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Protecting human rights

14 October 2019
Issue: 7859 / Categories: Legal News , Human rights , Brexit , EU
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The Human Rights Act, which enacts the European Convention on Human Rights into UK law, may come under attack again in the current ‘isolationist’ climate, Geoffrey Bindman QC has warned.

If there is another Conservative government, especially if it follows the UK’s departure from the EU, ‘we may expect it to renew plans to leave the Convention and repeal the Act,’ Bindman writes in this week’s NLJ.

‘There is no necessary connection between our adherence to the Convention and our membership of the EU but leading Conservative politicians have long disliked both, seeing human rights law, like the EU, as an encroachment on British sovereignty. The Conservative Party manifesto of 2015 commits a future Conservative government to withdraw from the Convention and repeal the Act, replacing both with a British Bill of Rights.’

Although some politicians have ‘relied on the occasional adverse Strasbourg decision to justify their criticism of what they see as foreign interference’, Bindman says the Strasbourg court’s margin of appreciation doctrine minimises disharmony by giving weight to the traditions and preferences of individual member states.   

Issue: 7859 / Categories: Legal News , Human rights , Brexit , EU
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MOVERS & SHAKERS

Birketts—trainee cohort

Birketts—trainee cohort

Firm welcomes new cohort of 29 trainee solicitors for 2025

Keoghs—four appointments

Keoghs—four appointments

Four partner hires expand legal expertise in Scotland and Northern Ireland

Brabners—Ben Lamb

Brabners—Ben Lamb

Real estate team in Yorkshire welcomes new partner

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