Coroners and Justice Bill

My Lords, I, too, support this Bill. Of all the public services, the justice system is the one that requires legislation to change it. I am deeply out of sympathy with those in your Lordships’ House who criticise the Bill for being a Christmas tree. Having been Lord Chancellor and Justice Minister, I know that you have to fight to get particular provisions in. I think that the right way in which to judge a Lord Chancellor or Justice Minister is to look at the extent to which he can drive through changes within the Government and the quality of those changes. I believe that the Lord Chancellor in this case shows that he has got clout in government and that the judgments that he has made are the right ones in relation to what changes are required. Although it is easy to say, "We should just move methodically from one area of the law to another", if you are serious about change and reform in the justice system, you have to pick and choose. I think that, by and large, the judgments that the Lord Chancellor has made are accurate. I wish to refer to two particular matters. First, I strongly support the plea made by the noble Baroness, Lady D’Souza, in relation to genocide. What she described was an entirely correct decision made by the High Court a few weeks ago that four Rwandans charged with genocide could not be deported to Rwanda because they would not, by British standards, receive a fair trial. I do not contest the conclusion of the High Court; indeed, I am almost certain that it was the correct one. However, those people cannot be prosecuted in this country, because the horror of the Rwandan genocide, in which 800,000 people died over the space of three months, took place in 1994 and the law in this country applies only to crimes that have occurred after 2002. We need to change the law. The noble Baroness, Lady D’Souza, referred to the issue of whether it is wrong to change the law retrospectively. The human rights convention says that it is legitimate to change the criminal law retrospectively where something is criminal, ""according to general principles of law recognized by civilized nations"." If I need to say that in 1994 it was recognised by civilised nations that genocide was a crime, it seems as though I am stating the obvious. However, I have a legal basis for saying it as well as one of common sense, which is that in 1991 the United Nations set up the International Criminal Tribunal in The Hague to try those who were guilty of the Yugoslavian genocide. Civilised nations, as represented by international law, had committed themselves to the recognition of genocide as a crime. We should do the same here, and we should do it for a particular reason. The Rwandan nation has done its level best to deal with the genocide in an acceptable way. There were the tribunal hearings in Arusha, which have now finished, and the justice system is now there for those guilty of committing acts of genocide or something similar. If these four people cannot be deported to Rwanda, we as a nation should help the Rwandans as much as we can. All that is required is that the crime of genocide be made retrospective to a date—1991 is the obvious one—set before the genocide in Rwanda. I strongly support what the noble Baroness, Lady D’Souza, has said and I will strongly support the amendment proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Carlile. I hope very much that this House would regard such an amendment as something that we can do as an indication of our obligation to scrutinise. I do not believe for a moment that it would divide any feeling in this House at all. The second point that I wish to make relates to assisted suicide. The noble Lord, Lord Bach, is absolutely right to say that it is wrong for us in this House to try to embark on any significant changes in the law on assisted suicide. What this Bill does, in effect, is to re-enact the law with changes to reflect the way in which the law has changed in practice over the past few years. I strongly oppose the law being re-enacted without reflecting one significant change. The Director of Public Prosecutions will not prosecute people who, in good faith and with good motives, assist a loved one to go to a clinic in Switzerland or another place where suicide is lawful. He will not prosecute because he rightly believes that it is not in the public interest to prosecute in those circumstances. Approximately five days ago, the previous DPP, Sir Kenneth Macdonald, said on the radio that there were 100 cases in which he had decided not to prosecute in these circumstances. It is wrong as a matter of principle, as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Bingham of Cornhill, said on the same programme, that the law should be set to one side by one individual, no matter how important that individual is. This House should not re-enact Section 1 of the Suicide Act, which makes it a crime to assist suicide, unless it properly reflects the way in which the law operates at the moment. There are two further reasons why the amendment should be passed. The first is that, if we do not put in a detailed amendment, we will not be able to identify the proper safeguards in relation to such a provision. The current situation is that the Director of Public Prosecutions makes a decision applying his common sense. There are no guidelines as to what is required as a matter of safeguard; he simply focuses on the facts and comes to an overall decision. The right course is that we should put in safeguards so that what is required is much clearer. The second reason is that there is uncertainty about the law. However much one may, as a matter of principle, oppose the idea of this being allowed, it happens. People should know what the law is. Miss Diane Purdy should not be forced to go to court to try to seek immunity for her partner before he takes her to Switzerland. It is wrong that the law is so uncertain, so I will support an amendment in this House not to seek to change the law fundamentally in relation to assisted suicide but to make the law reflect the way in which it is operated. That is how the law should operate and one of the functions of this House is to ensure that that is right. Finally, it is a source of great sadness to me that Viscount Bledisloe is not here today. He participated in every justice Bill in which I have been involved since 1997, when I came into the House. His contributions were significant and effective. We shall all miss him.