Bill of Rights

Robert Key says...

This Government has piled on more and more legislation and at the same time chipped away at our great English common law personal freedoms. We warned them that if they incorporated the European Convention on Human Rights into Statute Law there would be adverse consequences - and there have been. The ECHR was designed to cope with the aftermath of World War II - not 21st Century international terrorism. David Cameron is right to set up an expert body of advisors to work out exactly how we can achieve what most people know to be common sense.

In a speech to the Centre for Policy Studies today, David Cameron announced that a future Conservative government would replace the Human Rights Act with a British Bill of Rights. He said:

The Problem: Labour’s Human Rights Act

‘Any fair audit of the Human Rights Act would come to the conclusion that change is needed in order to protect both our security and freedom more effectively. The Human Rights Act has made it harder to protect our security. And it has done little to protect some of our liberties. It is hampering the fight against crime and terrorism. And it has helped to create a culture of rights without responsibilities. ‘What are the options open to us? There is a case for simply abolishing the Human Rights Act and doing nothing else. This has the advantage of simplicity. And it would at least help us in the fight against crime. But it would not solve the problem on terrorism. And it has the strong disadvantage of taking a step backwards on rights and liberties. Citizens would have to go once again to an international court to enforce their freedoms. It would lead to a procession of cases going to the Human Rights Court in Strasbourg at considerable public cost, and Britain being governed in part by court judgements made in Strasbourg, with little or no reference to home-grown British law.

‘Another option is to abolish the Human Rights Act and pull out of the ECHR. This also has some logical consistency. It would address the security challenge, both in terms of crime and terrorism. But it would leave British citizens reliant on ancient rights as developed over time in our common law and through Parliament, and the common law cannot properly protect the citizen from ministers who have the power to override it by statutory instrument, or from a government that can at will abrogate or repeal habeas corpus or any other protection of freedom.

Need for a British Bill of Rights

‘So I believe that the time has now come for a new solution that protects liberties in this country; that is home-grown and sensitive to Britain’s legal inheritance; that enables people to feel they have ownership of their rights, and that at the same time enables a British Home Secretary to strike a common-sense balance between civil liberties and the protection of public security.

‘The Conservative Party, under my leadership, is determined to provide a hard-nosed defence of security and freedom. And I believe that the right way to do that is through a modern British Bill of Rights that also balances rights with responsibilities. This would clearly set out people’s rights, would enable those rights to be protected in British courts, and would strengthen our hand in the fight against crime and terrorism. ‘Without being too prescriptive at this stage, it is possible to outline the key elements of such a Bill. A modern British Bill of Rights needs to define the core values which give us our identity as a free nation. It should spell out the fundamental duties and responsibilities of people living in this country both as citizens and foreign nationals. And it should guide the judiciary and the government in applying human rights law when the lack of responsibility of some individuals threatens the rights of others.

‘It should enshrine and protect fundamental liberties such as jury trial, equality under the law and civil rights. And it should protect the fundamental rights set out in the European Convention on Human Rights in clearer and more precise terms. Greater clarity and precision would allow those rights to be enforced more easily and effectively in circumstances where they ought to be protected, but it would become harder to extend them inappropriately as under the present law. Greater clarity and precision in the law, as opposed to vague general principles which can be interpreted in many different ways, is more in accordance with this country’s legal tradition. So I am today committing my party to work towards the production of such a Bill of Rights.’

The full speech is available on the Party website:

http://www.conservatives.com/tile.do?def=
news.story.page&obj_id=130572&speeches=1.