Examination of Witnesses (Questions 120-127)
Mrs Amanda Bowring, Mr Brian Gibbins and Mr Peter
Hall
18 APRIL 2007
Q120 Chairman: Article 18.3 is the
general obligation and I think, as Lord Mance says, the implementing
legislation would need to make provision. However, next week we
see the draftsmen from the Commission and it is very helpful to
have clarification at least of the difficulties in their existing
draft. Mr Hall, I am sorry, had we concluded your answer to questions
as to the difficulties that you on behalf of ACPO would see in
the actual enforcement of the provision, in other words, the supervision
of the very orders that we are contemplating?
Mr Hall: My Lord, it is really just to amplify
I suppose the response given to an earlier question by Mr Gibbins
and that is that we have concerns about the numbers of these cases
that may be forthcoming from other Member States. Certainly the
experience in the recent past with mutual legal assistance and
the European arrest warrant indicates that these are rising significantly
and the concern would be that these provisions would also lead
to a significant increase in work. I think it is the point that
was made earlier, which is that they may be available within inquisitorial
systems much earlier in the investigative process and that might
broaden the net for European states in a way in which it would
not in the UK, so the resourcing implications for policing in
the UK may be significant, particularly if there were concentrations
of particular ethnic origins in particular parts of the country.
Chairman: I think we have very largely covered
matters. Unless any Member of the Committee has any other questions
or you feel there is anything you would wish to add to what you
have already helpfully told us, I think we might draw this to
a close.
Q121 Lord Mance: That last observation
might lead to the conclusion that in fact there is a real need
for this. If there are a lot of people who are lingering in prison
abroad unnecessarily who could be brought back here, and perhaps
even if they could be brought back here under the Eurobail scheme
in order to serve their time on remand pending trial here, there
could be said to be a real need for this scheme?
Mr Hall: Absolutely, my Lord. I merely make
the observation that we are unclear as to the scope and the extent,
and I suppose to reinforce the point that the CPS have made, which
is that I think ACPO would appreciate some scoping analysis to
give some idea as to likely numbers.
Q122 Baroness Kingsmill: May I just
for a point of clarification ask, maybe I did not quite understand
the point; what have ethnic minorities got to do with it? I did
not quite get that point.
Mr Hall: Perhaps a poor choice of language on
my part, my Lady, really just the disproportionality that may
exist between the way in which the UK system works and the way
in which other jurisdictions may operate.
Q123 Baroness Kingsmill: Just expand
a little bit what you mean by the difference?
Mr Hall: I think we have seen a significant
increase in European arrest warrant activity and also mutual legal
assistance from some of the accession countries that have recently
come into the EU.
Baroness Kingsmill: Thank you.
Q124 Chairman: Just a final question,
the problems of below age criminals, we touched on this as being
one of the grounds on which you can refuse to recognise a supervision
order. It is under Article 10.2(a). Have you any views as to what
our own reaction would be to that? Would we be likely to exercise
our discretion not to recognise a warrant for somebody who was
below our criminal age?
Mr Gibbins: My Lord Chairman, certainly on the
extradition front we have had no experience of receiving European
arrest warrants, as it is technically possible to do, for juveniles
so it is really impossible to make any sort of guess as to the
position we would be in as the issuing Member State. In terms
of being the executing Member State, of course one imagines a
situation, perhaps a child on holiday with parents in Spain, who
would otherwise be subject to detention, and this would of course
afford the possibility of then coming home with their parents
at the end of what might have been a disastrous holiday, I suspect!
Q125 Chairman: Quite. If you exercise
your discretion against it, actually the consequence is not in
his favour, the consequence is that he remains in custody.
Mr Gibbins: Indeed, so we acknowledge in the
scenario that I have outlined that there would be a benefit.
Q126 Chairman: Yes. Very well, thank
you all very much indeed. It has been most helpful and I am afraid
we have identified yet more problems for the proposed scheme.
As I say, I hope we can resolve at least some of them or set in
train a process for dealing with them next week.
Mr Gibbins: My Lord Chairman, there is one matter
that I very quickly wish to flag up, I do not want to trespass
on your patience, but it is simply this: that of course the issue
of a European supervision order is entirely contingent on the
person being a resident of the country to which he wants to be
sent back and there is nothing in the Framework Decision, it seems
to me, to assist in how you determine who is a resident of a particular
country. One accepts that this is an umbrella, a pan-European
system, but absent any guidance on the Framework Decision there
is the possibility of huge variances in national practices.
Q127 Chairman: So residence would
need to be defined to give a common meaning to what is within
the contemplation of this order?
Mr Gibbins: My Lord, we would be assisted.
Chairman: Thank you very much. That is a very
helpful comment. Thank you very much indeed.
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