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Extradition

It is a pleasure to have the opportunity to speak in this debate. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Esher and Walton (Mr Raab) on securing it. Like others, I believe that this debate should be held in the main Chamber. We are discussing fundamental constitutional rights. There is only one forum where those rights should be discussed, and that is the Floor of the House of Commons. The Leader of the House was with us a little while ago, and I have no doubt that he heard what many Members said, but I shall make a point of going to see him after this debate to reinforce the view that the Chamber is the place for such issues. I first took an interest in these matters in July 2006, when at Prime Minister's questions in two consecutive weeks, I sought to interrogate Tony Blair. I said then what I say now: the extradition treaty with the United States puts United Kingdom citizens in a position of disadvantage compared with their US counterparts. It is implied that the United States embraced the treaty, but that is not true. The Senate waited until autumn 2006 before ratifying it. The purported reason was that the strength of the Irish lobby in the United States was such that senators were concerned that the treaty, if ratified, might cause alleged terrorists from Ireland in the United States to be extradited to the United Kingdom. The treaty did not have an immaculate conception. The treaty is wrong in principle. Extradition is based on the principle of reciprocity. For a state to give up one of its citizens to another jurisdiction can be justified only by the confident knowledge that citizens of both states have equal rights. I know that, here in the United Kingdom, the representatives of the United States have some reservations about what I and others are saying today. They need have no anxieties. I wish not for a levelling down but a levelling up. I seek equivalence, not exceptionalism. I have sought to test the integrity of my position by asking myself what a United States member of Congress would do if the positions were reversed. We all know that such is the strength of feeling on Capitol hill about such issues that, if United Kingdom citizens were in a better constitutional position than Americans, there is no member of Congress who would not seek, as we do, to protect their own citizens. One thinks, for example, of Robert Byrd, the longest serving senator in the history of the United States and a constitutional expert to his fingertips. Faced with the situation that we face, I have absolutely no doubt how vehement and articulate his opposition would be.