Human Rights in the UK

Alex Chalk Excerpts

Wednesday 13th February 2019 Westminster Hall

[Alex Chalk (Cheltenham) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Gapes. I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Edinburgh East (Tommy Sheppard) for leading this debate.

I want to say a few words about the European convention on human rights, which I very much support. It is important to emphasise that the values that we see in the European convention are British values. Let us look, for example, at some of the rights contained within it: the right to life, which sounds fairly British to me; the right to avoid torture, inhuman or degrading treatment, article 3—we could probably sign up to that; the right not to be subject to slavery, article 4; the right to liberty and security, article 5; and the right to a fair trial and so on. All too often this debate has been tainted by a misunderstanding of what the actual rights are, as though they are a foreign import that do not reflect some of the cultural norms in our country, but nothing could be further from the truth. That is emphasised by the fact that, certainly in my experience in court, and I dare say in the experience of plenty of the other distinguished practitioners in this room today, it is overwhelmingly the case that any submission that is supported by, for the sake of argument, article 6 is often buttressed by domestic legislation as well.

In the criminal courts, if someone seeks to exclude evidence that is relied upon by the prosecution on the grounds that it would deny their client the right to a fair trial, it might be that, in tandem with invoking article 6, they will rely on section 78 of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984. Although the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) was absolutely right to highlight individual cases where rights had been asserted in order to achieve a remedy, in the overwhelming majority of cases in our country the domestic legislation does perfectly well and may be supported to some extent. As I say, it is rare that the right itself would found the claim or application for a remedy.

[Nick Thomas-Symonds]

The hon. Gentleman is entirely right in his assessment of the criminal law. The one area where the Human Rights Act, in the sense of the incorporation of the ECHR into UK law, has made a big difference is in family law, particularly in rights to see children.

[Alex Chalk]

That is right, and there are areas where there has been a greater role for it. However, I want to slay the myth that people are routinely invoking Human Rights Act points to seek remedies that are not otherwise available in the legislation. There are examples of that, but they are by no means the norm. The convention is important because it provides an important safety net at a time particularly of national stress and crisis. We know that in the case of a terrorist atrocity, the cry immediately goes up that the state must act ever more robustly, often impinging upon individual liberties. Sometimes that is the right judgment to make, but equally it is critically important that any measures that the state proposes are viewed through the prism of what we see as keenly won liberties. It is not just a British phenomenon.

If one thinks of the United States in the second world war, one of the episodes of which it has now the most shame was the internment of Japanese Americans at a time of national stress. But our country is not immune to it. In the aftermath of September 11, there was legislation in the UK that people will remember: part 4 of the Anti-terrorism, Crime and Security Act 2001, which was used by the then Government to effectively hold people without charge. That ultimately was challenged in the European Court of Human Rights and the Court ruled that that was unlawful because it breached article 5. Again, it seems that that provides a useful safety net.

[Joanna Cherry]

In my lifetime, members of the Catholic community in Northern Ireland were interned without trial, with quite some impact on family life. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that that is something that the ECHR has made a big difference to in the United Kingdom? As a result of our membership and its applicability through the Human Rights Act, it now would not be possible to intern without trial in the UK.

[Alex Chalk]

It is an important point and we must recognise that because—as is necessary in a democracy—we listen to our constituents and reflect their concerns, this House will always have a tendency to react in a very public way to what is perceived as a public need; but it is not wrong that there should be a check to that and a requirement for us sometimes to pause for thought.

In so far as we give great power to the courts—and to the European Court of Human Rights, through the convention—it is also right that they should exercise necessary discretion, and I respectfully suggest that there have been examples of their straying beyond their natural area of competence. The most obvious example is Hirst, when article 3, which of course prohibits torture and “inhuman or degrading treatment”, was relied on to rule that the British Government were in error in saying that prisoners could not vote. A number of people might think that that had gone too far, and that there had not been appropriate respect for the principles of subsidiarity and the margin of appreciation. I will not go into that now, but there is certainly a case for saying that the Court should tread carefully—and I invite it to do so. I say that because what the Court does, and the rulings that it provides, overwhelmingly contribute to human rights in this country and to the quality of our public discourse and democracy. It would be a crying shame if unfortunate judicial activism were to put that at risk.

[Kate Osamor (Edmonton) (Lab/Co-op)]

It is a pleasure to speak under your chairmanship, Mr Gapes. I thank the hon. Member for Edinburgh East (Tommy Sheppard) for bringing this important issue to the House.

I am deeply concerned by the huge hole that will be left in human rights protection after Brexit, especially in the event of a no-deal Brexit. However, even while the UK remains a member of the European Union, human rights have been considerably worn down as a result of austerity policies.

[Alex Chalk]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Kate Osamor]

No, but only because there is not a lot of time.

Only last year, the UK, according to Professor Alston, the UN rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights, was found in breach of four UN human rights agreements: those relating to women, children, disabled people and economic and social rights. The critiquing report drew on work by the Institute for Fiscal Studies and the Joseph Rowntree Foundation to highlight predictions that child poverty could rise by 7% by 2022, possibly up to a rate of 40%. Professor Alston declared that such actual and projected levels of child poverty were

“not just a disgrace, but a social calamity and an economic disaster”.

Such reports agree with the experience of my constituents. Enfield Council has already made £178 million-worth of savings since 2010 because of funding cuts from central Government. However, further cuts mean that the council currently has to find another £18 million to draw out of essential services by 2020. That amount of £18 million is more than Enfield’s current net spend on housing services, leisure, culture, libraries, parks and open spaces combined. The impact of cuts on young people is tragic. Youth services have been decimated and young people are abandoned, as essential staff have had to be shed, and what is simply a skeleton service is provided. Austerity in education in Edmonton has created an £8.5 million annual funding shortfall. Every school in my constituency has had funding cuts since 2015. That means, in an already struggling community, that the education of every single pupil in Edmonton has been undermined.

All that and much more has been done while the UK still has the protection of the EU charter of fundamental rights. The Human Rights Act 1998 is woefully insufficient on its own, and I dread what could be done to our communities without the limited protection that the EU charter provides. Does the Minister recognise the limitations of the Human Rights Act without the protections of the EU charter of fundamental rights, and can he explain how his party’s Government are preserving those rights before the UK leaves the EU?