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UK Extradition Arrangements

The systems provided by the United States are accepted by the international community as being perfectly amenable to the interests of democracy and the rights of the individual within the state of Texas and other states of the American union. Approximately a year ago, Her Majesty's Government commissioned a report—the Baker report—to which several colleagues have referred and which I am holding. It is 500 pages long, it took one year to complete and it was conducted by three eminent jurists: Sir Scott Baker, who was called to the Bar some 50 years ago, and two eminent lawyers, both of whom have acted for Governments and for requested persons and have therefore dealt with this issue on many occasions and from both sides of the fence. They came to the conclusion that there was no significant difference or imbalance between the extradition arrangements in the United States and the United Kingdom. That is the crux of this matter. Many of the previous speakers seemed to assume that there were imbalances, which they criticised, but they did not address those alleged imbalances. I have heard no evidence, and the Baker report came up with no evidence, pinpointing where there is imbalance. There is different terminology, with ““reasonable suspicion”” being used often in the UK arrangements in relation to the evidential burden that is required, whereas ““probable cause”” is used by the United States. Those two terms may be slightly different in phraseology but they mean very much the same thing, and those who have analysed the position in some detail, either in the Baker report or elsewhere, have come to that clear conclusion.