Human Rights Legislation

Mark Hendrick Excerpts

Tuesday 14th December 2021 Commons Chamber

[Dominic Raab]

I thank my right hon. Friend. He has been a long-standing champion of this issue, and has had a long-standing interest in it. I think the separation of powers between the legislative, the Executive and the judicial branches is really important. We want a robust judiciary, which is why we are proposing to strengthen the primacy of the Supreme Court—it is called a Supreme Court for a reason, and there is not a doctrine of precedent in Strasbourg. We also need to make sure that if there are expansions of human rights, the shifting of the goalposts that frustrates many of our constituents, they are subject to the democratic scrutiny of this House.

[Sir Mark Hendrick (Preston) (Lab/Co-op)]

The Secretary of State said in his statement that the Government will make it crystal clear that the UK courts are under no duty to follow Strasbourg’s case law, so will it be a matter of pick and mix from the articles contained in the convention? If that is the case, using the Secretary of State’s logic, what is the point of being signatories to the ECHR when he has made it clear that the Government will choose only those articles they feel are appropriate?

[Dominic Raab]

With the greatest respect to the hon. Gentleman, he has not followed the point that I was making. We will stay within the European convention. There are some articles, such as article 8(2), which admit a qualification to protect security. We will avail ourselves of that. The issue is about the interpretation of the application. There is no doctrine of precedent in Strasbourg, which is one of the areas of confusion that has arisen because we do have a doctrine of precedent in the UK courts. We will make it clear that it is for UK courts to apply in relation to UK case law and UK circumstances and, above all, to follow the will of the elected lawmakers. When there is a declaration of incompatibility and the courts will be free to still use that tool, that should come back to this House to decide what to do.