Businesses are increasingly turning to the Human Rights Act to assert their commercial interests.
In reported court cases alone last year, 31 businesses used the Act, compared with 19 in the previous year, according to research by Sweet & Maxwell.
A larger number of human rights cases are also being settled or abandoned before reaching court. Examples in the last year include businesses using privacy arguments to prevent the media from running stories that might damage their corporate reputation, and a business trying to overturn an arbitration decision on the basis it deprived them of their right to a fair hearing.
Human rights are also a valuable asset in legal argument against HM Revenue & Customs—six per cent of reported tax cases refer to the Human Rights Act.
Stephen Grosz, partner at Bindmans LLP, says: “Since the legislation was passed, there have been a substantial number of legal disputes in which Human Rights Act arguments are made. But initial fears that it would be a `Rogues’ Charter’, which would open the floodgates to waves of spurious challenges, have proved to be exaggerated. The Act has been very important in helping a large number of individuals protect their interests.”
