Oral Answers to Questions

Allan Dorans Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd March 2022 Commons Chamber

[Debbie Abrahams (Oldham East and Saddleworth) (Lab)]

15. What steps he is taking to reform the Human Rights Act.

[Allan Dorans (Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock) (SNP)]

21. What recent discussions he has had with Cabinet colleagues on reforming the human rights framework.

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

22. What assessment he has made of the implications for his policies of the independent Human Rights Act review published in December 2021.

--- Later in debate ---

[Dominic Raab]

We are of course familiar with the views of the Law Society and others but respectfully disagree, and in the end it is not solely our job to listen to legal practitioners, important as they are, or indeed to serve their interests, but also to stand up for victims and the public and make sure we have a common-sense approach to justice. [Interruption.] I respectfully disagree with the hon. Lady; she might want to put herself on the side of the criminals, but we will put ourselves on the side of the victims.

[Allan Dorans]

The Scottish Government have committed to introducing a new Human Rights Bill for Scotland by 2025 incorporating four major United Nations rights treaties—an international covenant on economic, social and cultural rights; conventions on the elimination of all forms of discrimination against women; the elimination of all forms of racial discrimination; and the rights of persons with disabilities—along with other progressive human rights. Has the Secretary of State reviewed these plans with a view to incorporating them into any future Bill of Rights?

[Dominic Raab]

Although I disagree with the hon. Gentleman, I pay respect to the way he has introduced this question. There is a school of thought—I have been up to Edinburgh and discussed this with the Scottish Government—that we should expand a wider range of policy issues, social and economic, and environmental goals, and turn them into judicially enforceable rights. Many of those areas involve collective issues that require finely balanced judgment calls and often require public finances to be allocated in a very sensitive way, and I think they should be decided by hon. Members in all parts of this House, accountable to the British people, not lawyers in a courtroom.