Not to want to lose my human rights on the whim of a government minister?

[SecondRateFrog]

Dominic Raab says he wants to bring in a system which allows the Government to legislate against UK court judgements in human rights cases if it doesn't like them. Without going through a debate or a vote in Parliament.
Is this the end of the role of the courts in our democracy?
"Raab threat to ‘correct’ court judgments is ‘deeply troubling’, warn legal experts"
It's in The Telegraph too.
uk.yahoo.com/news/raab-threat-correct-court-judgments-144345935.html

@MamsellMarie
"What is this about - being able to return immigrant criminals to their country of birth? Stopping someone gluing themselves to the motorway ? Or what?"

And that's how the government will sell it to the masses. Give a bit of time and the murder of MP David Amess will be used.

If it wasn't for the Human rights act a second inquiry into Hillsborough wouldn't have had to happen. The change will also be used to shut down investigations into the handling of Covid. It can be used to shut down any inquiries including those into failings by hospitals because of cuts. Those involved in hospital scandals use the HRA to get another hearing.
The right to family life includes those needing care. Keeping people at home, or close to family if care is needed. Likewise prison sentences.
Women fleeing DV, turning down accommodation because it doesn't have enough room for all of them, can now be seen as being intentionally homeless. But the government will sell it via the criminal immigrant route.
Soldiers use the HRA to challenge failings in funding and other failings of the government in regards to the care of military personnel.
At present we don't extradite people to countries were they will be killed because they are a working woman, gay, disabled etc. That will change.
The keeping of DNA and fingerprints will give Police extra powers and if you consider how excess police power was used during Covid and how biased they are, don't think that it couldn't be used against a member of your family in the future.
The right to privacy gone for benefit claimants and other groups.
That's just a small list.
We need the back up of higher courts not controlled by a Tory government. We can at present deport criminals, we just don't use the law. For those mentioning removing the term woman and mother, if the proposals happen then we'll have nowhere to challenge that.

This is somewhat alarming. It seems our human rights are being eroded to the point that we now expect our phones to record us. 15 years ago this would have been unthinkable.

"Dominic raab's best friend knocks down and kills a small child because he is driving while drunk.
He goes to court and is found guilty.
Judge gives him a five Yr prison sentence.
But Dominic is unhappy with this and so with his shiny new ministerial power he overturns it, as he thinks the judge was wrong."
"I appreciate that is unlikely"

Swap that to Rabb's friends supplying hospital computer software, medical equipment etc that isn't fit for purpose, or so people die, but gets any court case shut down or the government decided to ignore the ruling (which they've done on a lesser scale), how likely is that? Very likely.

@Viviennemary

Yes. The government are our representatives voted in. Not judges.

So you would rather that decisions about verdicts and sentencing were determined by the 20% of voters who bothered to turn out to vote for the government than by people who have actual expertise in what the law is?

We already have popular representation in courts, btw, in the form of juries. The government is seeking power over those juries and judges.

Another "we don't need experts" type, happy to hand over our rights to potentially corrupt and malevolent politicians. Such a change to our constitution would mean that they and their friends would be free to do what they want with impunity.

@SecondRateFrog

They've essentially removed the right to demonstrate, haven't they?

How so?

Abolishing the rule of law basically. Terrifying

How do we stop it?

@goinggently

Abolishing the rule of law basically. Terrifying

Again, how so?

“Abolishing the rule of law”

That is quite a statement

@goinggently

Abolishing the rule of law basically. Terrifying

Again, how so?

“Abolishing the rule of law”

That is quite a statement

I found this thoughtful:

www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/politics/the-government-wanted-to-rein-in-the-supreme-court-now-it-may-not-need-to-hale-reed-prorogation

Also, we have made international obligations, there's a limit to how much we can curtail them unilaterally.

@Reallyimeanreally2022

"Abolishing the rule of law basically. Again, how so?"

This government has been found on numerous times going against the legislation, by not allowing inquiries, by not abiding by the Equality Act (usually concerning people who are disabled), by going against welfare legalisation.
The DNRs put on otherwise healthy young people who have LD's was stopped on the principles of the HRA.

This is a link to the removal of the right to protest. Now link this with the removal of HR.

<a class="break-all" href="https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=committees.parliament.uk/committee/93/human-rights-joint-committee/news/156037/government-plans-to-change-law-to-restrict-demonstrations-breach-human-right-to-protest-says-jchr/&ved=2ahUKEwiKy9ylt9PzAhUMRkEAHejlAO4QFnoECA0QAQ&usg=AOvVaw3b3GmfQ9bbTAg46h5hKW1u" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=committees.parliament.uk/committee/93/human-rights-joint-committee/news/156037/government-plans-to-change-law-to-restrict-demonstrations-breach-human-right-to-protest-says-jchr/&ved=2ahUKEwiKy9ylt9PzAhUMRkEAHejlAO4QFnoECA0QAQ&usg=AOvVaw3b3GmfQ9bbTAg46h5hKW1u

I agree, the direction the country is moving in is really chilling.
History shows though that the people love authoritarian governments, if it's 'their' side.

How come if you disagree with something nowadays you are dismissed as a labour lefty ? Such
lazy thinking and no doubt how the mail will portray any divergence from government right think.

Why is this not in the Mainstream News?

Well - clearly it is a bit. But it should be headlines.

We all should know about this.

@Viviennemary

Yes. The government are our representatives voted in. Not judges.

But imagine if the next government to be voted in was the 'Anti Viviennemary Party'.

Would you still be happy with them taking the place of judges?

@Reallyimeanreally2022 I'm not too sure how to answer this, as it's unclear from your question whether you understand very little about checks and balances on power, or you know a great deal about our uncodified constitution and you're picking me up on a technicality...

the direction the country is moving in is really chilling

Yes. Another week, another fresh set of horrors seems to be the pattern. We’re being primed to accept a trade war as being an acceptable thing with our neighbors, who still supply much of the country with food and energy.

This is turning into a full on assault on our democracy, by the very people that harp on about its importance. Manipulating voter rules, removing the right to protest and now removing the authority of the courts. Trump only just failed, and I fear that we may not be so lucky given our current, much more precarious position.

@PersephoneJames

They’ll be able to get it through because he’s selling it as a flag waving “no European court should be able to tell us Brits what to do” policy, and only muttering “no British judges either” under his breath.

It's all so depressing

For the government to want to unpick Judicial rulings without going to parliament, in the absence of acute and dire emergency, is the very epitome of abolishing the rule of law. Clue in the name " rule of law".

In any properly functioning democracry, we are all ruled by law, including the government. Ask yourself why the government want to do this.

He won't get it through the House of Lords. That's the shock horror UNELECTED HoL.

Abusive men (and it is mainly men) consider themselves to be above the law.

The government currently in power is no different.

Recently heard in the news that 3,000 domestic abuse cases were not prosecuted as the courts were so overloaded they couldn't deal with the cases within the six month deadline.

That suited the present government, didn't it?

Along with round about onlly five per cent of rape cases being prosecuted as the courts are underfunded and underresourced.

And the family court is in meltdown.

And the recent case of disability discrimination for ESA claimants who were never given the twenty pound uplift in the pandemic was delayed because

'no judge was available.

Why are you surprised.

Boris and co. push it as far as they can push it.

Just lucky that not every court or judge in the land goes along with their sxxt adn there are organisations campaigned to tell the govenrment they are out of order on such matters.

But, what happens is the government pushes to see what they can get away with.

Hope their social media rep is looking at mumsnet as it does reach millions of viewers and I feel at least goes some way to tell them what they are trying to get away with they can't get away with at least as easily as they thought they could.

Abusive men are all the same. Boris included.

Anyone who thinks that the British MPs, let alone the British government, let alone the cabinet, are in anyway "representative" of people needs to have a look at the Electoral Reform Society.

www.electoral-reform.org.uk/campaigns/electoral-reform/

It is of course ridiculous really to talk of 'democracy' in a nation of 65 million +, but we don't even have representative democracy any more and other European countries manage the complications better.

I don’t even think most of the Tory back benchers would allow this.

I do, because the half way decent ones were chased out at the last election.

As others have implied, viviennemary would probably be happy with this as long as it was affecting people she considered undesirable. What if it happened to her, or her family, or unlikely though it seems, a Labour Government got in and started making free with this rule?

As for the Insulate Britain people, there are already rules about obstructing public highways. Why are they not already in court for this? Could it be that having Climate Protesters being had up in the Courts before the COP26 summit, (where Johnson will try to parade green credentials) is Not a Good Look.

As I said earlier, but no one picked up on it. Any secondary legislation IS debated in Parliament. At the very least it would be introduced as statutory instruments.

If I don't agree with the government and a new government which I don't agree with is elected, I respect that because it was democratically elected.

Don't forget, a big reason for the brexit vote was to be able make our own laws and not be bound by the Strasbourg courts. This is why we can no longer be part of the single market. A hard brexit, if you will.

We are still prominent and active members of the Council of Europe and work with the Strasbourg judges (kind of) to ensure human rights judgements are followed in all member states. Not all member states are EU members.