Impact of the Human Rights Act

ITV played a blinder this week with their screening of “Human Rights and Wrongs” as part of the “Tonight” series. Okay, it was a little biased in favour of the notion that the ECHR is a criminals’ charter and the presence of Shami Chakrabarti did seem a token gesture but as an access to the judiciary route for AS it was first rate.

This is the blurb:

“In tonight’s programme we explore how Human Rights laws work in this country.

Some recent human rights decisions have caused public outcry. The prospect of prisoners being given the right to vote, whatever their crime, and sex offenders having the right to have their names wiped from the sex offenders register has led members of the public and politicians to question if human rights laws are working.

Tonight, Fiona Foster meets ordinary people whose lives have been changed because of human rights legislation.

She first meets John Hirst, the man behind prisoners getting the right to vote. Hirst was jailed for 15 years for the manslaughter of his 63 year old landlady with an axe. In 2001 he took a case against the UK Crown to the European Court of Human Rights over the blanket ban on prisoners having the right to vote.

They ruled in his favour but so far our government has not lifted the ban and in a recent debate, MPs voted 234-22 against prisoners having the vote.

The Human Rights Act came into law in 2000, when it brought the European Convention on Human Rights into our legislature. The Convention, conceived after the Second World War, was written to try to prevent past human rights violations from happening again. The UK ratified the Convention in 1950 along with other members of the Council of Europe.

Even if we got rid of the Human Rights Act, we’d still be subject to the rules of the European Convention of Human Rights.

But it’s not just criminals who are benefiting from human rights law. Victims of crime have also benefited from the Act.

Naomi Bryant was murdered in 2005 by a sex offender recently released from jail, Anthony Rice. Using the Human Rights Act her mother Verna Bryant was able to successfully secure an inquest into her daughter’s death.

We find out how important this has been to Verna and the systematic failings discovered by the inquest.

We also hear from Paul Houston who is campaigning to change human rights law after his daughter’s killer avoided deportation because of human rights law.

Amy Houston was killed in a hit and run accident by Aso Mohammed Ibrahim, a failed asylum seeker disqualified from driving, who left the scene of the accident with Amy fighting for her life. Following his release from prison the UK Border Agency has unsuccessfully tried to remove Ibrahim from the country; they have been prevented from doing so because of his right to a family life.

Mr Houston wants rights to come with responsibilities and talks of his pain of feeling that the man who killed his daughter has had his right to a family life put above his own.

Other people in the programme include Debbie Purdy who suffers from Multiple Sclerosis; Debbie used Human Rights law to clarify if husband would be prosecuted if he assisted her to commit suicide, when her illness became unendurable to her.

We also follow the case of Arlene Fraser who was murdered by her husband in 1998. Her family went through numerous court appearances, as Nat Fraser appealed his conviction. Having been unsuccessful he brought a further appeal at the Supreme Court under his human right to a fair trial.

We hear from Arlene’s sister Carol about how it’s affected the family.

Last month David Cameron announced a Commission to look into human rights law and to consider the idea of replacing them with a British Bill of Rights. The commission will have to consider how a British Bill of Rights would incorporate current human rights law under the European Convention on Human Rights.”

This is the link

This is a summary of the arguments for and against a British Bill of Rights

The following can be regarded as arguments for a UK Bill of Rights either to replace the Human Rights Act or sit alongside it.
• A Bill of Rights would be a unifying force and help create a common bond. They would build on the HRA, giving further effect to principles as old as the Magna Carta, and thereby punctuating British values at a time when social mobility and diversity is increasing.
• A Bill of Rights would give explicit recognition of the link between rights and responsibilities, thus putting them in their proper context. This would give individuals a clearer idea of what to expect from public authorities and from each other. Education would be enhanced and greater citizenship would be promoted.
• A Bill of Rights would protect the individual against the powerful, addressing the needs of the poorest and most marginalised such as older people in healthcare, asylum seekers, adults with learning disabilities, and children in secure training centres.
• A Bill of Rights could include recognition of the importance of economic and social rights which are not covered by the HRA, e.g. the right to health and education, the right of access to court, the right to jury trial. On the latter it could also include more detailed articulation of this abstract principle.
• A Bill of Rights could restore the checks and balances that have been eroded by a steady stream of anti-terrorism legislation. The HRA has not been an effective bulwark against this. Since its inception it has not prevented restrictions on the right to assembly near Parliament (SOCPA, 2005), the ban on incitement to religious hatred, extension of detention without trial, increased use of stop and search, the use of kittling (e.g. student protests November 2010) and so on.
• In this way, a Bill of Rights would be “HRA plus”. The HRA and the rights in the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) must be the minimum safety net below which rights protection should not fall. Besides it would be impossible not to adhere to the ECHR since it is a condition of EU membership and Britain would still be bound by international law.
• A Bill of Rights would perform a symbolic or iconic role by suggesting that the state was serious about rights, and reflecting changes in society since the ECHR was drafted over 50 years ago. Thus it could include reference to the right not to be discriminated against on grounds of sexuality. This would reinvigorate democracy by empowering individuals and communities.

The following can be regarded as arguments against a UK Bill of Rights
• A Bill of Rights is only worth pursuing if it builds on the rights the HRA provides. It should not be a cynical attempt by politicians to remedy perceived failings of the HRA, e.g. that the HRA’s existence has prevented officials from deporting suspected terrorists since it would have infringed their human rights.
• A debate about a Bill of Rights could weaken the protection of existing civil liberties, especially if it afforded less protection than the ECHR/HRA, or if there were differences between a Bill of Rights and international human rights standards. There is a suggestion that the real motivation behind new proposals is to dilute the protections for human rights already contained in the HRA.
• On a related note, it is worth pointing out that the right wing press have picked up on the British Bill of Rights campaign only recently. These attacks cannot be divorced from accusations that “foreigners” are interfering in matters of British justice – there is more than a tinge of euro-scepticism (which should be unconnected to a rights debate) here.
• The unnecessary argument: it is disingenuous to talk of a British Bill of Rights since we already have one in all but name in the shape of the ECHR.
• What Mao Tse-tung might have called the “it’s too early to tell” argument: the HRA has only been in effect since 2000. It is better to wait for it to “bed down” and be understood by the public. Moreover, we don’t know how the new Supreme Court might begin to interpret the Act once it is fully settle into its new home at Middlesex Guildhall.
• Many Bills of Rights weaken rights protection by adopting aspirational tones or including aspirational language. Statements about the way society should be or the values you want as a society are not justiciable.
• In addition we can incorporate into our argument many of the negatives of potential codification of our constitution: the lack of inter-party consensus; low levels of public interest and the concomitant danger of low turnout in a referendum; fossilisation (e.g. the US 2nd Amendment).