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UK Extradition Arrangements

It is a particular pleasure to follow the right hon. Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough (Mr Blunkett). He and I crossed swords many times when he was Home Secretary. I am not remotely surprised to hear his reasonable tone in this debate or to hear of his compassionate action on Gary McKinnon, as both are entirely in line with his character. What is more, I can understand only too clearly why he took the stance that he did in the early 2000s, because at that time the extradition situation around Europe and elsewhere was a mess, and it was sometimes very difficult to get people extradited from other countries. It is therefore wholly unsurprising that after 9/11 he took the action that he did. That does not mean that I agree with him about that action, but it is entirely understandable that it was taken. The House will not be surprised that I think it went too far because of, in my view, the pre-eminence of justice in this matter. There is a balance between justice and security, but security without justice is a very fragile security. It is our job to defend our lives and way of life, and in this respect I do not think that we have done so. Unlike my hon. Friend the Member for Esher and Walton (Mr Raab), I do not speak as a criminal lawyer. What I am about to say is no doubt obvious to all criminal lawyers, but not necessarily so to the rest of us who are laymen. Let me make a simple point. In this country, we presume innocence. That has all sorts of implications that we do not think about most of the time. For example, it means that unless there is a threat to a jury, an ongoing threat to the public, or a risk of absconding, we generally give bail—we do not imprison people who are awaiting trial if we can avoid it. If we do imprison someone, we put them on remand, where they are treated as innocent. They wear their own clothes; they are not made to work; they are called ““Sir””: all sorts of things apply to prisoners on remand that do not apply to other prisoners, either in this country or, indeed, abroad. The presumption of innocence has a distinct effect on how we treat people. Let us compare that with people who are extradited. They feel as though they have been deported. They are in a foreign prison, often with lower standards; my hon. Friend referred to that in terms of Greece. They are not only in a different culture, but often surrounded by people speaking a different language. They are, in effect, in psychological isolation; one might think of it as psychological solitary. They are often thousands of miles away from their family. They are viewed as an alien in the institution in which they are held. That, of itself, is a very serious punishment of people we are presuming innocent at this stage of the process. In addition, such people face a different justice system; I will describe it only as lightly as that. As was alluded to in the context of the NatWest three, this is a justice system that is not above saying, ““Here is a plea bargain. Either you plead guilty or you're going to stay in this nasty Texan jail for the next two years while we think up the case against you.”” That is different from what they face here—and, frankly, I do not think that it is justice. As worst, it is a justice system that is actually corrupt, as we have seen in Greece. Although I understand the ex-Home Secretary's point of view, this was not new to us even when the EAW was created. I had a constituent who was one of the plane spotters and who was locked up, in effect, for political reasons and not given what I would judge to be anything like a fair trial—and, of course, he was tried for doing something that was not illegal in this country. That is, at this stage, how we treat people who are presumed innocent under our system.