One more day to nominate the human rights cases absolutely everyone should know about
26 February 2015
Nominations close tomorrow (Friday) at 5pm for the human rights cases which absolutely everyone should know about.
Full guidelines below – please feel free to nominate as many as 50 or as few as 1 case. The more people who contribute, the better the final list will be. I have already had some brilliant entries.
Here are the criteria:
- Each case must either be a domestic case (that is, one decided by a UK court) or a European Court of Human Rights case that involves the UK or has had a significant impact on the UK. The case can be 2 days or 30 years old.
- The focus must be on cases which have had a profound impact on people in the UK – the cases which you would mention first if you were explaining the importance of human rights to someone who knows nothing about the concept.
- Don’t worry if you don’t have legal expertise or are just starting out as a law student. I want to capture as broad a range of nominations as possible, and that includes from lawyers and academics with different specialisms, e.g. housing law, mental health, prison law etc.
- I would also be happy to accept nominations from groups of people or organisations.
Here is how to submit your nominations:
- You can submit as few as one or as many as 50 nominated cases. Please try to nominate at least 10 if you can.
- Name the case and its date (ideally using its full citation and a link to BAILII, e.g. Smith v Secretary of State for Justice [2015] EWHC 1234 (Admin) – you can find the citations at the top of the case report on BAILII)
- Each nominated case should be accompanied by a short rationale (no more than 50 words per case). Try the keep it simple – as if you were explaining the case to someone who doesn’t know anything about human rights.
- List the nominated cases in order of importance (with number 1 being the most important).
- Start the email with a one-line biography (e.g. “I am a law student at Birmingham University”)
- All nominations must be submitted by email to humanrightsinformationproject@gmail.com by 5pm on Friday 27th February 2015– please use the subject heading “50 cases – [your name]”
I really appreciate the help. I will publish the results on this blog and of course on the new HRIP site, which is shaping up very nicely – launch is going to be this Spring. Follow @rights_info on Twitter to keep posted.
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“A review of of Britain’s compliance to the European Social Charter found the country’s level of jobseeker’s allowance, pensions and incapacity benefit falls below 40 per cent of the median income of European states.
To comply, Jobseeker’s Allowance would have to be hiked by £71, from £67 to £138 a week.”
http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/456948/Europe-claims-Britain-must-DOUBLE-benefits
So already in breach of the above agreement, the UK government also charge the benefit claimants 10% of Council Tax, and in some cases where there is under occupancy in social housing a further charge of 14% or 25% depending on the amount of unused bedrooms.
So the UK government are not paying enough to live on by approx. 50% and have set their own level of what a benefit claimant needs to live on, but then reduces that amount by the reduced level of Council Tax, brings the claimant into poverty, then reduce the amount the government say claimants need to live on by the reduction of 14% or 25% the UK government are plunging claimants into desperation, resulting in eviction, homelessness and destitution.
http://www.theguardian.com/society/2014/jun/25/homelessness-crisis-england-perfect-storm It is no surprise then that the homeless figure has increased by 26% in the last four years.
So to summarize the UK government is paying benefit claimants anything from £73, £84 to £96 less per week than the EU Social Charter commitment they have signed. (please note figures can only be approx.. as Council Tax and rents differ greatly around the country, so the chances are these figures could be massively higher than presented if we looked at major cities alone.)
Is it any wonder people in the UK are struggling to meet their bills, to feed their kids?
Reblogged this on sdbast.