Human Rights Act

Jeremy Corbyn Excerpts

Tuesday 30th June 2015 Westminster Hall

[Jeremy Corbyn (Islington North) (Lab)]

I commend the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr Carmichael) on securing this debate. It is timely and important, and I concur with all the points made by the right hon. and learned Member for Beaconsfield (Mr Grieve) on how we approach this subject. We have to be aware that we are all concerned about human rights. Some of us have spent a great deal of time trying to defend the human rights of the most vulnerable people in this country and other parts of the world. I regularly attend the UN Human Rights Council, for example, and see the importance there of having a forum where those rights can be defended, difficult though it may be. It at least gives the rest of the world an opportunity to say to an authoritarian Government, “You are in breach of the universal declaration of human rights of 1948, and there will be consequences if you persist.”

The European convention on human rights, which was drafted by the Tory Sir David Maxwell Fyfe, gives serious levels of protection to an awful lot of people—the right to family life and a number of other things which are frequently quoted against it in relation to immigration law and other matters. I urge those who decided to go down a tabloid road of saying, “All that matters is to get rid of the controversial Human Rights Act,” to be specific about what they want and what they mean by that. It seems to me that the agenda behind it is to walk away from the convention on the basis that it somehow interferes with our laws and rights. Well, at one level, any time any Government or Parliament anywhere signs a treaty, of course to some extent it reduces their powers and their unfettered ability to do something. That is the whole point of a treaty. By signing up to a convention that covers the whole of Europe, it means that we support a basic level of human rights for people across Europe.

[Alex Chalk (Cheltenham) (Con)]

Is it not important to draw a distinction between the convention and section 2 of the Human Rights Act? The point made about the Human Rights Act is that it incorporates the convention into English law. There were convention rights in the United Kingdom and in particular in England before the Human Rights Act. Section 2, which requires that the courts “must take into account” the acts of convention bodies, could be repealed without coming out of the convention. It is important to draw that distinction.

[Jeremy Corbyn]

That is an interesting point, but I am not sure the hon. Gentleman is correct. My right hon. Friend the Member for Tooting (Sadiq Khan) is about to correct me to correct him.

[Sadiq Khan (Tooting) (Lab)]

To clarify the apparent misunderstanding among Government Members, section 2 of the Human Rights Act is quite clear. The former Attorney General, the right hon. and learned Member for Beaconsfield (Mr Grieve), was careful to remind the House of the careful steps that the Government went through before 2000. Section 2 says that UK courts and tribunals should take account of Strasbourg case law. It is not that they have to do so; it is possible for a UK court to consider and then ignore the jurisprudence. The understanding is that it is about taking account of, rather than blindly following the jurisprudence.

[Jeremy Corbyn]

It says “take into account”, and that is what it means. In forming the judgment, the court “must take into account” the convention. The court might decide—it sometimes does—

[Alex Chalk]

indicated dissent.

[Jeremy Corbyn]

Shake your head as much as you like, you will still have your head on your body.

[Mr Clive Betts (in the Chair)]

Order. My head and my body are not a subject of discussion at this stage, so the words “you” and “your” are not appropriate.

[Jeremy Corbyn]

Thank you, Mr Betts. May we get back to the question of the Human Rights Act and what it says? It incorporates the convention into British law and requires courts to take account of the contents of the convention and the rights within it. The Conservative party’s love affair with the tabloids before the last election was all about walking away from this controversial thing because it interfered with British law. Interestingly, the Government, in the person of the Foreign Secretary, now say that we will not leave the convention, but that we might not operate within the purview of the European Court of Human Rights in the future. I am not sure how those two things can be put together. The Foreign Secretary said he will restore rights to British courts, but the rights of British courts have never actually been taken away; they have been asked to take into account an important convention.

The politics are simple. If Britain withdraws from the European convention on human rights and sets up a British Bill of Rights that is outwith that convention and may have all kinds of things within it—good, bad, indifferent, appalling or wonderful—it sends a message to every other country in Europe. Those countries thinking about withdrawing from the European convention because they have been criticised for their treatment of Travellers, for their treatment of gay, lesbian or transgender people, for suppressing popular protest or for closing down internet sites and suppressing newspapers would be a little bit happier if one country withdrew. If Britain—one of the original authors of the document—withdraws, I suspect that many others will withdraw, and the human rights of the whole continent will be significantly damaged as a result. I urge the Government to think carefully about this issue before they go any further.

The Prime Minister was quick to quote Magna Carta, but then bizarrely went to Runnymede to make a speech saying, in a sense, that he would ignore Magna Carta and withdraw from the European convention. He did not seem to realise that most of Magna Carta has been overturned by subsequent legislation anyway, and I think it is only the section on the right to trial by jury that remains. There was also a fundamental misunderstanding about Magna Carta defending the rights of free people. Unfortunately, the statutes of the time defined free people as those who had been given their freedom by the King. The vast majority of the population—the peasantry—was not given any rights at all.

In St Stephen’s, there is a wonderful painting of King John reluctantly putting his seal to Magna Carta. All the barons are saying, “Do it,” but a peasant is lying on the ground saying, “There is nothing in this for me. This is between the barons and the King.” The principles set out in Magna Carta—I would urge people to visit the Magna Carta exhibition at the British Library—descended through the law in many other ways, on the basis that irrational Government should be held to account for what they do and that everybody should be given rights to stand up for what they believe in, with the rest of society being required to allow them to do so.

I do not know what will be in this British Bill of Rights, if it comes about, but I am pretty horrified by the mood music surrounding it, which is about damaging our civil liberties and rights.

[Sadiq Khan]

Does my hon. Friend agree that, just as judges often made decisions that did not please all the tabloid media before the Human Rights Act was passed, it is possible that judges will make decisions that some newspapers do not find to their liking even after a Conservative Bill of Rights has been introduced?

[Jeremy Corbyn]

It is part of the balance in our constitutional process that Parliament is independent of the Executive and that the judiciary is independent of Parliament. Sometimes, the judiciary makes perverse decisions, and sometimes its decisions upset Ministers and lots of other people. That is the point of having an independent judicial system and of referring to the basic principles in the European convention on human rights—the right to assembly, the right to free speech, the right to know and the right not to be discriminated against.

I urge the Government not to go down this road, but to accept that the contribution made in the aftermath of the horrors of the second world war by the European convention on human rights and the wonderful document that is the universal declaration of human rights, with the work that Eleanor Roosevelt put into it, is part of a narrative of giving rights to everybody around the world, whatever their station. If this country, which prides itself on being the longest continuous democracy and having the longest lasting parliamentary system of government and judicial system, walks away from the European convention, every dictator and every person who is annoyed by international conventions will be a bit happier, and it will be a sad day for those who are standing up bravely for human rights against the most oppressive regimes in the world. Please don’t do it!

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Raab]

I thought I had detected a slight revival of my right hon. and learned Friend’s former enthusiasm, but perhaps I was too optimistic.

I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Islington North (Jeremy Corbyn) for his contribution. He always speaks powerfully on these issues—I have listened to him speaking on human rights since I joined this House. He took us back to Magna Carta and its modern-day relevance.

[Jeremy Corbyn]

I can go back further if you want.

[Mr Raab]

I am sure you could.

I also welcome the contribution made by the Chair of the Justice Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Robert Neill). I congratulate him on his election to that post and look forward to being grilled in due course. He counselled us not to treat the Human Rights Act as a holy grail that cannot be questioned. That was a useful injection of common sense into the debate.

I also pay tribute to the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon), who highlighted some of the cases under the HRA that have been of concern to his party. He raised in particular the application of article 8 with regard to deportation. My right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Harborough (Sir Edward Garnier) made some powerful points on section 2 of the Act and on extraterritorial jurisdiction. The hon. Member for Lanark and Hamilton East (Angela Crawley) raised the difficult issue of the balance between liberty and security. My hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Mr Chope) discussed judicial legislation from Strasbourg—he has huge experience of that as a result of his representation on the Council of Europe.

There were other excellent speeches to which I cannot pay individual tribute, but I should also acknowledge the speech made by the shadow Minister, who reiterated his party’s position and lamented the lack of detail in the Government’s current proposals. I say to him gently that one issue with the Human Rights Act, arguably, is that it was rushed through, as it was introduced within six months. As a result of that haste, some problems have now emerged that we were warned of at the Act’s inception. The Government are not going to rush in the way the then Labour Government rushed through the Human Rights Act. We will take a little time, because we want to get it done right rather than quickly.

[Mr Raab]

The shadow Minister makes an interesting point. If, as a new Government, we had introduced a Bill within six months, it would have been argued that that was too hasty.

On the problems that have arisen as a result, a former shadow Justice Secretary, the right hon. Member for Tooting (Sadiq Khan), who is no longer in his place, took to The Daily Telegraph just last year to point out some of the problems with section 2 of the Act:

“Too often, rather than ‘taking into account’ Strasbourg rulings and by implication, finding their own way, our courts have acted as if these rulings were binding on their decisions. As a result, the sovereignty of our courts and the will of Parliament have both been called into question. This needs sorting out.”

If the Labour party has U-turned on that rather thoughtful critique of its own legislation and now, as my hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst said, believes the Act to be a holy grail that cannot be touched, called into question or criticised at all, there are some questions for Labour to answer. I know hon. Members in the shadow Minister’s party would not all agree on that matter.

I shall take this opportunity to set out the Government’s position. I should say that I have found the debate very valuable at this still formative stage of the Government’s process towards enacting a Bill of Rights. To answer some of the questions put, we will be consulting formally this Session, including with the devolved Administrations—I am aware that there are some issues there—and I hope hon. Members will understand if I do not prejudge that consultation or its terms in my remarks today.

I remind hon. Members that the United Kingdom has a strong tradition of respect for human rights that long predates the Human Rights Act 1998. The Government are proud of that tradition and will be true to it in delivering our reforms. As I explained at Justice questions, our plans do not involve us leaving the convention. That is not our objective. We want to restore some common-sense balance to our human rights, which are out of kilter, so nothing has been taken off the table.

[Jeremy Corbyn]

If the proposal is not to withdraw from the convention, would it still be applicable in British law and in decision making by judges in British courts?

[Mr Raab]

The hon. Gentleman is alluding to the idea of having a middle course between throwing the baby out with the bathwater, as some have described it—tearing up human rights, getting rid of the convention and not replacing it—and trying to reform the current model by looking at the way the convention has been applied and interpreted. There are not huge numbers of objections to the black letter law of the convention’s text, but the way it has been applied and extended is a matter of concern. All that will be the subject of debate and consultation.