Activists and human rights

[MotCO]

I can imagine a large proportion of the population think we had already left the ECHR because it has the word European in it.

That is a fair comment. I still struggle to understand the various lines of jurisdiction.

 

[Berliner]

Not going to happen, as the Belfast Agreement is predicated upon incorporating the ECHR.

The tories don't care about the GFA one bit.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

The UK, like all EU member states, could have controlled our borders while remaining part of the EU.

Eh? How could we have controlled our borders as part of the EU when EU freedom of movement rules (roughly) mandate allowing any EU citizen to live in any EU country?

 

[Lost property]

And can you explain exactly what Freedom of Movement actually means?

I suggest you visit any war memorial along with the significance of the "11th hour of the 11th day " and the millions who died as the best definition as to why F.O.M has such prominence...until the " Divine Saviour ", ok Farage if you prefer, decided to make his malignant presence felt.

That said, this Gov't is determined to negate any forms of human rights, well as many as it feels it can get away with, to appease an insular demographic and its own populist ideologists.

Remember, the UK once had a justified reputation for offering sanctuary for the oppressed...now, the Gov't seem to revel in tarnishing the UK's global standing in as many areas as it can.

Activists are essential to openly defy, and counter, the otherwise autocratic actions of Gov'ts per se who feel they can abuse the populations as much as those in power wish

 

[najaB]

I suggest you visit any war memorial along with the significance of the "11th hour of the 11th day " and the millions who died as the best definition as to why F.O.M has such prominence...until the " Divine Saviour ", ok Farage if you prefer, decided to make his malignant presence felt.

Oh, I know what FoM means in the context of Article 45 of the TEFU, but I wanted to know if @KenA does.

Eh? How could we have controlled our borders as part of the EU when EU freedom of movement rules (roughly) mandate allowing any EU citizen to live in any EU country?

They do not.

 

[ainsworth74]

That is a fair comment. I still struggle to understand the various lines of jurisdiction.

Very very broadly the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) is the court of the Council of Europe and, as the name implies, deals with matter relating to European Convention on Human Rights. It effectively acts as an appellate court, broadly meaning that you need to have exhausted your domestic legal process before you can appeal to the ECHR for them to rule on your case. If you think someone has breached your human rights, for instance at work, your starting point would be the Employment Tribunal not the ECHR. You'd end up asking for the ECHR to look at your case only once you'd been to the Employment Tribunal and appealed any decision of theirs all the way through the domestic UK court system.

Now, the important thing here to note is that the Council of Europe is a separate organisation to the European Union with its own linage and treaties. You can be a member of the Council of Europe without being a member of the EU. The Council of Europe actually has 46 members (previously 47 until Russia decided to invade Ukraine) whereas the EU is of course only 27.

The Council of Europe actually gets its start in 1949 (a couple of years before the European Coal and Steel Community which would eventually become the European Union in future decades) and is the brainchild of several people including most notably Winston Churchill who was a keen proponent of an organisation whose primary goal was to protect and promote democracy, human rights and the rule of law. It was effectively an idea born of two global conflicts which had spawned from Europe in the first half of the twentieth century and had killed tens of millions. It created a few years later the European Convention on Human Rights (for anyone who hasn't looked before, it might be worth having a quick glance through the list of things it protects, Wiki has a reasonable summary with links to more detailed info) which in the UK was eventually given proper force of domestic law by the Human Rights Act 1998. UK fingerprints are all over the Council of Europe, the European Convention of Human Rights and the European Court of Human Rights.

So having left the EU we are no longer, outside anything within any agreements with subsequently signed, not subject to the courts of the European Union. We are, however, still subject to the ECHR as we remain a member of Council of Europe.

These are, to a great extent, institutions we designed and set up. We were there at the start (the founding treaty is the Treaty of London) and were set up by UK leaders (such as Winston Churchill, that famed woke lefty!). It is a great disappointment and concern that the Conservative Party and the right wing press have decided that somehow that this is a great affront to our dignity.

In the case of the Rwandan deportations my understanding is that the intervention of the ECHR was to effectively say not that "you cannot deport these people" but that you have to allow the legal process to play out properly before they are deported. There are appeals ongoing so it would seem perverse not to allow them to reach their conclusion before deporting people.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

They do not.

Really? I just checked Article 45, and it's pretty clear that, provided an EU citizen has some offer of employment in a different EU country, then that EU citizen has the right to go and live and work in that country, and to continue living there after any termination of that employment. I'm struggling to imagine how that would allow the UK, if it were still an EU member, to control its borders in regard to EU immigration.

 

[najaB]

Really? I just checked Article 45, and it's pretty clear that, provided an EU citizen has some offer of employment in a different EU country, then that EU citizen has the right to go and live and work in that country, and to continue living there after any termination of that employment. I'm struggling to imagine how that would allow the UK, if it were still an EU member, to control its borders in regard to EU immigration.

You answered your own question "provided an EU citizen has some offer of employment". FoM doesn't, as some claim, give rise to uncontrolled migration as member states have the right to require economically inactive people to leave.

There are also exclusions on the basis of public policy.

 

[AlterEgo]

I'm struggling to imagine how that would allow the UK, if it were still an EU member, to control its borders in regard to EU immigration.

It has been able to deport Romanian beggars, for example, in a number of reported cases.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

You answered your own question "provided an EU citizen has some offer of employment". FoM doesn't, as some claim, give rise to uncontrolled migration as member states have the right to require economically inactive people to leave.

That doesn't really give meaningful control of borders in the sense that most people would understand the term - since it still leaves a huge group of foreign citizens for which the Government has no effective say on whether or not they can move to the UK: Basically, any EU citizen who has some employment offer. In terms of uncontrolled migration - that certainly did lead to uncontrolled migration for a period of about 15 years (roughly between 2005 and 2020) when huge numbers of people were moving to the UK that the Government had not anticipated or planned for, and in numbers that - certainly after 2010 and possibly before then - the UK Government didn't wish.

 

[brad465]

Very very broadly the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) is the court of the Council of Europe and, as the name implies, deals with matter relating to European Convention on Human Rights. It effectively acts as an appellate court, broadly meaning that you need to have exhausted your domestic legal process before you can appeal to the ECHR for them to rule on your case. If you think someone has breached your human rights, for instance at work, your starting point would be the Employment Tribunal not the ECHR. You'd end up asking for the ECHR to look at your case only once you'd been to the Employment Tribunal and appealed any decision of theirs all the way through the domestic UK court system.

Now, the important thing here to note is that the Council of Europe is a separate organisation to the European Union with its own linage and treaties. You can be a member of the Council of Europe without being a member of the EU. The Council of Europe actually has 46 members (previously 47 until Russia decided to invade Ukraine) whereas the EU is of course only 27.

The Council of Europe actually gets its start in 1949 (a couple of years before the European Coal and Steel Community which would eventually become the European Union in future decades) and is the brainchild of several people including most notably Winston Churchill who was a keen proponent of an organisation whose primary goal was to protect and promote democracy, human rights and the rule of law. It was effectively an idea born of two global conflicts which had spawned from Europe in the first half of the twentieth century and had killed tens of millions. It created a few years later the European Convention on Human Rights (for anyone who hasn't looked before, it might be worth having a quick glance through the list of things it protects, Wiki has a reasonable summary with links to more detailed info) which in the UK was eventually given proper force of domestic law by the Human Rights Act 1998. UK fingerprints are all over the Council of Europe, the European Convention of Human Rights and the European Court of Human Rights.

So having left the EU we are no longer, outside anything within any agreements with subsequently signed, not subject to the courts of the European Union. We are, however, still subject to the ECHR as we remain a member of Council of Europe.

These are, to a great extent, institutions we designed and set up. We were there at the start (the founding treaty is the Treaty of London) and were set up by UK leaders (such as Winston Churchill, that famed woke lefty!). It is a great disappointment and concern that the Conservative Party and the right wing press have decided that somehow that this is a great affront to our dignity.

In the case of the Rwandan deportations my understanding is that the intervention of the ECHR was to effectively say not that "you cannot deport these people" but that you have to allow the legal process to play out properly before they are deported. There are appeals ongoing so it would seem perverse not to allow them to reach their conclusion before deporting people.

Yes the thinking seems to be that the whole scheme to send refugees to Rwanda is actually designed to reduce the rights of UK citizens, as the Government can attack/blame the ECHR, depart form it, and as all the rights enshrined in it are not in UK law they no longer apply. The tribalism of the last 6 years has done a great job of making many think that just because someone one doesn't like decides something, doesn't mean everything they decide is wrong. As Tony Benn once said:

"The way a government treats refugees is very instructive because it shows you how they would treat the rest of us if they thought they could get away with it."

 

[Mikw]

Yes the thinking seems to be that the whole scheme to send refugees to Rwanda is actually designed to reduce the rights of UK citizens, as the Government can attack/blame the ECHR, depart form it, and as all the rights enshrined in it are not in UK law they no longer apply. The tribalism of the last 6 years has done a great job of making many think that just because someone one doesn't like decides something, doesn't mean everything they decide is wrong. As Tony Benn once said:

"The way a government treats refugees is very instructive because it shows you how they would treat the rest of us if they thought they could get away with it."

Indeed, and seeing as some of the ECHR is not backed up in British law that means the population has a lot to loose if Boris and crew decide to withdraw.

I mean, we've already lost our right to protest in the recently passed police bill.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

I mean, we've already lost our right to protest in the recently passed police bill.

No you haven't! That's just propaganda that Labour and the LibDems kept repeating ad nauseum, despite it being manifestly largely false. That act passed nearly 2 months ago, and I haven't noticed any reduction of people speaking out or generally protesting against the Government since then. What you've lost is (roughly speaking) that, if you want to harass other people or prevent other people from going about their normal lives as part of your protest, then it's become easier for the police to stop you (and those are things that really should not be part of any legitimate protest anyway).

It created a few years later the European Convention on Human Rights (for anyone who hasn't looked before, it might be worth having a quick glance through the list of things it protects, Wiki has a reasonable summary with links to more detailed info) which in the UK was eventually given proper force of domestic law by the Human Rights Act 1998. UK fingerprints are all over the Council of Europe, the European Convention of Human Rights and the European Court of Human Rights.

That's a good summary you've given. But to my mind, the problem isn't with the things that the EHCR protects: In general they are good things that should normally be protected. The problem is that the EHCR was written a long time ago, in a way that was suitable for and reflected the mindset and conditions of the immediate postwar period, and it appears not to have kept up with today's World. The thing that immediately strikes me on reading it is that it's very much based on the idea of entitlement: People can demand their rights, but there's no corresponding sense of responsibility by individuals: To my mind, the two go hand in hand: If you're not willing to respect the human rights of other people then do you have any moral right to demand that anyone respects your human rights? And thus we end up in the absurd situation where people who have systematically committed crimes and destroyed the lives of others without any second thought can suddenly demand that - for example - their own right to a family life is absolutely respected. Unsurprisingly, setting up human rights in this way appears to have have strongly contributed to an unpleasant culture of entitlement where people know their own 'rights' while having no concern for anyone else. And in the particular context of migrants and refugees, we've ended up in the equally absurd situation where thousands of people sit, camped in a safe country (France), perfectly at liberty to claim asylum there if they choose, but who instead choose to pay smugglers and risk their own lives in perilous dinghies etc., expecting that the UK Government will at considerable expense rescue them from the consequences of their own actions, and then feed and house them when they have no prior connection with the UK, purely because they'd rather be in the UK than France. Is this really the kind of behaviour the ECHR was designed to protect? It seems to me perfectly legitimate to question whether this is the best framework for protecting human rights, or whether something else would be better.

So having left the EU we are no longer, outside anything within any agreements with subsequently signed, not subject to the courts of the European Union. We are, however, still subject to the ECHR as we remain a member of Council of Europe.

These are, to a great extent, institutions we designed and set up. We were there at the start (the founding treaty is the Treaty of London) and were set up by UK leaders (such as Winston Churchill, that famed woke lefty!). It is a great disappointment and concern that the Conservative Party and the right wing press have decided that somehow that this is a great affront to our dignity.

I think the issue that concerns many on the right is not who drafted the original ECHR proposals - it's more the fact that decisions are now being made about UK policies by anonymous judges outside the UK based on principles that - as outlined in my previous paragraph - seem at best questionable. It doesn't seem unreasonable that someone who believes strongly that UK laws should be made by the UK Parliament elected by the UK people would be concerned about that.

In the case of the Rwandan deportations my understanding is that the intervention of the ECHR was to effectively say not that "you cannot deport these people" but that you have to allow the legal process to play out properly before they are deported. There are appeals ongoing so it would seem perverse not to allow them to reach their conclusion before deporting people.

That sounds fine in theory, but the problem is, how long would those appeals take, while those peoples' legal representatives presumably use every legal trick they can to extend the process as long as possible? Weeks? Months? Years? Is there really a problem in principle if the people concerned are fed and housed in Rwanda while those appeals are heard, provided of course that they will be returned to the UK in the event that their appeals are ultimately successful?

 

[Mikw]

No you haven't! That's just propaganda that Labour and the LibDems kept repeating ad nauseum, despite it being manifestly largely false. That act passed nearly 2 months ago, and I haven't noticed any reduction of people speaking out or generally protesting against the Government since then. What you've lost is (roughly speaking) that, if you want to harass other people or prevent other people from going about their normal lives as part of your protest, then it's become easier for the police to stop you (and those are things that really should not be part of any legitimate protest anyway).



That's a good summary you've given. But to my mind, the problem isn't with the things that the EHCR protects: In general they are good things that should normally be protected. The problem is that the EHCR was written a long time ago, in a way that was suitable for and reflected the mindset and conditions of the immediate postwar period, and it appears not to have kept up with today's World. The thing that immediately strikes me on reading it is that it's very much based on the idea of entitlement: People can demand their rights, but there's no corresponding sense of responsibility by individuals: To my mind, the two go hand in hand: If you're not willing to respect the human rights of other people then do you have any moral right to demand that anyone respects your human rights? And thus we end up in the absurd situation where people who have systematically committed crimes and destroyed the lives of others without any second thought can suddenly demand that - for example - their own right to a family life is absolutely respected. Unsurprisingly, setting up human rights in this way appears to have have strongly contributed to an unpleasant culture of entitlement where people know their own 'rights' while having no concern for anyone else. And in the particular context of migrants and refugees, we've ended up in the equally absurd situation where thousands of people sit, camped in a safe country (France), perfectly at liberty to claim asylum there if they choose, but who instead choose to pay smugglers and risk their own lives in perilous dinghies etc., expecting that the UK Government will at considerable expense rescue them from the consequences of their own actions, and then feed and house them when they have no prior connection with the UK, purely because they'd rather be in the UK than France. Is this really the kind of behaviour the ECHR was designed to protect? It seems to me perfectly legitimate to question whether this is the best framework for protecting human rights, or whether something else would be better.



I think the issue that concerns many on the right is not who drafted the original ECHR proposals - it's more the fact that decisions are now being made about UK policies by anonymous judges outside the UK based on principles that - as outlined in my previous paragraph - seem at best questionable. It doesn't seem unreasonable that someone who believes strongly that UK laws should be made by the UK Parliament elected by the UK people would be concerned about that.



That sounds fine in theory, but the problem is, how long would those appeals take, while those peoples' legal representatives presumably use every legal trick they can to extend the process as long as possible? Weeks? Months? Years? Is there really a problem in principle if the people concerned are fed and housed in Rwanda while those appeals are heard, provided of course that they will be returned to the UK in the event that their appeals are ultimately successful?

The right to protest hasn't been properly tested yet. But in broad terms ANY protest that the home secretary might find annoying is now liable to a lengthy spell in jail.

So yes, you have lost the right to protest.

 

[AlterEgo]

The right to protest hasn't been properly tested yet. But in broad terms ANY protest that the home secretary might find annoying is now liable to a lengthy spell in jail.

So yes, you have lost the right to protest.

Tend to agree. The bill is worrisome and civil disobedience and protest is a vital part of the democratic ecosystem. Most democratic change comes away from the ballot box.

 

[najaB]

No you haven't! That's just propaganda that Labour and the LibDems kept repeating ad nauseum, despite it being manifestly largely false. That act passed nearly 2 months ago, and I haven't noticed any reduction of people speaking out or generally protesting against the Government since then. What you've lost is (roughly speaking) that, if you want to harass other people or prevent other people from going about their normal lives as part of your protest, then it's become easier for the police to stop you (and those are things that really should not be part of any legitimate protest anyway).

Nobody notices that the salami is getting smaller after the first slice.

 

[DarloRich]

No you haven't! That's just propaganda that Labour and the LibDems kept repeating ad nauseum, despite it being manifestly largely false. That act passed nearly 2 months ago, and I haven't noticed any reduction of people speaking out or generally protesting against the Government since then. What you've lost is (roughly speaking) that, if you want to harass other people or prevent other people from going about their normal lives as part of your protest, then it's become easier for the police to stop you (and those are things that really should not be part of any legitimate protest anyway).

I have been on plenty of noisy but not disruptive demos over the years. The new legislation seems to allow the home secretary to declare any protest she doesn't like, including but not limited to, those that are noisy or annoying as illegal. Anyone would think the whole legislation was drafted to stop that bloke in Parliament square shouting at Tory Mp's and dirty students who glue themselves to things from protesting!

If someone behind a protest is deemed a “public nuisance” – “intentionally or recklessly” – and causes “serious annoyance, serious inconvenience or serious loss of amenity” for someone in the community, they could face a jail sentence of up to 10 years.

Recall the 2nd referendum protests in 2019. They were huge, noisy and I am sure disruptive to people in London and annoying to the pro Brexit camp. These powers would, potentially, allow a pro Brexit home secretary to criminalise the organisers of those protests despite the fact these protests were peaceful and very good natured.

That seems pretty dodgy to me!

EDIT - I am Home Secretary and I don't like fox hunting and countryside folk. These plummy, tweedy, twonks descend on London blowing thier silly horns and letting thier silly dogs bark. Thier tractors are slow and block the street. I don't like them so decide they are annoying me. Criminalised. 10 years in clink for you Ponsonby-Smythe!

That isn't right either.

The right to protest hasn't been properly tested yet. But in broad terms ANY protest that the home secretary might find annoying is now liable to a lengthy spell in jail.

So yes, you have lost the right to protest.

Agreed

 

[Howardh]

When folks are suggesting freedom of movement equalled uncontrolled immigration, remember it works both ways, and gave us the freedom to live and work in any other EU country.

So for balance, when we were in the EU I'd love to know how many came here to settle, compared with how many UK citizens left to live abroad?

 

[Ediswan]

I think the issue that concerns many on the right is not who drafted the original ECHR proposals - it's more the fact that decisions are now being made about UK policies by anonymous judges outside the UK ...

The judges are not anonymous: Composition of the Court

 

[DynamicSpirit]

The judges are not anonymous: Composition of the Court

But they are not anonymous to the extent that it is not revealed who presides over a particular case?

 

[DarloRich]

Is this really the kind of behaviour the ECHR was designed to protect? It seems to me perfectly legitimate to question whether this is the best framework for protecting human rights, or whether something else would be better.

the problem is while your stance seems very reasonable ( if disagreeable personally) many of us do not believe the current government would offer us the same rights or protections that the ECHR or the Human Rights Act 1998 currently offer us.

You highlight one of the serious potential issues: That the government (especially this government) determines who amongst us may have rights rather than everyone having rights as described by the act.

 

[Ediswan]

But they are not anonymous to the extent that it is not revealed who presides over a particular case?

I looked up a recent decision, the president and other judges are named.
https://hudoc.echr.coe.int/eng#{"so...onid2":["JUDGMENTS"],"itemid":["001-217704"]}

In the case of Skorupa v. Poland,

The European Court of Human Rights (First Section), sitting as a Chamber composed of:

Marko Bošnjak, President,
Péter Paczolay,
Krzysztof Wojtyczek,
Alena Poláčková,
Raffaele Sabato,
Lorraine Schembri Orland,
Ioannis Ktistakis, judges,
and Renata Degener, Section Registrar,

 

[TwoYellas]

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/...man-rights-record-supreme-court-b2101344.html

Is there really a problem in principle if the people concerned are fed and housed in Rwanda while those appeals are heard, provided of course that they will be returned to the UK in the event that their appeals are ultimately successful?

---

Rwanda has an atrocious human rights record. A quote below from the article I posted above #53.



The US State Department also listed extensive concerns about Rwanda’s human rights practices in its most recent assessment of the country.

It warns: “Significant human rights issues included credible reports of: unlawful or arbitrary killings by the government; forced disappearance by the government; torture or cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment by the government; harsh and life-threatening prison conditions; arbitrary detention; political prisoners or detainees; politically motivated reprisals against individuals located outside the country, including killings, kidnappings, and violence; arbitrary or unlawful interference with privacy; serious restrictions on free expression and media, including threats of violence against journalists, unjustified arrests or prosecutions of journalists, and censorship; serious restrictions on internet freedom; substantial interference with the rights of peaceful assembly and freedom of association, including overly restrictive laws on the organisation, funding, or operation of nongovernmental and civil society organisations; serious and unreasonable restrictions on political participation; and serious government restrictions on or harassment of domestic and international human rights organisations.”

 

[windingroad]

the problem is while your stance seems very reasonable ( if disagreeable personally) many of us do not believe the current government would offer us the same rights or protections that the ECHR or the Human Rights Act 1998 currently offer us.

This is exactly it. Right now debating which court should have jurisdiction feels like a luxury. I'll take my rights wherever I can get them!

 

[Gloster]

My objection to any rewriting of the ECHR is that those who would rewrite it are likely to be, or be chosen by, the very people who would most like to restrict our rights. Changes are likely to ending up weakening the convention, rather than improving it. For the average citizen it is better to live with the current ECHR, with all its imperfections, than try to improve it and end up with unintended negative consequences. This may particularly be aimed at the UK and its government, but other countries might appoint delegates not entirely devoted to the freedoms supported by the convention. Who would Viktor Orban appoint?

As far as rights and responsibilities are concerned my feeling as a result of living abroad is that the responsibilities of a citizen in any given situation are automatically there in most countries. In this country they need to be proved in law to exist and the law only includes them to a limited extent, mainly in specific situations. If there is nothing saying that a citizen must do or not do something, there is no responsibility on them to so act,even if the action (or lack of it) is plain common-sense, decency, consideration, etc. (I am no legal expert.)

 

[windingroad]

My objection to any rewriting of the ECHR is that those who would rewrite it are likely to be, or be chosen by, the very people who would most like to restrict our rights. Changes are likely to ending up weakening the convention, rather than improving it. For the average citizen it is better to live with the current ECHR, with all its imperfections, than try to improve it and end up with unintended negative consequences.

There's a certain permanence to the ECHR which is reassuring. In contrast, once people start tinkering with rights domestically, what's to stop governments doing so repeatedly? Rights should be fundamental and not subject to the whims of whatever reactionary government happens to be in power.

 

[ainsworth74]

No you haven't! That's just propaganda that Labour and the LibDems kept repeating ad nauseum, despite it being manifestly largely false. That act passed nearly 2 months ago, and I haven't noticed any reduction of people speaking out or generally protesting against the Government since then. What you've lost is (roughly speaking) that, if you want to harass other people or prevent other people from going about their normal lives as part of your protest, then it's become easier for the police to stop you (and those are things that really should not be part of any legitimate protest anyway).

As always I admire your trust in this and, perhaps equally importantly, future Home Secretaries not to use their new sweeping powers for evil! Personally I don't think a Home Secretary of any party or calibre should have the power that they've now been given. Sure a decent Home Sec won't abuse it or allow it to be abused but the law is so loosely written than any guarantee of that purely rests of the shoulders of the incumbent of the day.

To me that is a concerning direction of travel for the government to be taking us in.

That's a good summary you've given. But to my mind, the problem isn't with the things that the EHCR protects: In general they are good things that should normally be protected. The problem is that the EHCR was written a long time ago, in a way that was suitable for and reflected the mindset and conditions of the immediate postwar period, and it appears not to have kept up with today's World.

Which articles in particular do you think are now outdated and should be reformed?

As a reminder, and for those playing along at home, the articles in full (with a brief explanation in [] added by me):

• Article 1 – respecting rights [Signatories will actually implement all of the rest of them]
• Article 2 – life [You have the right to your life]
• Article 3 – torture [Prohibits torture and inhumane or degrading treatment or punishment]
• Article 4 – servitude [Prohibits slavery and forced labour]
• Article 5 – liberty and security [You have the right to liberty and security of your person]
• Article 6 – fair trial [You have the right to a fair trial in front of an independent court and a presumption of innocence]
• Article 7 – retroactivity [You can't be punished for something you did in the past if it later become a crime]
• Article 8 – privacy [You have the right to your own private and family life along with your home and correspondence, this is quite broad!]
• Article 9 – conscience and religion [You have the freedom of thought and religious worship]
• Article 10 – expression [Basically freedom of speech]
• Article 11 – association [You can get together with others, including to form trade unions]
• Article 12 – marriage [You can marry and start a family, the court has yet to rule it applies to same-sex couples]
• Article 13 – effective remedy [Your country must provide a way for you to challenge them for a violation of the Convention]
• Article 14 – discrimination [You cannot be discriminated against for almost any reason but only with regards to the articles of this convention]
• Article 15 – derogations [Signatories can drop these articles in time of war or other public emergency threatening the existence of the nation]
• Article 16 – foreign parties [Signatories can restrict the political activity of foreigners]
• Article 17 – abuse of rights [No-one can try and use one of these articles to restrict another]
• Article 18 – permitted restrictions [Limitations allowed by the articles should only be used for the purpose that they were permitted for]

For anyone who would like to read in more detail Wiki is a good starting point.

There are also a variety of protocols which amend the Convention in various ways. Protocol 13 for instance outlaws the death penalty in all circumstances. Others just effect the machinery of how the thing operates. Protocol 14 for instance which tries to filter out cases where someone hasn't actually been put at a significant disadvantage by an alleged breech or where someone else from the same member state has brought a similar action before which has already been ruled on.

Personally speaking I can't really see anything that I think "Oh yes that's outdated now and from a different era, we should get rid of it or fundamentally overhaul it". Surely all of those rights remain core values of the United Kingdom and, frankly, of any proper Western style democracy? So what bits of the Convention would you get rid of? What hasn't "kept up with the modern world"?

The thing that immediately strikes me on reading it is that it's very much based on the idea of entitlement: People can demand their rights, but there's no corresponding sense of responsibility by individuals: To my mind, the two go hand in hand: If you're not willing to respect the human rights of other people then do you have any moral right to demand that anyone respects your human rights? And thus we end up in the absurd situation where people who have systematically committed crimes and destroyed the lives of others without any second thought can suddenly demand that - for example - their own right to a family life is absolutely respected.

But that isn't what the Convention is for. The Convention isn't to protect me from you (not that I'm suggesting you're out to get me!! ) or you from your neighbour down the road, or me from the local drug addict who has been terrorising the neighbourhood. It's to protect both of us (and the druggie) from the state. The Convention, given force in the UK by the Human Rights Act, only applies to public authorities (things like the government, courts, local councils, the police, etc etc). You and I have our interactions regulated by UK criminal and civil law.

It protects us from state overreach not each other.

And in the particular context of migrants and refugees, we've ended up in the equally absurd situation where thousands of people sit, camped in a safe country (France), perfectly at liberty to claim asylum there if they choose, but who instead choose to pay smugglers and risk their own lives in perilous dinghies etc., expecting that the UK Government will at considerable expense rescue them from the consequences of their own actions, and then feed and house them when they have no prior connection with the UK, purely because they'd rather be in the UK than France. Is this really the kind of behaviour the ECHR was designed to protect?

There is absolute no obligation on them to claim asylum in the first or indeed any safe country that they come to. They can claim asylum wherever they think is best for them. This is something established by the UN Convention on Refugees. Can I at least assume that we're not going to be withdrawing from the UN because it impinges on the UK's sovereignty?

But then we come back to the problem of the only reason that they're trying to risk their lives, at great financial cost to themselves usually, is because there is no safe way for them to claim asylum in the UK. If we really wanted to end the scourge of people smugglers and traffickers taking people across the channel we'd make it possible for people to claim asylum safely. Perhaps an office in Calais for instance? I hear there are plenty of safe ships which sail from them.

And, again, a reason why even those that do make it here often linger for so long is because the Home Office is chronically underfunded and takes an eon to make decisions on asylum applications. Heck, even when it does make decisions it can't even get around to deporting the people who no longer have the right to be here (see the Liverpool bomber who inexplicably was still here six years after he lost his last appeal!).

Also they're only a burden on the tax payer because we've decided that they shouldn't be able to do any work at all whilst waiting for the asylum claim to be decided. There's no reason, other than ideology, that I can see for them not to be allowed to work, pay taxes and then source their own accommodation and meet their own living costs. That would help ease the "burden" of feeding and housing them after all.

But in any event. None of this is actually anything to do with the Convention. As far as I'm aware the reason that the injunction was granted was is it appears is that the Home Office were unable to actually answer how they'd get the person back if their asylum claim was successful in the UK. Therefore causing issues under I think a mixture of Article 6 (right to a fair trial) and Article 13 (the right to an effective remedy). If the Home Office had actually been able to offer some assurances that they'd have been able to get the person back we might not have been here at all. To me knowledge there was no concern raised under any of the other articles because none of them applied.

It again seems odd to blame the Convention for the governments lack of ability to create a convincing plan for how they'd get this individual back in the event he was actually successful in his claim.

It seems to me perfectly legitimate to question whether this is the best framework for protecting human rights, or whether something else would be better.

I'm quite happy for people to question but what "something else" would you suggest? Because from where I'm sitting just handing over control of human rights to the state seems to be a very bad idea. The whole point of the convention is to protect us from the state. If the state gets to write the rules and enforce them then that protection has broken down quite severely.

I think the issue that concerns many on the right is not who drafted the original ECHR proposals - it's more the fact that decisions are now being made about UK policies by anonymous judges outside the UK based on principles that - as outlined in my previous paragraph - seem at best questionable.

Others have pointed out that the judges aren't anonymous so I'll just ask what principles are questionable? Which articles do you think should be repealed? Why?

It doesn't seem unreasonable that someone who believes strongly that UK laws should be made by the UK Parliament elected by the UK people would be concerned about that.

But UK laws are made by the UK Parliament which is elected by the UK people (a right to a free election, at regular intervals by a secret ballot being protected by Protocal 1 Article 3)? The UKs laws simply have to be in accordance with Convention rights. As long as the UK doesn't make laws which break those rights then the UK Parliament can legislate in whatever manner it sees fit. Considering what the Convention covers I'm not sure I really want a UK Parliament which, to take an extreme example, passed a law saying that torture is okay (Article 3)? Or take a topical example which rules that trade unions were now illegal (Article 11).

Also worth nothing that there plenty of carve outs and exceptions to make sure that the State still isn't too constrained. For instance Article 10 (freedom of expression) contains a whole host of carve outs where it can be constrained for reasons of national security, the prevention of crime, etc etc.

That sounds fine in theory, but the problem is, how long would those appeals take, while those peoples' legal representatives presumably use every legal trick they can to extend the process as long as possible? Weeks? Months? Years? Is there really a problem in principle if the people concerned are fed and housed in Rwanda while those appeals are heard, provided of course that they will be returned to the UK in the event that their appeals are ultimately successful?

Surely the answer should be "as long as it takes"? Ensuring that justice is done is surely paramount in a society that is supposedly governed by the rule of law?

Delays in the courts are often as much to do, if not more, to do with the vast underfunding of a legal system by the government over many years rather than "legal tricks" (otherwise known as insisting that the law be applied correctly and fairly). The criminal justice system for instance is in a state of collapse not because defence lawyers (who switch sides very regularly, they may defend a case one week and then be prosecuting another the next) deploy tricks to drag cases out but because over the course of more than a decade a conscious decision has been made to cut funding to the courts themselves meaning that at the same time as the backlog is longer than ever we have empty court rooms because the government won't pay for the judges and clerks to staff them. The Crown Prosecution Service and Police are so starved of funding that they can barely get the paperwork together for cases to be dealt with meaning that key evidence is often missing, witnesses not interviewed and delays follows as these errors are fixed. It is not dissimilar in the civil side of things.

It seems deeply unfair that because of the conscious decision of government to starve the courts system of resources causing massive delays that we now propose to send people to Rwanda because it might take a bit too long to process their appeals...

 

[Mikw]

As to the suggested British bill of rights. Worryingly there's parts of ECHR's legislation that aren't covered in British Law now.

So, potentially, a replacement could well leave a lot of people totally at the mercy of the current ruling party.

This leads to potential full blown policy decisions against minorities - as if the current culture wars isn't enough.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

As always I admire your trust in this and, perhaps equally importantly, future Home Secretaries not to use their new sweeping powers for evil! Personally I don't think a Home Secretary of any party or calibre should have the power that they've now been given. Sure a decent Home Sec won't abuse it or allow it to be abused but the law is so loosely written than any guarantee of that purely rests of the shoulders of the incumbent of the day.

Thanks! Actually I'm well aware of the possibility that a future home secretary might abuse their powers at some point. But the claim that keeps consistently being made by Labour, the LibDems, and many of their supporters, is that we have all lost our right to protest (implied *completely* and *now*). That is vastly different from the actual situation which is more like: If (hypothetically) a home secretary at some point in the future chose to abuse their powers, then at that point we might lose the ability to organise/attend certain public demonstrations (but note that our right to protest in many other ways, such as social media, writing and publicising blogs that protest about the Government, writing to MPs, campaigning for opposition parties, etc. etc. - in other words, the forms of protest that are actually usually most effective at changing the Government - remain unchanged and as strong as ever).

Personally speaking I can't really see anything that I think "Oh yes that's outdated now and from a different era, we should get rid of it or fundamentally overhaul it". Surely all of those rights remain core values of the United Kingdom and, frankly, of any proper Western style democracy? So what bits of the Convention would you get rid of? What hasn't "kept up with the modern world"?

It's not so much the specific articles that concern me (though there are some that I would question/want to reform) - it's more the principle that the EHCR completely divorces rights from responsibilities, and I don't think that's a sound (or ethical) approach. I think a better approach to human rights would make that connection. Off the top of my head, if I was designing the framework, I'd probably keep most of the existing articles in some form, but I want to revise the principles of how they are applied, to something like this:

1. A human rights claim against a Government is only valid if the primary purpose of the claim is actually to prevent the Government depriving the victim of the specified right. If, for example, (on the evidence available) a human rights claim is being made mainly in order to facilitate committing a crime, or to evade justice for a crime, or to harm others, or to evade legitimate immigration controls, then that claim should be discounted.
2. If you have (recently) deliberately deprived someone else of a particular human right, then you automatically forfeit that right and can no longer make a human rights claim for it. (As an example, if you've been found guilty of murder, and you face the death penalty in the country where you committed the murder, then you wouldn't be able to make a right-to-life claim to avoid extradition to face justice. You might have some other grounds to claim, but not right-to-life because you've deliberately deprived someone else of that right. (Having said that, in this case you'd probably be caught by the first rule anyway: Claiming primarily in order to evade justice ).
3. If you voluntarily and freely (not under duress) take action that deprives yourself of what would normally be considered a human right, then you can't use a human rights claim to make a Government restore that right. (Example: If you've left your family to go abroad on a normal visa, then you can't make a 'family life' claim to demand that your family be allowed to join you. You're the one who gave up your family life, it's not the Government's responsibility to restore it!).

(Before anyone quibbles: The above expresses the broad intention. Obviously if you were actually formalizing those principles, then you'd need frame them more carefully to make sure the rules do precisely match the intention and don't inadvertently catch out people making genuine claims)

I would argue that, in the absence of some kind of principles that link rights to responsibilities and prevent criminals from abusing the human rights legislation, the ECHR is simply no longer fit for purpose - and that is the reason why many people on the right are inclined to want to withdraw from it. It's not - as left-wing politicians tend to claim - about wanting to give up human rights, it's about wanting to have a mechanism to defend human rights that is fit for purpose.

There is absolute no obligation on them to claim asylum in the first or indeed any safe country that they come to. They can claim asylum wherever they think is best for them. This is something established by the UN Convention on Refugees.

Are you saying that a refugee should have the right to roam the World, possibly passing through many safe countries, in order to cherry-pick which country they would like to live in? That doesn't seem reasonable to me.

But then we come back to the problem of the only reason that they're trying to risk their lives, at great financial cost to themselves usually, is because there is no safe way for them to claim asylum in the UK. If we really wanted to end the scourge of people smugglers and traffickers taking people across the channel we'd make it possible for people to claim asylum safely. Perhaps an office in Calais for instance? I hear there are plenty of safe ships which sail from them.

If we set up an office in Calais for people to claim asylum in the UK, what effect do you think that would have on smuggling routes between Africa/the Middle East/Asia and Calais? Do you think that would cause that people-trafficking trade to increase or decrease?

Also they're only a burden on the tax payer because we've decided that they shouldn't be able to do any work at all whilst waiting for the asylum claim to be decided. There's no reason, other than ideology, that I can see for them not to be allowed to work, pay taxes and then source their own accommodation and meet their own living costs. That would help ease the "burden" of feeding and housing them after all.

It sounds a lovely idea, doesn't it! But I see a very good reason for not doing that: It would mean that anyone who fancies earning a UK salary for 6 months or so - even people who have absolutely no grounds for claiming asylum - would be incentivised to come here and lodge an asylum claim, knowing that during the months until their claim is rejected, they'll be able to earn vastly more than they could have earned back home. Before long, the asylum system would become utterly overwhelmed with people trying to game the system to earn a bit of money - and the irony is: The more the system gets overwhelmed, the more waiting times would go up, and the more people would therefore be incentivised to abuse it so they could work in the UK. The impact on genuine asylum seekers from what you'd think is surely a compassionate idea would in fact be disastrous!

And as a wider point of principle, this illustrates the problem with most 'progressive' ideas that politicians on the left tend to come up with for solving the Channel crossings problem: In order to figure out whether an idea is workable, you have to think through how people would react if that idea was implemented. Does it incentivise people to change their behaviour in a way that would help or harm the situation, or would it actually inadvertently make the problem worse? Too many people come up with ideas that sound compassionate and humane, but simply haven't been thought through. Whatever the merits and de-merits of the Government's Rwanda solution (and I do understand and to some extent share the concerns about sending people to a country that itself has a poor human rights record), it is the *only* solution we have for which the impact on people's behaviour has actually been thought through, and which therefore stands a chance of working.

 

[najaB]

Thanks! Actually I'm well aware of the possibility that a future home secretary might abuse their powers at some point. But the claim that keeps consistently being made by Labour, the LibDems, and many of their supporters, is that we have all lost our right to protest (implied *completely* and *now*).

As I noted above: nobody notices that the salami is smaller after the first slice.

As to the loss of rights, we've gone from "You have a right to protest" to "You have a right to protest, if..."