---

Mr. Straw: I am grateful for the manner of the hon. Gentleman's remarks. It was extremely important to the family that they were represented at Strasbourg. I entirely accept that we must do a great deal more to ensure that the victims or, in the case of murder, their families, are able to play a more dignified role in our court process. Previous Governments considered that, and we are thinking further about it. Already, there have been developments in victims' statements. I meet many relatives of victims of murder. Anyone who has met such people knows how harrowing that experience is. One of their main complaints is that they feel as if they are spectators--at best--in the court process. They do not ask to take over prosecution, recognising that that is a proper role for the state. However, we must examine our procedures and the experiences of some other countries to see whether families could play a better and more dignified role.

The hon. Gentleman suggests that, under the current system, setting tariffs and determining release are political decisions. I do not think that that is the appropriate adjective to attach to our system. I do not want to speak about the arrangements for tariff-setting in respect of juveniles, as that is a matter which I have to consider in the light of the judgment of the European Court in Strasbourg, but the arrangements for setting the tariff and for release in respect of adults have been taken seriously by successive Home Secretaries, who have sought to exercise their judgment in a quasi-judicial way.

I can speak only personally, but I believe that I speak on behalf of others who have held this office. In every case where we are faced with such difficult decisions, we must consider the matter in a quasi-judicial way, first because that is right, and secondly because such decisions are, rightly, the subject of intense scrutiny and supervision by the courts through the process of judicial review. Moreover, the reasons that led us to make those decisions are the subject of full disclosure.

The hon. Gentleman's final point related to the incorporation of the European convention on human rights into our domestic law, which will come into force on 2 October next year. I believe that that should help the United Kingdom to ensure that that convention and the jurisprudence of the court impacts on our institutions in a way that is more attuned to our law. That was one of the reasons why the noble Lord Kingsland, the shadow Lord Chancellor, speaking on behalf of the Opposition, commended the incorporation of the convention, which has become part of the Human Rights Act 1998. Although that may reduce the number of times that the UK Government are taken to the Strasbourg court, it will not eliminate that process. There will still be occasions when applicants seek to overturn judgments made by our courts or by Parliament.

Mr. Frank Doran (Aberdeen, Central): I thank my right hon. Friend for his statement, and align myself with the comments that he and other hon. Members have made expressing sympathy and continuing support for the Bulger family.

Inevitably, we will concentrate on that case and the criminal law aspects involved. Before I entered the House, I practised as a Scottish solicitor, and my specialism was

16 Dec 1999 : Column 403

child care law. When I was learning my trade 25 or so years ago, I quickly learned how poorly we deal with children in all aspects of our legal system.

I am not asking for a decision today but, when my right hon. Friend, together with other relevant Ministers, considers the full implications of this case, will he see it as an opportunity for us to undertake a proper examination of the rights of children in our society, and in particular of the way in which the legal processes deal with children?

Mr. Straw: With great respect to my hon. Friend, may I decline his invitation? It is extremely important that I carefully look at the judgment and consider its implications. I am aware that some people are concerned about the way in which our courts deal with such cases. I must tell my hon. Friend, however, that dealing with children who have committed, or who are alleged to have committed, grave crimes is difficult in any jurisdiction.

There is sometimes criticism of our system for its adversarial nature and the fact that it is more public than some people would wish, yet, when I speak to my colleagues who are European Ministers of Justice and the Interior, their concerns often come from the other direction. Their systems are sometimes seen to lack public confidence because they are perceived as wholly private.

On the general issue of juvenile delinquency, it is interesting that the French Government--in the light of recent events, the House will excuse me if I mention that country--are studying with great care our system for dealing with young offenders because of considerable public concern in France that their more welfare-based system is seen to be ineffective in dealing with young criminals and in maintaining public confidence.

Mr. Michael Howard (Folkestone and Hythe): I thank the Home Secretary for his courtesy in giving me early sight of his statement.

I once again associate myself with those who have offered sympathy to the parents of James Bulger. I also particularly associate myself with the remarks made by the Home Secretary in answer to the hon. Member for Southwark, North and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes) about the painstaking and conscientious nature of the tariff-setting process.

Does the Home Secretary agree that, if anyone had told those who signed the European convention on human rights in the immediate aftermath of the unspeakable horrors of the second world war that it would be applied to a case such as this, they would have reacted with utter disbelief?

Does the Home Secretary also agree that, if the judges at Strasbourg cannot resist the itch to intervene in such cases, their legitimacy will increasingly be called into question? Will the Home Secretary resume the efforts made by the previous Government to increase the margin of appreciation--that is, the extent to which member states of the Council of Europe are allowed to decide cases such as this in accordance with their own democratically accountable procedures and without outside interference?

Mr. Straw: I have to say to the right hon. and learned Gentleman that it is inappropriate in the current context for him to make what are partisan remarks even within his own party about our signature and application of the

16 Dec 1999 : Column 404

European convention on human rights. I cannot say what was in the mind of David Maxwell Fyfe, later a Conservative Lord Chancellor, who was one of the British jurists who played such a leading role in drafting the European convention on human rights, but what was certainly in the minds of those who drafted it was that it would set out a body of European law and jurisprudence, to which member states would voluntarily agree to comply.

I have to remind the right hon. and learned Gentleman that, during the whole period that the Conservative party has been in power, not just in the previous 18 years, but in the many years before that, he and his colleagues in his party fully accepted Britain's membership of the Council of Europe and, therefore, the obligations which went with it. In the other place on 3 November 1997, the noble Lord Kingsland, the shadow Lord Chancellor, said:

"on behalf of my party, I make no apologies for what is contained in that convention; we support its terms wholeheartedly."--[Official Report, House of Lords, 3 November 1997; Vol. 582, c. 1235.]

I would also point out to the right hon. and learned Gentleman that, during the period that he was Home Secretary, he brought proposals to the House, which were accepted, to amend our domestic law so as to make it comply with decisions of the European Court of Human Rights, as he did in the Crime (Sentences) Act 1997, following the case of Singh and Hussain, which led to the decision about the final release of those who are being detained at Her Majesty's pleasure being taken away from the Home Secretary and transferred to the parole board.

It is not just a fact of life but a central tenet of the rule of law that we are subject to the rule of law--in Britain that includes the law laid down by the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg, to which we have voluntarily agreed to comply. An aspect of the rule of law is that those who hold political office sometimes find that decisions may be made by judges which we may or may not happily have made ourselves, but that is an important part of the separation of powers on which our democracy is founded.

Jean Corston (Bristol, East): I thank my right hon. Friend for his prompt statement. He is right to say that the tragedy will affect members of the Bulger family for as long they live. It traumatised a generation of parents, as any sensitive person who went shopping in the wake of the case and watched parents with their children knows. They were traumatised in the same way as my generation in the wake of the Moors murders.

As I understand it, the European Court had no difficulty with 10 as the age of criminal responsibility. That must be correct: children of 10 know the difference between right and wrong. However, the difficulty was that the mode of trial offered in the juvenile courts was not appropriate to the case, and it was therefore transferred to the Crown Court. During his deliberations, will my right hon. Friend consider the operation of the juvenile court, and make it possible to give due process to children who commit what are, hopefully, rare crimes?

---