To think leaving the ECHR (European Court of Human Rights) is a cause for concern?

[WakeUpAndBeAwesome]

On paper, the new Home Secretary, Suella Braverman, looks well qualified to understand the rule of law and flex her legal arm. She seems to be a competent lawyer (but being a good lawyer does not mean someone is also a ‘good person’).

I get that it’s easier for the government to win legal cases if they withdraw from the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR). Change the rules of the games to make it easier to win the game. I get it. But I don’t agree in principle because it’s not in the spirit of the game or rule of law. Some rules put players at a disadvantage, but they’re rules for a reason (reasons that need consideration).

Why do the plans to take the UK out the ECHR sound worrying?

To me, it’s because human right laws were hard won (do people who support getting rid of human rights laws realise that or care?). Once lost it’ll be even harder to win back human rights laws (and they may never be re-won again). Losing human rights protections under the ECHR is a slippery slope imo. We’re all humans with vulnerabilities, so we all benefit from the enforcement of human rights laws under ECHR.

Apt.

It is interesting how so many people buy into what the media feeds them without questioning what they’re consuming.

Does the media realise that with great power comes great responsibility?!

Well you know that's theory that cases don't get as far as court unless the criminal is actually guilty, so I imagine lots of people really wouldn't care!

@WakeUpAndBeAwesome Certain sections of the media are utterly complicit - Emily Maitlis’s recents comments feel really relevant here.

“The former Newsnight presenter highlighted the role of Sir Robbie Gibb, who previously worked as Theresa May’s director of communications and helped to found the rightwing GB News channel.
Last year he was appointed to the BBC’s board by Boris Johnson’s government and has since influenced a series of ongoing reviews of the broadcaster’s editorial output.”
”Maitlis warned that the traditional media is becoming increasingly afraid to stand up for itself in an era where “facts are getting lost, constitutional norms trashed, claims frequently unchallenged”.”

amp.theguardian.com/media/2022/aug/24/emily-maitlis-says-active-tory-party-agent-shaping-bbc-news-output

I mean, it’s not surprising, but a worrying number of people won’t realise that they’re being spoonfed Tory-friendly news rather than an unbiased agenda.

Too many criminals/terrorists etc have been able to hide behind/go running to the ECHR that it's given "human rights" a bad name.

Rights come with responsibilities. If people are irresponsible, they don't deserve the same rights as those that are.

@Florenz only about a dozen cases a year make it to ECHR

They are available on-line, maybe you could reference the ones you disapprove of.

@Florenz too many criminals and terrorists? Do you know how many, or is that Daily Mail headlines at work again?

This list on the ECHR’s impact on criminal cases is quite enlightening. Was this the kind of thing you mean? Abu Qatada makes the list. I assume people are aware he was deported to Jordan to face trial there. Abu Hamza isn’t on this list, but was extradited to the US (actually backed by the ECtHR) where he’s in prison.

files.justice.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/06170745/Human-Rights-Act-and-criminal-justice-system.docx

How do you separate out the responsible from the irresponsible without having a fair system for doing so? Without, essentially, human rights? And if you say well, take them away at the point when it is proved, by due process and to a high standard, that they they are bad people, what about, as pps have mentioned, the Judith Wards, the Colin Staggs etc, who turned out to have been wrongfully convicted? Miscarriages of justice prove that human rights have to be for everyone at all times.

They said that about Brexit.🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️

Sorry, just realised Stagg wasn’t actually convicted but lost a chunk of his life to a wrongful accusation. I could have used lots of other examples. The point stands.

Human right are about protecting you / everyone - from the State. It’s not just the daily Mail crap about terrorists & prisoners. When my severely disabled son was carted off 380 miles from us with 2 hours notice (yes it did happen) - due to lack of resources locally it was the Human Rights Act that was his greatest protection. He’d never been away from me for more than 2 days before & the NHS ignored their own codes of practice. It was the HRA protections and the joint parliamentary committee for human rights using his case as an example of what not to do that meant the NHS changed (eventually) what they were doing.

So of course human rights are Important. The ERG who are now in charge have always been against the little people having too many rights. We’re in for a rocky ride for the next two years

It does. So does boiling a frog. I’m bloody glad I’m old and the effect on me will be minimal.

I would view the UK stepping away from the ECHR much the same way as I do the overturn of Roe v. Wade in the US.

Deeply concerning.
Doesn't affect me or mine thankfully but it is very worrying

Rights come with responsibilities. If people are irresponsible, they don't deserve the same rights as those that are.

I think the rights should be first stripped of the ones supporting it as a test trial. Then they should be forced back to school.

Just an fyi, you also have responsibilities that come without rights. Like i have to pay taxes, or i go to jail, but I am not allowed to vote. I have all responsibilities of british citizen, yet I don't have all thet rights.

If people think they can just decide when and what rights someone can loose, you couold also argue thfat people can then decide what laws apply to them and when.

Well you know that's theory that cases don't get as far as court unless the criminal is actually guilty, so I imagine lots of people really wouldn't care!
Here is a catch. It's also about due process. They could actually change it that the case doesn't have to go to trial and person goes straight to jail. It includes even bits like arrest when you have to be informed properly etc. Denying legal representation from the beginning would fall under as well. Lastly, another right is presumed innocent until found guilty, not until trial starts. You are not guilty at that point, there is just enough evidence to bring it to trial.

Looks like people are happy to give the rights up because they don't seem to know what they are.

I know of at least one 'TERRORIST'-headlined story about human rights where the man in question was actually totally innocent, but was arrested along with a family member who wasn't. But that didn't stop the DM claiming he was terrorist and misrepresenting what his claim was about - they focused on I think 36 hours of detention that was carried out against the letter of the law when his claim was also about weeks of sleep deprivation and other inhumane treatment.

I'm sure leaving ECHR will be trumpeted as a victory for Brexit (despite it being co-founded by the UK and being nothing to do with the EU) and 'Making our own laws', which we've always been able to do. What it is there for is a higher power to appeal to when our laws get it wrong. Slow handclap for the people who are cheering the removal of that.

NI would have had to be exempt from any changes as the Belfast Agreement explicitly requires the oversight of the ECHR.

www.dfa.ie/media/dfa/alldfawebsitemedia/ourrolesandpolicies/northernireland/good-friday-agreement.pdf

with the US pressure already piling on, it's hard to see how a move like this would have helped.

It’s telling that not a single person advocating leaving the ECHR has even tried to address the Northern Ireland issue.

Do you share that view, Leafy3? Don’t dignify it with the word ‘theory’. It’s a silly nonsense with no basis in legal reality.

Interesting that the 2 posters I asked questions of ages ago are completely ignoring me.

Isn't it just.

That’s you culldesack and Florenz

Lots of those "rights" aren't universally protected anyway, there are already limitations on them. If a right can be limited, it's not a right at all.

"The right to life" - we all die, therefore this isn't a right. Life-saving treatment can be withdrawn on the order of a court, therefore we don't have this right.

"The right to liberty" - there are lots of people locked up in prison who might argue they are not being afforded their right to liberty. Some criminals know they will never be released. They are also not given their "rights" to freedom of expression, freedom of assembly or to participate in free elections.

"Freedom of expression" isn't a right either. Lots of people have been convicted for expressing opinions which have been deemed unacceptable by others.

Even things like the right to marry and start a family are not rights. Most people would surely agree that no man has the right to have a family, no man has the right to decide he wants kids therefore a woman has to be provided to enable him to exercise this right. He can only exercise his right if he can find a woman who wishes to facilitate it.

The big issue for me is the abolition of the death penalty, this if nothing else should be the reason to withdraw from the ECHR. No civilised country should be without the death penalty, it's an essential tool in the same way that courts and prisons are.

Blinking heck @Dotjones if life on the back benches that boring?

I've never heard the argument that we are not immortal, so therefore is no right to life before.

The political extremism is breath taking or are you doing a Joe Lycett? It may have been wise to prefix with 'I am extremely right wing'

Quite😳

I don't think I ever saw anyone misrepresent things like right to marry this way and i have seen some weird stuff.
Wtf man. Honestly, what the actual fuck.

The issue is that if @Dotjones is joking (based on last paragraph), it's not clear to the gullible and oh my god, I can totally see that arguments now appearing on twitter😳

Are you seriously spouting on about human rights without the faintest idea of the differences between qualified and absolute rights, and between positive and negative rights?

The fact that a right is qualified does not mean it is not a right.

The fact that a right is a negative right (ie the right to not be interfered with by the state) rather than a positive right (ie the state must take positive steps to vindicate the right) doesn’t mean it’s not a right.

Leaving aside the obvious trolling about the death penalty, you obviously haven’t the first clue how the law of human rights works.

And you are just the latest in a line of anti-ECHR posters to totally ignore that withdrawal means the end of the Good Friday Agreement.