Expediency and Constitutional Strictures

Some, including Paco Oliva, of the Chronicle, have excused and gone so far as to praise the expedient handling of the recent Guardia Civil incursions on grounds of reducing inter state tensions. There is no excuse in any situation for anyone to ride roughshod over constitutional and legal safeguards: processes exist for the greater good and not to be arbitrarily ignored for political or diplomatic ends. This has been shown by the recent protest made by the British government to the Spanish Government over the recent Guardia Civil incursions.

The jump to the conclusion that any incursion is not politically motivated by Spain brings with it the setting of dangerous precedents liable to abuse by the Spanish Government in the future. We will see how this develops.

Do the Guardia Civil now have a free reign to do it again? If they do it again, what will Gibraltar's authorities do? React the same way or assume again that in the heat of "hot pursuit" other Guardia Civiles have lost their way again? The Guardia Civiles knew at all times where they were. Any person with basic boating skills will know that. They skilfully avoided all harbour walls and entered through the harbour entrance, hardly indicative of not knowing where they were headed for.

One wonders how the Gibraltar Police reached the conclusions that they reached on this incident so quickly? How many witnesses did they interview?

Expediency is never a good excuse to ignore proper legal process, even if it produces a good and obvious conclusion. Expediency can and will bring adverse consequences in the future in other areas that will be of more concern to the citizen.