and it is too dependent on facts and circumstances which will not apply from case to case to come up with a precedent which would allow noble Lords who have spoken in these terms to speak with such certainty.

Should I address the noble Lord, Lord Purvis of Tweed, at this stage? At an early stage in these proceedings, he spoke about the nature of the plea to necessity. I say again that it is very different from the interpretation of a domestic statute. Of course in international law there are similarities with domestic legislation, and of course in international law, often being a matter of paction, there are similarities with the law of contract. But it cannot be equiparated with, to use a metaphor that emerged from the Cross Benches, a contract for the sale of sausages. It is too complex and too fact-specific. That point was continued by the noble Baroness, Lady Suttie, my noble friends Lady McIntosh of Pickering, Lady Altmann and Lord Kirkhope of Harrogate, my noble and learned friend Lord Garnier—I am sure that I have missed others out; as I said, my undertaking is to engage with your Lordships to assist them in moving this forward—and, I decipher from my scrawl, the noble Lord, Lord McDonald of Salford, speaking from the Cross Benches. The assertion that the Government’s position breaches international law is too bold and lacking in nuance. I submit that we are entitled to proceed on the basis that we anticipate that the protocol will be operated in a manner that reflects the unique and serious circumstances against which it was drawn up.

The doctrine of necessity was approached by the noble Baroness, Lady Crawley, and my noble friend Lord Hannay of Chiswick in particular, who equiparated—if I misattribute this to my noble friend, I apologise to him and will happily correct it—invocation of the doctrine of necessity with the law of President Putin. Far from it: there is authority for the existence of a defence of necessity dating back at least to the early 19th century. It was recognised by the International Court of Justice in 1997 in a case between Slovakia and Hungary regarding a dam on the Danube. It formed part of the International Law Commission’s articles on state responsibility, drawn up in 2001, as the Government’s statement on their legal position notes. In 1995, the Government of Canada justified steps taken to protect the Grand Banks fisheries on the basis that it was necessary to do so. If fisheries in the Atlantic are important, how much more so is the extension of democratic rights across the whole of this United Kingdom?

Invoking the doctrine of necessity does not repudiate international law or the international rules-based order. It is part of the international rules-based order. The noble Baroness, Lady Kennedy of The Shaws, my noble and learned friend Lord Clarke of Nottingham, the noble Lord, Lord Bach, and my noble friend Lord Tugendhat stated that the Government were undermining the rule of law and that this constituted a flagrant breach of the rule of law. Again, by invoking the doctrine of necessity, we operate within the framework of international law and—

[Lord Howard of Lympne (Con)]

Is not my noble and learned friend rather missing the point? None of us has suggested that the doctrine of necessity plays no part in international law. What we are saying is that it is not justified by the Government’s approach in this particular instance.

[Lord Stewart of Dirleton (Con)]

I respond to my noble friend by saying that the assertions that it breaches international law simply cannot be determined at this point because it is a matter of exploring the complex background of facts and circumstances, including the manner in which the protocol has been operated.

Rule of Law

Lord Howard of Lympne Excerpts

Thursday 10th September 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Keen of Elie (Con) [V]]

As I previously indicated, my Lords, there are exceptional circumstances that arise, from time to time, when we find ourselves with a tension between our domestic legal regime and our obligations at the level of international law. There are also occasions when we find some conflict between different international law obligations. We adhere to the rule of law, but we understand the need to try to resolve tensions that may emerge if, at the end of the day, we do not have a post-transition agreement and determinations from the Joint Committee.

[Lord Howard of Lympne (Con)]

My Lords, does my noble and learned friend simply not understand the damage done to our reputation for probity and respect for the rule of law by those five words uttered by his ministerial colleague, in another place, on Tuesday— words that I never thought I would hear from a British Minister, far less a Conservative Minister? How can we reproach Russia, China or Iran when their conduct falls below internationally accepted standards, when we are showing such scant regard for our treaty obligations?

[Lord Keen of Elie (Con) [V]]

My Lords, we are not showing scant regard for our treaty obligations. We are endeavouring to allow for a contingency that may arise very soon, which will require us to ensure that we can discharge our obligations to Northern Ireland. That creates difficulties, so far as the direct effect of EU law is concerned, if there is no post-transition agreement and no determinations by the Joint Committee.