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Mr. Alison: I have a couple of points on the important area that the Minister is covering. Will he confirm that, if a country such as Thailand introduces a death penalty for child abuse, we will still extradite British nationals in conjunction with our extradition treaty? Otherwise, his extradition argument is weaker. Will he confirm that the
review that he mentioned in Committee is still continuing, and that he is not announcing negative conclusions about the review in his remarks at the present time?
Madam Deputy Speaker: Order. Before the Minister replies, I should point out that the debate is now becoming very broad. I am not sure whether the nature of the amendment lends itself to such a wide argument.
Mr. Maclean: Naturally, you are correct, Madam Deputy Speaker. I shall briefly respond to my right hon. Friend.
With all due respect, the question whether we would extradite to countries that have introduced penalties that are unacceptable to us--such as the death penalty--is bogus. This point has been made before, and it is not correct. In those circumstances, Britain seeks an assurance--a binding guarantee--that, if the person is found guilty, the death penalty will not be applied, and then we extradite. That has been our policy for some time.
In my first few weeks of moving to the Home Office, we had a case--I cannot remember its name--in which we extradited back to Morocco a student who had been accused of murder. Once we got a guarantee that he would not be executed if he was found guilty, he was extradited. That would not be any bar to extradition of people back to Thailand. If I may say so--without causing offence in international relations--some countries have no difficulty in taking rigorous action against drug dealers who are caught with drugs on them, but they seem to find enormous difficulty in taking action against perverts who abuse children.
We have not come to any conclusions on the review--we have severe doubts on the difficulties. I have taken every opportunity to point out the practical difficulties, not because I am prejudging the outcome of the review but because there are genuine difficulties. I do not want hon. Members to be under the impression that all we have to do is make a few changes to the law here and there, that Britain can then have extra-territorial jurisdiction, that a queue of perverts will be prosecuted in the British courts and found guilty, and that we will stamp out the problem. It would not work like that--although we all wish to God that it would.
Mr. Batiste:
While I understand everything that my right hon. Friend has just said, I make the same comment that I made during the passage of the War Crimes Act 1991: given all the evidential difficulties, even if there are no successful prosecutions, it is still better to cause these perverts to live in fear that one day the hand will fall on their shoulders and they will be called to account for their deeds. If we do not put our laws in order to achieve that, they can come back to this country and regard it as a safe haven.
Mr. Maclean:
If it worked on the basis that they would live in fear, there might be some considerable merit in what my hon. Friend says. However, I believe that they would not live in fear--they would see the law as ineffective, as it would be. If we have no prosecutions, or one prosecution every five years and it fails--as it possibly could--it would not strike terror into the hearts of potential paedophiles, molesters or those putting messages on the Internet.
To strike fear into the heart of potential criminals, we must have two things--as my right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary has been emphasising in his sentencing proposals. We must improve the likelihood--indeed, make it certain--that people who commit such offences will be caught, and the sentence must be adequate.
We have an adequate sentence in this country, but if, as I suspect, by extending and taking extra-territorial jurisdiction we would make no difference to the possibility of someone being caught and the case being proved in court, it would be a bogus exercise.
I hope that, if the review does conclude that we can take sensible further steps on extra-territorial jurisdiction, it will so recommend, because it shows that in practice we shall be able to make a difference. All right hon. and hon. Members want to do that. We do not want to spend our Fridays passing legislation for the fun of it or as gesture politics. We want to make a difference.
For the present, extra-territorial jurisdiction is not the solution to the problem. It is right that the assumptions and opinions that underlie our concerns about extra-territorial jurisdiction are from time to time tested to discover whether they remain valid. That is why we have had the wide-ranging interdepartmental review announced by the Home Secretary on 1 February.
I can assure the House that my right hon. and learned Friend will carefully consider the report of that review. If it suggests that it is possible for us to enforce extra-territorial jurisdiction in the specific circumstances of sexual offences against children, I am sure that he, I, everyone in the Government and the whole House will want and expect us to act, and we shall not be backward in coming forward.
The Government condemn, without question, the activities of those monsters who prey on innocent children. We shall strive to take any measure we can to combat that dreadful trade--provided that it can be seen to be effective. The measure will be effective when the amendments are made.
I hope that hon. Members will understand from what I have had said that the amendments will complete the shield that the Bill will provide to prevent the abuse of children. I support the amendments, and the Government support them. I hope that all hon. Members will do so, so that the Bill will be as effective as possible in its aim to deter those who wish to use this country as a base to plan their evil activities.
I commend the amendments to the House.
Mr. Michael:
I intend to be brief, but the debate has ranged over not only the two amendments but most of the other essential issues arising from the Bill.
I congratulate the hon. Member for Hendon, South (Mr. Marshall) on tabling the amendments, and the Minister on responding so positively to them. I am grateful especially because the amendments respond to the arguments that I and my hon. Friends made in Committee, and they bridge what we felt was a massive gap in the Bill, despite its good intentions. The amendments are of great importance in making the Bill an effective piece of legislation and in enabling it--as the Minister suggests we all seek to do--to make a difference.
Parliament has been at its best in dealing with the Bill. We had sensible but searching debates in Committee, in which many genuine arguments were made. The quality of that debate is reflected in the amendments before us. It was a worthwhile Committee stage, in which we tackled serious issues. We hoped to extend the Bill's scope and impact. That is why debate in Committee focused on extra-territoriality, on making it possible to catch the actions of offenders--especially of British citizens abroad--and on tackling incitement.
As the Minister suggested, the amendments take a considerable step down the road of making the intentions of Parliament effective in relation to incitement and conspiracy, and the activities of those who seek to promote and be involved in such unspeakable activities.
The amendments are central to making the Bill effective in that they close off the possibility of convolutions of communication to evade the intentions of the Bill as originally drafted; they toughen the Bill. The test of the Bill's success will not be the number of prosecutions alone but the certainty among the paedophile community--if we can call it that--that the powers are sufficient and prosecution is likely. The object is to prevent such activity, and success in preventing the activity will be success for the Bill.
Several references were made to extra-territoriality. The example of the War Crimes Act 1991 comes to mind. We would not regard Parliament as having been wrong or consider that the 1991 Act had failed if there were no successful prosecutions. It would still be right, because the principle was right, the intention was right and Parliament was right to pass it. The question is, what should Parliament do about the activities of our citizens abroad, and how should we extend the law? That is what the Home Secretary's inquiry is supposed to be about, and the House needs to debate the question as soon as possible.
We want the Government to go further--if not by extending territoriality, in other ways. Extradition is insufficient, for reasons that I gave in Committee and shall not repeat. The economy and tourism of some countries may receive a devastating impact if they exercise the rights through agreement of extradition, so it is not as simple for them as it would be for us if it arose from the activities of one of our nationals abroad.
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