Diplomatic Privileges and Immunities Amendment Bill

, on behalf of the Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade: I move, That the Diplomatic Privileges and Immunities Amendment Bill be now read a third time. This bill contains empowering provisions that will allow Orders in Council to be made under the Diplomatic Privileges and Immunities Act to implement two treaties. The first is the Agreement on the Privileges and Immunities of the International Criminal Court, which supplements obligations in the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, to which New Zealand is already a party. The second is the amendment on the establishment and the privileges and immunities of delegation of the Commission of the European Community in New Zealand.

Orders made on the new provisions will be broadly similar to those that already exist for other bodies such as the International Court of Justice, the World Trade Organization, and the United Nations. Although the International Criminal Court is based in The Hague, much of its work will be undertaken elsewhere including, on occasions, New Zealand.

New section 10D will allow Orders in Council to confer certain privileges and immunities that are associated with the functioning of the International Criminal Court, and these fall into three categories. The first relates to the protections that the court itself needs if it sits in New Zealand. The second relates to protections for the International Criminal Court judges and staff, and the third relates to other persons involved in International Criminal Court proceedings, such as witnesses and lawyers. These protections ensure that the International Criminal Court and those involved in its proceedings can perform their particular functions or roles free of interference.

At the Committee stage, there was some concern that the bill did not make it sufficiently clear that privileges and immunities given to witnesses were limited in nature. New section 10D(2) states that the privileges and immunities that may be conferred are those “required” by specified articles of the Rome Statute and agreement. Those articles are spelt out with specific limits. Article 19(1) of the agreement, for example, provides that witnesses enjoy specified privileges and immunities “to the extent necessary for their appearance before the court and the purpose of giving evidence”. This is clearly not a blanket immunity. The Order in Council to be made under new section 10D will state that the purposes for which the particular privileges and immunities will be given are as set out in the agreement.

New section 10E relates to the meetings of the States that are party to the Rome Statute, and implements article 13 of the privileges agreement. It is standard practice for those who are attending international meetings in other countries as part of a Government delegation to have protections similar to those of diplomats. Those protections are limited in nature and in duration. Moreover, the protections do not belong to individuals, but rather to the State or the body they represent. Like the privileges and immunities mentioned in section 10D, they can be waived. New Zealand representatives who attend meetings in other countries would be accorded such protections. We therefore need to be able to give them to others in the event that meetings are held here.

The need for amendments relating to the European Community became apparent in the context of the implementation of the agreement concerning the office that the European Commission is setting up in Wellington. The commission proposes to open a new office this month, and it is keen to have the requisite privileges and immunities in place in preparation for that opening. Accordingly, I wish to record Phil Goff’s appreciation of the cooperation of other parties in allowing these amendments to be dealt with as part of this bill.

The European Commission is defined as an international organisation, not a country. The present Act contains powers for the conferral of privileges and immunities on international organisations, but does not cover the establishment in New Zealand of delegations of those organisations and accompanying family members. The amendment provides a clear and explicit power to confer privileges and immunities on the members of the proposed European Commission delegation and their families. These privileges and immunities will be similar to those granted to the staff of diplomatic missions of foreign States, recognising the similar role those delegations will carry out in New Zealand.

At the Committee stage, the question was raised whether there might also be a need to confer an amendment on the Consular Privileges and Immunities Act, to cover the possibility of a consular office being established by the European Commission in New Zealand at some point. This would, however, involve a substantial amendment, as that Act does not include a section encompassing international organisations. The European Commission has not indicated any wish at this point to open a consular type office in New Zealand. We consider that the present amendments appropriately focus on facilitating the opening by the European Commission of a diplomatic-type office in Wellington.

The passage of this bill will clear the way for New Zealand to implement two international agreements. Firstly, an Order in Council to be made under new sections 10D and 10E is the final stage in implementing New Zealand’s obligation relating to the International Criminal Court. The ratification of the privileges agreement will reaffirm New Zealand’s support both for the International Criminal Court itself and for the ideals it embodies. The order to be made under section 9AB will enable New Zealand to implement the establishment agreement with the European Commission and thereby facilitate the opening of its delegation office in New Zealand. The opening of such an office will serve to underpin and strengthen New Zealand’s relationship with the commission. I commend this bill to the House.

It is kind of sad during the second term of a Government to see a Minister stand in the House, in the third reading on a bill, and read a speech that some official somewhere has written for him. Quite clearly, the Hon Rick Barker has not a clue what this legislation is doing. He just read, parrot-fashion, a speech that some official somewhere had written for him, and that, to me, is sad. It shows the shallowness of a Government that really has no depth beyond its front bench.

The Committee stage of this bill was just a tad messy, because what happened was that the Government introduced, with support from the Opposition, a Supplementary Order Paper to extend the provisions of the bill to cover not just the International Criminal Court and New Zealand’s commitments under the Rome Statute, but the extension of diplomatic privileges and immunities to the delegation of the European Commission. We have no objection to that because, obviously, it is in New Zealand’s interests to have the European Commission delegation present in New Zealand, but the Supplementary Order Paper 190 that was required to do it required quite a significant amount of amendment.

What is a wee bit worrying is that I would not mind betting that not many members of the Committee of the whole House actually understood the detail of this Supplementary Order Paper, at all. We were told that the Parliamentary Counsel Office added a subclause to it at the last minute, and basically the Committee just had to accept the Government’s claim that it would be all right. The Supplementary Order Paper has not been examined by the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee, and it really is not very satisfactory when the Government does that.

The Government should have known that the European Commission wanted to set up this delegation in New Zealand. I understand that personnel are currently in Australia ready to take up this position in New Zealand, so the Government should have known that this was required weeks ago, and it would not have been very difficult to incorporate this material in the original legislation. It shows a Government that is a bit at sixes and sevens, which I suppose is what happens once Governments start to do U-turns. They get in a mess, and that is when legislation that is less than satisfactory can slip through the House.

We have to be honest. While we all agree with the intent of Supplementary Order Paper 190, which is now part read into the bill, I do not believe that there are too many members of this House who can absolutely assure the public of New Zealand that no clause in Supplementary Order Paper 190 will have any unexpected outcome that this House has not thought about—especially when subclauses are added by the Parliamentary Counsel Office.

The Parliamentary Counsel Office does a wonderful job, but it just shows a somewhat messy process. When the Government wants something done, the officials and legal people at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade draft legislation, and then the Parliamentary Counsel Office has to add a bit to it just before the Supplementary Order Paper is introduced into the House. It is not a very satisfactory procedure.

The other thing that was notable during the Committee stage was that the Green Party tried to introduce its own Supplementary Order Paper. They wanted diplomatic privileges and immunities extended to all their mates in the non-governmental organisations. Keith Locke wanted all his mates in Greenpeace to have the diplomatic privileges and immunities that the embassies and high commissions of other countries have in this country. Keith Locke wanted the Greenpeace wallahs to be able to get tax-free grog and to be immune from criminal prosecutions in this country, and all that kind of nonsense. It shows how out of touch with reality the Green Party is.

I was the first one in this Parliament to say 2 or 3 years ago that it was a shame that someone who cared so much about this planet as Jeanette Fitzsimons did, did not spend a wee bit more time on it. Others have copied my comments, but I can claim that I was the first to say that in this Parliament. As for Keith Locke, I do not think he spends any time on this planet. God knows how his intellectual processes work, but I guess coming up with amendments like that, and thinking that Parliament would accept them, added a bit of humour to the Committee stage.

However, I think the public of New Zealand ought to be wary, because it is that Green Party, with its weird—

💬 Dr Wayne Mapp: And dangerous.

Dr the Hon LOCKWOOD SMITH: —and dangerous ideas that keeps the Labour Government in office. The people of New Zealand need to know how damaging that has been for New Zealand—the transport gridlock in Auckland, no progress on the Penlink toll road, and the Albany to Puhoi realignment B2 going nowhere are all Jeanette Fitzsimons’ fault, and it is a weak, gutted Labour Government that lets the Greens do that to it.

Let me come to the other issue in the Diplomatic Privileges and Immunities Amendment Bill that causes me concern. I am someone who has had some experience of international treaties, having been a former Minister for International Trade and negotiated treaties on New Zealand’s behalf. During the last phases of the Committee stage, I mentioned that I was a great supporter of New Zealand’s constitutional arrangements, whereby the prerogative to negotiate international treaties is within the power of our executive Government. It holds the prerogative to negotiate international treaties.

That is not the case in every country. I guess the best-known country that has a different arrangement is the United States of America. In the United States, it is the Congress—and in New Zealand it is Parliament that is the equivalent of the US Congress—under the US constitution that has the prerogative to negotiate international treaties. Because it is totally unwieldy for Congress to decide on the detail of treaties, from time to time it votes to give negotiating authority to the executive. That does not happen too often. During President Clinton’s entire administration—8 years—the US Congress did not grant him negotiating authority for international treaties. For some reason or other, it did not trust President Clinton and his administration to negotiate international treaties. The Bush administration achieved what used to be called “fast-track” and is now called a trade promotion authority, but the majority in Congress that voted the executive of President Bush the authority to negotiate trade treaties was not huge.

Constitutionally, that issue is quite an important one. I totally support the constitutional arrangement here in New Zealand, whereby the executive has the power to negotiate treaties. Where I have a problem with this bill is in the way it is drafted. Any future negotiation with regard to the International Criminal Court and the articles of the agreement associated with the Rome Statute that the Government enters into automatically becomes part of New Zealand law—as provided for by new sections 10D and 10E.

We have always argued that it is OK for our executive to have the authority to negotiate international treaties, because anything that affects New Zealand’s domestic law is the prerogative of this Parliament. Only Parliament can actually pass legislation that alters our domestic law. The way this bill is worded changes that. As I read it, any change to articles 18 to 22 of the Agreement on the Privileges and Immunities of the International Criminal Court that are within the area of article 48 of the Rome Statute would automatically change our domestic law.

As someone who supports the prerogative of our executive to negotiate international treaties, I believe that is a dangerous move. Only this Parliament should be able to pass legislation that alters our domestic law. This bill will enable agreements negotiated by the executive to change our domestic law, and I think that is not wise. Despite that, we will support this legislation.

I want to speak briefly to support the third reading of the Diplomatic Privileges and Immunities Amendment Bill. Many of the reasons why this bill is being promoted have been canvassed in the debate already, and I do not intend to repeat them. Essentially, this is a mechanical piece of legislation, which gives effect to our agreement under the Rome Statute with regard to the International Criminal Court and, also, by way of Supplementary Order Paper 190, brings in the issue of representation by the European Commission in New Zealand.

There is one point from the Minister’s speech that I want to comment on, which I do not regard as satisfactory. I was the one who raised, at various stages of the debate on this bill, the suggestion that we ought to look at the status of the Consular Privileges and Immunities Act, and I do not find acceptable the excuse that to do that would be difficult because there is not provision in that legislation—which largely parallels the Diplomatic Privileges and Immunities Act—for agreements with international organisations. It is not a difficult amendment to draft.

The point I made in the debate on the second reading and at the Committee stage was that it seemed entirely logical, given the similarity of those two Acts, to combine them into one, recognising that there will be situations where both diplomatic and consular privileges are being afforded to nation States—or international organisations, in this particular instance—and there will be some occasions where that is not the case. My point was that to continue a situation where two largely similar Acts operate independently in the same area did not seem to me to make a great deal of sense, and I do not think that the Minister’s response—admittedly, on the advice of his officials—adequately represented that issue.

I know, because I have had an interest in the area for many years, how rare amendments to both those Acts are. The circumstances that give rise to them are not common. It is not every day that we ratify an agreement to establish a body such as an International Criminal Court. It is not every day that an agency such as the European Union decides it wants to establish representation in New Zealand. Every time a situation like that arises, we have to pass an amendment to the primary legislation. That is not a problem, but my point is that we can minimise some of the difficulties, because there are some situations today where consular privileges have not been afforded to States that we give diplomatic privileges to, and they could be dealt with by dealing with this as one omnibus Act.

I am disappointed that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade, through the Minister, seems reluctant to grasp that point. It is not a difficult issue. In fact, I recall discussing some years ago with the Minister the prospect of a member’s bill to achieve just that goal. I was not told then that that would be horrendously difficult to do, so I am very disappointed in the response that the Minister gave in that respect. I hope there will be a time when the issue can be revisited. While it does not arise in respect of an agency like the International Criminal Court, which clearly will not seek to have consular offices or consular privileges, it may well arise in respect of the European Union. The fact that it is not yet on the European Union’s agenda is hardly an excuse for not doing it, and we are also acting a little slowly, given that the European Union announced the name of the person who would be its representative in New Zealand at least a couple of months ago.

This bill is non-contentious. I am certainly happy to support its passage, as is United Future, but I do make a plea that the issues that have been raised regarding the standardisation of the legislation not be dismissed as lightly as they have been by the Minister tonight. I know that the officials do not like extra work. I am sorry about that, but I actually think that that is a logical step forward and ought to be entertained. With those words, I am happy to indicate support for the bill.

I rise on behalf of the Green Party to support the third reading of the Diplomatic Privileges and Immunities Amendment Bill. It is a very important bill, and its extension of diplomatic privileges and immunities to representatives of the European Union will be very valuable to us in drawing closer to that important regional Parliament. We have had many delegations here. We are getting closer in all respects—politically, economically, socially, and culturally—to the European Union, and this bill will set us further down that track, and remove an obstacle in terms of diplomatic privileges and immunities for European Union representatives.

I think that it is important to look at the origin of diplomatic immunity, as a background to some of the debate that took place in the second reading and Committee stage, in particular. Diplomatic immunity is provided not because diplomats are superior beings who should be beyond the law and can commit crimes with impunity, but because they are often in a country where the Government is quite hostile to their policies. Sometimes, diplomats might be representing a country that is almost on the verge of war with the host country. The idea of diplomatic immunity is to stop harassment of, or domestic hostility toward, diplomats being expressed in some sort of frame-up, or in some inadequate judicial process, which could easily take place if a Government wants to promote more hostility towards another Government. Having diplomatic immunity is very important in that respect.

Under this bill, immunity is extended to the particular court process of the International Criminal Court. I think that the idea is to stop the proceedings of that court from being interfered with by domestic jurisdictions, and by certain witnesses, who may be politically charged. In the discussion at the Committee stage, the name Milosevic was brought up, and the example was given that a lot of people around the world would be hostile to him if he were the star witness at an International Criminal Court hearing in New Zealand. Nobody has great sympathy for him, and nobody would want—from any simple, moral basis—someone like Milosevic, who has committed such crimes against humanity, to be immune were he in New Zealand at such a hearing, and had he committed some offence against our domestic law. But if we look at the broader context of universally protecting the International Criminal Court from interference, then we would give immunity even to someone like Milosevic, if he were a witness or defendant at an International Criminal Court trial in New Zealand.

To extend that line of thinking, certain nations are extending that jurisdiction in an extraterritorial manner, in terms of the court cases that have taken place—or have begun—around the world against people who have committed crimes, such as Pinochet and Ariel Sharon. In the Pinochet case, Spain and Britain held court proceedings as to whether he should be tried. The Spanish wanted to try Pinochet. He ended up in Britain, and there was a question over whether he should be extradited. All those proceedings occurred under the domestic jurisdictions of Spain and Britain. We could, under the procedures of the International Criminal Court, have hearings for war crimes, or other crimes, in relation to Pinochet and his colleagues’ activities in Chile. It could take place in London. We would not necessarily want those court proceedings to be interfered with by claims of domestic jurisdiction from Britain, or, if the hearing were held in Spain, by claims of domestic jurisdiction from Spain. We would want the proceedings protected, even though, separate from the International Criminal Court hearing, one might support Spain or Britain moving against someone like Pinochet.

The Belgium Supreme Court last year said that Ariel Sharon could be put on trial in Belgium for the crime of genocide, which he allegedly committed while he was Israel’s Defense Minister in 1982—he is charged with being responsible for the deaths of between 1,000 and 2,000 people, in the Sabra and Shatila Palestinian refugee camps in Lebanon. There is legitimacy in that trial proceeding against Sharon in Belgium, but, again, we would not want that reality to interfere with an International Criminal Court proceeding.

We even have the situation of overseas jurisdictions applying in the case of one of our citizens Helen Todd, who initiated proceedings in a US court against an Indonesian general for the murder, by Indonesians, of Kamil Bamadhaj in East Timor a few years ago. I think that all those cases are very legitimate, and they parallel what is happening in the International Criminal Court, in terms of trying to bring to justice people who have committed crimes against humanity. I think it is important to include the immunities and diplomatic privileges applied in this bill in the proceedings of the International Criminal Court, so that there is an integrity to International Criminal Court proceedings.

With those few words, I indicate the Green Party’s support for this bill.

I rise for the ACT party to advise the House of the reasons why we will vote against the third reading of this bill. We will do so primarily as a way of recording, once again, our concern that New Zealand’s sovereignty, and the position of New Zealand’s service people on operations overseas, may one day be very sadly affected by the operation of the International Criminal Court. Offering immunities to judges, prosecutors, and other staff of the International Criminal Court is not a matter that seriously concerns us—indeed, we think that it is inevitable and sensible, should the International Criminal Court ever operate in New Zealand. The Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee, chaired by the Hon Peter Dunne, did the same kind of superficial job on this bill as was done on the bill passed in 2000—which this bill expands and makes more easy to implement. ACT will therefore vote against the third reading to remind the House that bills implementing international treaties should be taken very seriously indeed.

The Hon Lockwood Smith mentioned that when we bring international treaties into our law by reference, they could have meanings that we completely fail to anticipate. The direct purpose of this bill is to extend immunities that are very longstanding.

As Mr Keith Locke for the Greens said, the immunities are an attempt to ensure that nations can be civilised with each other. Diplomacy cannot occur unless diplomatic agents can be sure they will not be taken hostage, and their presence in a foreign country will not be used as a chance to exercise pressure and use them as symbols or targets for action that is really part of international position taking.

We do not want any prospect of being seen in the company of nations like Iran, which seized the American mission people and held them for over 200 days. We do not want to be seen as the kind of country that is simply unsafe, and where diplomats can be insulted by robbery, or crime, or otherwise with impunity. So this bill should be relatively straightforward in that area, but as well as our concern to make a point about the International Criminal Court, we believe that this bill is a piece of clumsy drafting, and the select committee did not seem to take note of that.

The bill has added in power to exempt or give immunity to witnesses or other persons who may come in for International Criminal Court proceedings, without recording that it is perfectly appropriate for New Zealand to confine any immunities to the sorts of risks that Mr Keith Locke mentioned—that is, the risk of someone using New Zealand law to try to make political points by seizing people who have come here for a court proceeding and charging them with offences essentially relating to things that have happened outside New Zealand and perhaps many years ago.

It is quite proper that New Zealand can reassure people coming here for International Criminal Court proceedings, including witnesses who may be thugs in their own country or who may have robbed their own country, taken their treasury and put it in Switzerland. Despite the foulness of their deeds, if those sorts of people are to come here for court proceedings, they need to know that they at least will not face New Zealand law in respect of that kind of matter, in case that frustrates the purposes of the International Criminal Court.

But I can see no reason whatsoever that they should be immune from the ordinary operation of New Zealand law for offences that they commit while they are here. Why should New Zealand allow yet another category of people to ignore their parking tickets, at the bottom end; or their manslaughter offences, at another stage; or even, as I understand it, their rapes? The Foreign Affairs and Trade Committee might, for example, have asked the Government just how many rapes or serious assaults have been committed by people with the benefit of diplomatic immunity in the period of the Labour Government. I would venture that it would shock people to know how often people with immunity do commit offences, and in the case of decent countries get bundled home, and in the case of other countries, stay on as an affront to New Zealanders.

There was no reason why this bill could not have made a significant distinction between people like the judges of the criminal court who could be expected to need a very wide form of immunity and the hangers-on, some of whom we can almost certainly predict will be undesirables. Why should they, for example, be allowed to bring their liquor cabinets in without paying duty? There is nothing in this bill that tells us that will not occur. As an amusing aside, we did find out that a bunch of European Union diplomats are hanging about somewhere outside New Zealand, waiting until we pass this bill to get in. One wonders whether it is because their bags are clanking with bottles and they cannot bear the thought of paying their duty.

💬 Simon Power: And cigars.

And cigars. Or is it because they have children they cannot control and they know they had better not bring them here until they have immunity for the traffic offences and worse that their children are going to commit?

During the Committee stage the Minister in the chair was given a chance to explain exactly why there is such urgency, and why the European Union mission members appeared to think New Zealand is the kind of country they cannot come to until they are immune from local law. Could it have had anything to do with the abolition of the Privy Council? Do they now fear that perhaps we have kangaroo courts here and there is no right of appeal to an independent judiciary? Perhaps the European Union has been watching what is happening and they realise that now they would be subject— [Interruption]. The former? The member thinks it is the fatted—

💬 Simon Power: I think it’s the bottles in the bags.

The bottles clinking in the bags? Whatever it is, it is puzzling to us that the Minister did not choose to explain why European mission members would be so afraid of our justice system. It does seem to me that at least the leaders of the missions might have taken the risk of being here on their very best behaviour without immunity and seen whether there was a problem while we put this legislation through at an ordinary pace.

I want to come back to the principal reason why we are voting against this bill—this uncritical acceptance of the International Criminal Court. This is a court that the United States has not joined and that the United States is so concerned about that it has gone round to somewhere between 60 and 80 countries—we do not know exactly how many have signed up—and got agreements that these countries will not subject United States personnel to the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court. In other words, the country that should be our chief ally has decided that this court is a risk to it, and before it will have its servicemen deployed in many countries, they must undertake not to hand its people over to this court.

Whatever this Government may think about international agencies, that is a very serious consideration for us. This court could be, as the US fears, a victors’ tribunal. It has undefined crimes. We have put into our criminal law, in effect by proxy, crimes that no New Zealand lawyer can define. No one knows exactly what the crime of aggression is going to be, and it will be applied by judges who may share nothing of our history or our traditional respect for the rule of law—for rules known in advance and for the protective rules of evidence that are designed to prevent miscarriage of justice processes that are, in effect, glorified lynch mobs. We will not control who the judges are.

This bill should have been rejected by more in this House to make the same point.

National supports this legislation. I feel I must elaborate on this point, given the statements by the member from the ACT party. I know that ACT has very strong feelings about the degree of involvement that New Zealand should have with international institutions generally. I think it would be fair to say that ACT takes a sceptical view, not—

💬 Stephen Franks: A New Zealand first view.

A New Zealand first view! I would say a sceptical view in the sense that it does not fully rule out engagement with international institutions. ACT members are realistic enough to know that New Zealand has to have an appropriate engagement, but at the same time they remain suspicious of what I would loosely describe as the international project, which is the broader extension of international law across the relations between States and also as it applies to individuals.

This is something of a century-old project, and what has been attempted through the course of that project is to provide a complete framework of rules and principles that will ultimately lead to peaceful relations between States. Members might say that sounds all very noble and idealistic, and of course it is, because the ultimate ambition of such a project is to prevent the scourge of war.

Whereas in domestic life crime and violence are always prohibited and are always, so to speak, outlawed activities, in international relations war is permissible for self defence—be it immediate, imminent, or threatened. The war in Iraq was supported on the basis that there was an enormous risk from weapons of mass destruction, and that Saddam Hussein had the most flagrant breaches of international humanitarian law. Most notable were the gassing of tens of thousands of his citizens, and those of other countries, and threatening to do the same, as well. On top of that, he was in gross and continuing breach of literally dozens of United Nations resolutions.

So the international law framework is quite different. The use of armed force is permissible. It is not as if it is a matter of just the isolated force we might see from a police force. It is wide scale, and it allows and accepts that innocent civilians will be killed. Broadly speaking, there may not be accountability. So the international project is to try to minimise, and ultimately eliminate, that scourge of mankind.

The creation of the International Criminal Court is part of the framework to reduce the scope and breadth of war, so that it does not affect civilians to the extent it has in the past. Ultimately, the ambition must be to eliminate war and, in that sense, the International Criminal Court is part of that framework. That is why I have consistently said to the ACT party—notwithstanding its concerns, which I believe, fundamentally, to be imagined rather than real—that it should reverse its position. I certainly would like ACT members to acknowledge that when the House passed the substantive legislation in 2000, they would have then recognised the reality of that, and at least accede to the legislation we will be passing today. I made that statement in my first reading speech.

ACT members have, of course, raised various serious concerns. Mr Franks, to be fair, has done something that the select committee failed to do. That was to point out some of the deficiencies of the bill. I think everyone would acknowledge—and Mr Franks himself has acknowledged—it is appropriate that the judges, the prosecutors, and the registrar have immunities. But why would we extend, on the face of the legislation, that same kind of immunity to witnesses? It is worth bearing in mind whom those people are likely to be. They themselves will frequently be people who participated in the war crime itself, and in a sense they would have been offered immunity to testify against a more serious criminal. Yet in this legislation, on the face of it, we are extending to them the immunities that might be expected of judges.

I know that Government members, if they chose to take calls—which they have not, I note—would say that the immunity is of a different kind; that article 48(4) is different. But no one reading the legislation, on the face of it, would know that. I believe that because legislation is not just for experts but has important symbolic value, accessible to the people, then the legislation on crucial issues like this—this is not some passing matter—ought to be plain, on the face of it, that the immunity of such people is limited only to the extent of giving evidence. They do not have some kind of general immunity. That offer was made to the Government last night. It could have agreed to the Supplementary Order Paper I submitted to it, and passed it into law.

The Minister’s excuse—and it could be seen as no more than that—was that if she did that in this case, then on every international convention she would have a statute that was a foot high. Well, that is simply fatuous. The reality is that this bill deals with the International Criminal Court, and with the most serious crimes imaginable. Surely in that situation it is important that Parliament signals as clearly as possible the difference between the witness who has received immunity to testify, and the judge. I am disappointed in the Government that it did not take that opportunity.

The other point I would like to refer to in passing is the extension of diplomatic immunities to the European Commission. Of itself, that provision is perfectly sensible. No one would doubt that. But one has to ask whether it is really necessary to debate a Supplementary Order Paper on the same day it is introduced—that is, yesterday—because of extreme public urgency. Is this a body that we have not had any association with for the last 40 years? Is it not the case that European Commissioners and their staff have visited this country numerous times, and that we extend to them all the normal courtesies? What on earth was the case for the extraordinary urgency of the Supplementary Order Paper in that instance? It is bad parliamentary practice to introduce to this House legislation that distorts the very purpose of the original bill—which was about using the International Criminal Court—and to use that device to extend privileges to the European Commission, as a matter of urgency.

I would implore the Government to have some respect for this Parliament and to introduce legislation in a proper and timely manner so that it can be sent to a select committee to have the issues properly considered, rather than have the extraordinary spectacle of legislation being done in haste—and, I would be prepared to bet, to be amended yet again by Mr Rick Barker in one of his numerous Statutes Amendment Bills. Those bills will be circulating later this year. He will say: “Oh, by the way, there was a minor error…”, or was it a major error in that Supplementary Order Paper introduced without any consideration.

I want to conclude on the point that the importance of the International Criminal Court cannot be doubted. It is important that we pass this legislation—but we do so with those caveats.