Silver Linings

Dear Diary,

It is encouraging to note that decent things seem to be happening, and even more encouraging to see most of them emanating from the Courts.

In a Judgment of remarkable terseness, the Divisional Court (Moses LJ and Sullivan J) have comprehensively demonstrated that the Government gave in to Saudi Arabia and was, effectively, complicit in the breach of the rule of law when it prevented the SFO from investigating whether BAE had bunged the Saudis in order to get an arms deal. The Judgment is long, but the language is pithy. At paragraph 77 the Court says:

Mr Sales’ submission appears to us not to be one of principle but rather one of practicality: resistance is useless, the judgement of the Government is that the Saudi Arabian government will not listen and the authorities in the United Kingdom must surrender. That argument reveals the extent to which the Government has failed to appreciate the role of the courts in upholding and protecting the rule of law.

And at paragraph 102:

The Director failed to appreciate that protection of the rule of law demanded that he should not yield to the threat. Nor was adequate consideration given to the damage to national security and to the rule of law by submission to the threat. No-one took any steps to explain that the attempt to halt the investigation by making threats could not, by law, succeed. The Saudi threat would have been an exercise in futility, had anyone acknowledged that principle. We are driven to the conclusion that the Director’s submission to the threat was unlawful.

This diary has already commented on the particularly loathsome stance the Saudis take when it comes to dealing with this country (and perhaps other countries). It is bracing to see that the Government’s traditional submissiveness to the Sons of the Desert is not shared by the Courts.

In a separate development, the Court of Appeal refused to deport Mr Othman (otherwise known as Abu Qatada: ‘Abu’ meaning ‘father’ and ‘Qatada’ meaning ‘Of All Bastards’) to Jordan. The Government said that the Jordanians had promised not to torture Mr Othman. The Court said that such a promise was worthless. The Government said that the use of torture would not cause a real problem because the evidence would be reliable. The Court said (at paragraph 48):

That view, that the use of evidence obtained by torture or ill-treatment is prohibited not just, or indeed primarily, because of its likely unreliability, but rather because the state must stand firm against the conduct that has produced the evidence, is universally recognised both within and outside Convention law. What is, with respect, a particularly strong statement to that effect, citing a multitude of equally strongly worded authorities, is to be found in §17 of the speech of Lord Bingham in A v Home Secretary (No2) [2006] 2 AC 221.

It is depressing that the Court needs to tell the Government why we are against torturing people until they say what those inflicting the pain wish to hear, but cheering that the Courts’ moral compass is firmly pointing to the North.

Abu Qabomba is an odious person. His hatreds match Hitler’s in their insanity, passion and apparently deadly determination to do something about them. That is exactly why we must treat him conspicuously better than he would treat us. Preferrably we would also laugh at him, his toxic beliefs and his idiotic rantings. This is difficult whilst he and his mates are trying to kill people, but it is an effort worth making.

Interestingly, in both cases the Government was represented by Philip Sales QC, who raised eyebrows when he was appointed the Treasury Devil whilst still at prep school. Now in silk Phil is one of the stars of the Bar. This was just a bad few days in the office.

Finally, thousands of ordinary people have turned out to show the Chinese that killing whoever they like is widely viewed as unpleasant. This is not a message the IOC, the Chinese or any government wanted to hear. It does, however, show that most of us can tell right from wrong and vastly prefer the former.

The conclusion I draw, dear Diary, is that the Courts and the people are in tune with each other.  Those who put the making of money and power above all else, march to a different beat. Pathetic pleas to protect ourselves by destroying the claimed subject of the protection should be seen for the humbug they are. Moses LJ may have replaced the staff of old for two stiff fingers but the message is the same and particularly timely.

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• After the Verdict
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