argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Withdrawal Agreement: Legal Position — House of Commons, 2018-12-03
Topic: International Affairs
Charles Geoffrey Cox (Conservative, Centre-right): I do not agree with my hon. Friend that this is a sell-out. There is no question but that aspects of it that are both undesirable and unsatisfactory, but this backstop need not ever be triggered, and if we are in, I am confident that we can emerge out of it. It will also produce significant benefits for the people of Northern Ireland—let us not forget that—were it ever to be engaged.
Withdrawal Agreement: Legal Position — House of Commons, 2018-12-03
Topic: Government Operations
Charles Geoffrey Cox (Conservative, Centre-right): I hope the House will reconsider the position. I hope that it will understand that no Attorney General and no Government would wish to place themselves—and certainly not I as Attorney General—in contempt of the House. There is simply nothing of that in my desire or wish, and I would not take this position if I did not feel that that was contrary to all our interests. I stand before the House fully understanding the nature of its concern, not to say indignation; I accept that. It is a deeply unsatisfactory position for any Attorney General or Government to be in I am truly sorry that I am not in a position to disclose either the fact or the content of my advice. However, I am doing so not to frustrate the legitimate interests of the Members opposite or Members behind me, but rather and only because I do believe it is against the public interest at a time when we are negotiating and at a time when this involves advice to a Cabinet or might well involve advice to a Cabinet that must, for reasons of fundamental principle, be kept confidential.
Withdrawal Agreement: Legal Position — House of Commons, 2018-12-03
Topic: International Affairs
Charles Geoffrey Cox (Conservative, Centre-right): My hon. Friend must understand that we cannot look at this simply as a question of the traffic of goods between the Republic and Northern Ireland. The stated objectives are to protect in all its dimensions the integration that has taken place between Northern Ireland and the Republic—in health treatment, in education, in cultural activities—and all these activities are to be protected. The Government of the United Kingdom have made a solemn and good faith pledge to the Republic of Ireland and to the European Union that they will preserve that integration in the interests of the people of Northern Ireland. What we have to do is find a way of doing so that is consistent with the interests of the Union and of the United Kingdom. The backstop is a temporary solution. We will find another, and it will not, except by the consent of the Stormont institutions, have the same problems that the backstop has.
Withdrawal Agreement: Legal Position — House of Commons, 2018-12-03
Topic: International Affairs
Charles Geoffrey Cox (Conservative, Centre-right): There is a formula in the agreement for the calculation of our obligations, but it depends on others’ contributions, what particular programmes there are and whether they spend particular sums of money. There is a series of variable factors, which is why we cannot give a firm, clear and precise figure. If my hon. Friend is referring to what may be due after no deal, that would depend on a series of arguments that would be untested except in a court.
Withdrawal Agreement: Legal Position — House of Commons, 2018-12-03
Topic: Government Operations
Charles Geoffrey Cox (Conservative, Centre-right): But one might lose the vote. What then? No Minister could go ahead and harm the nation merely because of a resolution, when the House had not seen the document. In court, there is a mechanism for weighing this, but the House has not seen the document. The motion for a return was traditionally always confined to public and official documents.
Withdrawal Agreement: Legal Position — House of Commons, 2018-12-03
Topic: Government Operations
Charles Geoffrey Cox (Conservative, Centre-right): That is because this procedure has been reinvented recently. The truth of the matter is that the House has no power to command documents that are not public and official. That is the constitutional question that the House needs to grapple with.
Withdrawal Agreement: Legal Position — House of Commons, 2018-12-03
Topic: International Affairs
Charles Geoffrey Cox (Conservative, Centre-right): As my hon. Friend knows, that is not a legal question. We have reached a deal. The House must make a judgment on this deal. If it had been possible to secure a unilateral right of termination, it would have been secured. It was not secured because the European Union asked for an absolute guarantee at the Northern Irish border, but has said that it is temporary; that is written into the agreement. It may well be that the word "temporary" is not enforceable, in the sense that this will subsist even in the event of negotiations breaking down, but that is a clear indication that the backstop cannot subsist forever; and, in my view, as a matter of European Union law, it cannot.
Withdrawal Agreement: Legal Position — House of Commons, 2018-12-03
Topic: Law and Crime
Charles Geoffrey Cox (Conservative, Centre-right): The existence of very rare examples of the Attorney General’s advice being disclosed does not mean that the power ought to be exercised in this case. In the Goldsmith case, it was disclosed two years after the event. We are in the middle of a negotiation.
Withdrawal Agreement: Legal Position — House of Commons, 2018-12-03
Topic: Foreign Trade
Olukemi Olufunto Badenoch (Conservative, Centre-right): Further to the comments of the right hon. Member for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford (Yvette Cooper) regarding the customs union, will my right hon. and learned Friend confirm that the future declaration guarantees that the UK will have an independent trade policy, and consequently that our future relationship will not be in the customs union?
Withdrawal Agreement: Legal Position — House of Commons, 2018-12-03
Topic: International Affairs
Charles Geoffrey Cox (Conservative, Centre-right): I am most grateful to my hon. Friend for that, because it is an important consideration. There are two things of real significance—certainly of real prominence—in the political declaration. First, the European Union has accepted that the final arrangement will involve an independent trade policy. One cannot have an independent trade policy and belong to a conventional customs union. Secondly, there will not be free movement; one cannot belong to the single market without subscribing to the four freedoms, so those set the outer boundaries of any deal that will be done.
Withdrawal Agreement: Legal Position — House of Commons, 2018-12-03
Topic: International Affairs
Chris Ian Brian Mynott Philp (Conservative, Centre-right): The terms of our EU membership say that we have the right to leave unilaterally under article 50. We also have the right to leave the unrelated European convention on human rights. What explanation and assurance can the Attorney General give the House as to why, under the proposed arrangements, we do not have those two rights?
Withdrawal Agreement: Legal Position — House of Commons, 2018-12-03
Topic: International Affairs
Charles Geoffrey Cox (Conservative, Centre-right): As I have explained, a unilateral right of termination would be inconsistent with a backstop, which is a guarantee that in circumstances where there is not a deal, or during the negotiations for a deal, there will be no hard border, and there will be protection of north-south co-operation. That backstop has to exist, or there will be no deal. As to the ECHR, that is already protected by the Belfast agreement; it is embedded in that agreement, and would have to be preserved for that reason.
Withdrawal Agreement: Legal Position — House of Commons, 2018-12-03
Topic: Agriculture
Charles Geoffrey Cox (Conservative, Centre-right): The CAP is dealt with by the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, and I have no doubt that Government lawyers will have given it advice. I am afraid that I am not in a position to assist the hon. Gentleman with any specific advice on that question at the moment, but I am happy to write to him about it.
Withdrawal Agreement: Legal Position — House of Commons, 2018-12-03
Topic: International Affairs
Richard Grosvenor Plunkett-Ernle-Erle-Drax (Conservative, Centre-right): We have heard of the will of the House tonight; what about the will of the people? They voted to leave the EU in its entirety, not to be half in, half out. I thank my right hon. and learned Friend for his legal advice today, but it is full of ambiguity, as I fear the political interpretation could be in future. This will not breed confidence in our nation.
Withdrawal Agreement: Legal Position — House of Commons, 2018-12-03
Topic: International Affairs
Charles Geoffrey Cox (Conservative, Centre-right): I was puzzled as to what I was to answer. I disagree with my hon. Friend. We will leave legally on 29 March. To get back, we would have to apply for accession under article 49. We will be in a fundamentally different position on 30 March, if we can get there—and we have to get there, because that will honour the verdict given by the British people on 23 June 2016. The best way of ensuring that we do that, whatever the unsatisfactory elements that I accept are involved in this deal, is to take the key to the door of the cell, and get out on 29 March. This deal is the best means of doing that.
Withdrawal Agreement: Legal Position — House of Commons, 2018-12-03
Topic: International Affairs
Charles Geoffrey Cox (Conservative, Centre-right): The hon. Member puts his finger on something that I do regard as being one of the undesirable features of the backstop, which is that there will be rules passed relating to goods. The trade in goods is a narrow field of human and public life, but rules will be passed and the people of Northern Ireland will not have the right of representation in their passage. That is why I think it is essential it should be temporary, why we must strive to make it so, why the extension of the implementation period is a real option in those circumstances, and why I believe, for the reasons I have already given, we can avoid it or avoid it being of any great length.
Withdrawal Agreement: Legal Position — House of Commons, 2018-12-03
Topic: International Affairs
Robert Henry Halfon (Conservative, Centre-right): Will my right hon. and learned Friend publish not the whole legal advice, but the legal advice on why we have to give £39 billion to the European Union? He mentioned that there could possibly be an extension to the transition period. Will he set out our legal financial obligations if we do extend the transition period?
Withdrawal Agreement: Legal Position — House of Commons, 2018-12-03
Topic: International Affairs
Charles Geoffrey Cox (Conservative, Centre-right): There would be financial obligations for extending the implementation of the transition period. They would have to be negotiated at the time. The Joint Committee would consult on them and it would reflect a reasonable proportion or contribution for the period for which we were signing up. In relation to any advice connected with the £39 billion, again my right hon. Friend will understand that I am not at liberty to disclose advice the Government may have received on that matter. I can say that there has been very widespread commentary and discussion on it. I commend to him, for example, the House of Lords European Union Committee.
Withdrawal Agreement: Legal Position — House of Commons, 2018-12-03
Topic: Law and Crime
Margaret Ann Throup (Conservative, Centre-right): Can my right hon. and learned Friend reassure me, as someone without any legal background at all, that I have interpreted the lawyer-client relationship correctly: that it allows for the lawyer to provide impartial and proper legal advice unencumbered by political consideration? Does this convention hold true in relation to the issue we are talking about today?
Withdrawal Agreement: Legal Position — House of Commons, 2018-12-03
Topic: Law and Crime
Charles Geoffrey Cox (Conservative, Centre-right): Yes. My hon. Friend is absolutely right. No lawyer would be worth his salt or any use to his client if he allowed his personal or political views to affect his judgment on matters of law.
Withdrawal Agreement: Legal Position — House of Commons, 2018-12-03
Topic: International Affairs
Charles Geoffrey Cox (Conservative, Centre-right): The governance provisions, set out between articles 167 and 181, provide for 25 independent arbitrators, who are not members of any member state of the European Union or belong to the United Kingdom, to be appointed by both sides as a panel from which an arbitral tribunal can be selected. Ten are to be proposed by the United Kingdom and 10 by the European Union. Five chairmen are then to be proposed by each. If the parties are unable to agree, when a tribunal is formed two are appointed by the UK and two are appointed by the EU. Those four then choose the chairman. If they are unable to decide on a chairman, the permanent court of arbitration will appoint by lot.
Withdrawal Agreement: Legal Position — House of Commons, 2018-12-03
Topic: International Affairs
Caroline Elizabeth Johnson (Conservative, Centre-right): My current understanding is that if there is no deal, we will leave with no backstop on 29 March. If the EU and the Republic of Ireland have been content effectively to have a "leave without backstop with two years’ notice period" situation until now, what does the Attorney General think has changed that makes it unacceptable to them now? What does he consider their motivation for that to be? As an aside, can the Attorney General confirm that in extremis the Vienna convention can be used to allow treaties to be broken?
Withdrawal Agreement: Legal Position — House of Commons, 2018-12-03
Topic: International Affairs
Charles Geoffrey Cox (Conservative, Centre-right): The purpose of the backstop is to give the people of Northern Ireland and the Republic the confidence of knowing that there will not be any retreat from the current integration that has taken place between them over the past 20 years. That is a solemn commitment that is in the interests of Northern Ireland, as well as the Republic of Ireland. The question is how to achieve it. In the interim before another solution is found, which I firmly believe we shall find, this is the solution that would pertain were we ever to have to use it. As to the Vienna convention, there is no provision in the Vienna convention that allows us to terminate a treaty that has no termination clause and that is plainly intended to subsist until another event takes place.
Withdrawal Agreement: Legal Position — House of Commons, 2018-12-03
Topic: International Affairs
Robert Alexander Courts (Conservative, Centre-right): I am very grateful for the Attorney General’s indication that article 50 does not provide a legal basis in Union law for permanent future arrangements. Will he give his view on the concern that it might none the less be a basis for arrangements that prove to be indefinite?
Withdrawal Agreement: Legal Position — House of Commons, 2018-12-03
Topic: International Affairs
Charles Geoffrey Cox (Conservative, Centre-right): No, I do not believe that that is the case. Once it became de facto the subsisting and permanent arrangement, in that there was no prospect of agreement because negotiations had broken down, it would be severely vulnerable to challenge, because it is widely understood that article 50 cannot be a proper basis for any sort of permanent or enduring arrangement. The fact of the matter is that it would be extremely vulnerable to legal challenge.
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2018-12-03
Topic: International Affairs
John Simon Bercow (Conservative, Centre-right): First, I recall the hon. Gentleman’s inquiry. I would not have been able to pinpoint the date—I advise those attending to our proceedings outwith the Chamber—as I do not have that level of anorakish recall of his parliamentary contributions, but I do recall the fact of the question being put. It made an impression on me, as does so much of what he says. Secondly, as a matter of principle, the Foreign Secretary ought by now to have replied to a request of that date—if it was of that date—from the hon. Gentleman. Thirdly, as a matter of practicality, I say that it is somewhat unwise for a Minister—in this case, apparently, the Foreign Secretary, an extremely experienced and dextrous, as well as courteous, parliamentarian—not to have replied to the hon. Gentleman by now, for failure to provide one was bound to invite excoriation. The Foreign Secretary will now be on the receiving end of that as soon as he learns of the hon. Gentleman’s point of order. I hope that on all three counts I have brought some happiness into his life.
Crime (Overseas Production Orders) Bill [Lords] — House of Commons, 2018-12-03
Topic: Law and Crime
Robert Ben Lobban Wallace (Conservative, Centre-right): Under the current system, we present an MLA to a country’s central Government authority, which will take it to that country’s courts. Once it is out of our hands, the pace will be that of the country concerned. Its courts will recognise the order and enforce it against the CSPs overseas, which are predominantly in the United States—for instance, Facebook and Google—and will then bring it back to us. That whole process involves many bureaucratic delays. For instance, there is the time that it takes for the case to go to the central authority and then to the courts, and the time that it takes for the volume of the orders to be decided, and sometimes challenged, in the courts. We are simply seeking to introduce a system whereby our police go to a court in the United Kingdom, the court makes the order, and the international treaties allow our orders to be recognised by overseas CSPs.
Crime (Overseas Production Orders) Bill [Lords] — House of Commons, 2018-12-03
Topic: Law and Crime
Robert Ben Lobban Wallace (Conservative, Centre-right): As I have said, some of them have gone on for years. Some cases are still sitting in courts overseas. It is predominantly a matter of months and years at present, and we want to reduce that to days and weeks. Every day on which we cannot access content in this area—and let us remember that it is the court, not me, that must be satisfied that a request from the police is valid—is a day on which, in many cases, the offenders are still offending. That is why we think the Bill is so important. It reflects the changes in how offending is happening, and the fact that it is now happening online. For many months, Members on both sides of the House have asked what more the Government can do about not only online radicalisation but online offending. This is a concrete step to ensure that we can do more to counter it The MLA process will continue to exist. It remains critical to other types of evidence that are not within the scope of the Bill and to any electronic evidence that may not be provided for by the relevant international agreement. However, one of the biggest pitfalls of the current system is the long wait to secure electronic data that, by its nature, can be shared very quickly. The Bill provides the solution in the form of an additional, streamlined alternative: the overseas production order I do not doubt that Members will support the crucial purpose of the Bill, which is to provide a significantly faster mechanism for obtaining vital electronic data that is held by overseas providers in order to prosecute the most serious offenders and to safeguard vulnerable people in our society from further unnecessary harm. I commend it to the House.
Crime (Overseas Production Orders) Bill [Lords] — House of Commons, 2018-12-03
Topic: Law and Crime
Caroline Elizabeth Johnson (Conservative, Centre-right): The way in which we communicate with one another has changed dramatically as a result of the digital age. The rapid growth of social media platforms has led to a sea change in how information is shared, conveyed and consumed. Indeed, the use of these platforms is ubiquitous in this House, and not a day goes by without Members’ WhatsApp messages being conveniently "leaked". However, the convenience, accessibility and anonymity of these platforms has not been lost on those with more nefarious intentions, from terrorist groups looking to spread their hateful propaganda to child abuse rings sharing horrific images, and they are enthusiastically embracing this technology. As those who intend to cause harm change their methods of communication, so must our laws change to counteract that. The Bill will help us to keep pace with the increasing use of global electronic communications by criminals The current regime of mutual legal assistance is too slow and bureaucratic to make an effective contribution to an investigation. An MLA request to the United States can typically take nine months to produce what is being sought. This results in delayed or abandoned investigations and can delay people from being eliminated from criminal investigations. It is clear that when dealing with fast-moving dynamic criminal threats, this system is not fit for purpose. A nine-month wait for crucial information can be nine months too long. Overseas production orders, as provided by the Bill, will make the process far faster and more reliable, as they will get the information directly from companies. Rather than waiting for another country to consider whether it can comply with a request, then issue a court order or warrant and serve it, a judge in the UK will be able to go straight to a foreign company and get the information required in days, rather than months The new system that the Bill provides for will help us to tackle one of the most heinous crimes: child abuse. As the Minister outlined, there has been an exponential increase in the reports of child sexual abuse. As a paediatric consultant, I have treated far too many children who have fallen victim to this crime, sometimes with horrific physical injuries resulting from the abuse and with the mental health consequences that can occur at the time and later. The National Crime Agency estimates that a minimum of 66,000 to 80,000 individuals in the UK present some kind of threat to children. Each child is an individual, and each family can be badly affected. Any measure that helps to prevent one more child from suffering this fate deserves our full support. The Bill will ensure that child sexual abusers will see swift justice for their actions, and I welcome it.