Brighton rocks?

The European Court of Human Rights will hear fewer cases as a result of the “Brighton Declaration”, justice secretary Ken Clarke has said.

The 47 member nations of the Council of Europe agreed a package of reforms at their conference in Brighton last week, including: amending the European Convention on Human Rights to include the principles of subsidiarity and the margin of appreciation; tightening the admissibility criteria so the court can focus on serious abuses; reducing the time limit for claims from six months to four; and improving the selection process for judges.

Clarke said: “Taken together, these changes should mean fewer cases being considered by the court. Those that it considers will be allegations of serious violations or major points of interpretation of the Convention and they will be processed without the scandalous delays we are seeing at present.”

However, Michael Bochenek, director of law and policy at Amnesty International, said the amendments would “do little to alleviate the workload of the court, while some of them instead undermine the independence of the court and curtail individuals’ access to justice”.