EU: UK and the Dublin Convention
01 September 1992
The UK has deported 36 Yugoslavian refugees back to Belgium and Germany by strictly applying the terms of the Dublin Convention which says that refugees seeking asylum should be returned to safe third countries. A further 20 refugees from Yugoslavia are facing similar treatment and lawyers dealing with these cases believe many more have been sent directly back when they arrive at ports and airports and therefore have never been recorded in the figures.
Under the Dublin Convention refugees can only seek asylum in the country to which they first flee and because there are no flights out of Yugoslavia direct entry to the UK is virtually impossible. Mr Charles Wardle MP, Under Secretary of State at the Home Office defended the government's action and said they would be more sympathetic to applications for asylum from those who had clearly not "lingered" in another country. These deportations have been condemned by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, other EC governments and refugee groups in the UK.
The Dublin Convention & the "Ponsonby rule"
The Dublin Convention was prepared by the Ad Hoc Group on Immigration and agreed by the 12 EC governments in Dublin in June 1990. It is an inter-governmental agreement which is not subject to debate in the formal structures of the EC so the European Parliament had no chance to debate it. Under the Convention a refugee can only apply for asylum to one country in the EC and this is the country their first arrive in. It also sets out that refugees can be deported to "safe" third countries.
Under UK parliamentary procedure the Dublin Convention was laid before parliament in September 1991, when the House of Commons was not sitting, under what is known as "the Ponsonby rules". As no MP objected it was formally ratified by the UK state 21 days later. Arthur Ponsonby, a life-long pacifist and campaigner for open government, was Under-Secretary of State at the Foreign Office in the Ramsay MacDonald government of 1924. He gave an undertaking, during the 2nd reading of the Treaty of Peace (Turkey) Bill on 1 April 1924, that the House of Commons would be informed of all treaties and agreements and that they would be "laid" before the House for 21 days. It became a constitutional practice observed by governments. Unlike most other national legislatures where written constitutions gives parliaments the formal power of ratifying treaties and agreements this power rests with the government in the UK (exercising the royal prerogative on behalf of the monarch) - parliament only has a say if a very keen-eyed MP spots a proposed agreement during the 21 days and organises opposition to it. Graham Allen, Labour frontbench spokesperson on Home Affairs, has written to the Home Secretary saying that the Convention which "fundamentally affects the rights of refugees and migrants in the UK and Europe...has escaped effective parliamentary scrutiny".
Independent 12 & 13.8.92; Dublin Convention Cm 1623 HMSO, 1991; Treaties and the House of Commons Factsheet no 57 Public Information Office.