Category: European

Lord Chief Justice says European Court has too much influence over British Legal System

2 April 2010 by Adam Wagner

Lord Judge, the Lord Chief Justice, has used the annual Judicial Studies Board (JSB) lecture to complain that the English courts were being influenced too heavily by judgments of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR).

This is becoming something of a tradition at the annual JSB lecture. Lord Hoffman used the same platform last year (read lecture here) to criticise the ECtHR, saying it had been “unable to resist the temptation to aggrandise its jurisdiction and to impose uniform rules on Member States.”

In this year’s lecture, Lord Judge suggested that “statute ensures that the final word does not rest with Strasbourg, but with our Supreme Court” and that the Luxembourg-based ECtHR was encroaching on the legal territory of its Strasbourg cousin, the European Court of Justice.

The full lecture can be found here, or you can read more of the address after the page break below:

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Accused should have been allowed to attend appeal against the grant of her bail

1 April 2010 by Adam Wagner

Allen v. The United Kingdom (Application no. 18837/06), Date of judgment: 30 March 2010

(Read judgment)

The European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) has ruled that, in the circumstances, it was a breach of the applicant Susan Allen’s rights under article 5(4) of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) for a Deputy District Judge to refuse her permission to attend an appeal against the grant of her bail.

In October 2005 Ms Allen was charged with two offences of conspiracy to supply Class A drugs. She was produced at Liverpool City Magistrates’ Court. Following a contested bail application she was granted bail by the Deputy District Judge, and the prosecution subsequently appealed. Her counsel requested that the judge allow her to be present at the appeal. The judge declined the request, reasoning that the applicant could be given a full report of what had happened from her counsel. Moreover, her attendance would be undesirable as one of the applicant’s co-accused had not been present at the hearing of the appeal against the grant of bail to him, and it would therefore be unfair to treat the applicant more favourably.

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European Court rejects UK pensioners’ top-up claim

28 March 2010 by Adam Wagner

Carson and Others v The United Kingdom (Application no. 42184/05)

The European Court of Human Rights has rejected a claim by British pensioners living abroad that their pension payments should be uplifted to take into account inflation. The case was supported by Pension Parity UK, a pressure group. The majority in the Court held that the pensions system was not a breach of ECHR Article 14 (non discrimination), saying at [86]:

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Sharper teeth for the European Court of Human Rights?

24 March 2010 by Adam Wagner

According to Alex Bailin QC and Alison Macdonald writing in The Guardian, the European Court of Human Rights will soon have much needed power to filter cases at an early stage, and therefore begin to clear its huge backlog of cases:

Fortunately, in January a significant stalemate was broken when Russia finally ratified a six-year-old provision which will speed up the court’s processing of cases. Protocol 14 provides for a more robust and rapid filter of weak cases, with a single judge having the power to declare wholly unmeritorious cases inadmissible, without any right of appeal. “Repetitive cases” can also be blocked if a relevant ruling on similar issues has already been given. Most controversially, the court can also refuse to hear cases in which the applicant has suffered “no significant disadvantage”, providing the case was properly considered by the domestic courts in the relevant state. Russia had previously blocked the entry into force of Protocol 14 in protest at what it considered were “political rulings” of the Strasbourg court, primarily relating to the conduct of its operations in Chechyna.

One immediate effect which the change will have on the UK, according to the authors, is in relation to prisoners voting rights. Until now, even though the Court has criticised the UK in relation to this issue, the criticisms have not led to an actual change in UK policy. However, as a result of Protocol 14:

The Committee of Ministers can refer a case back to the European court if it considers that the state has not fully complied with a decision of the court. If the court agrees, the committee can decide to take action against the state for noncompliance – including, in theory, suspension or expulsion from the Council of Europe

Read more:

• Will prisoners sue if denied voting rights?

EU Directive on Refugee status does not enhance asylum rights under Strasbourg Convention

28 February 2010 by Rosalind English

The Queen on the Application of MK(Iran) v Secretary of State for the Home Department
CA (Civ Div) (Sedley LJ, Carnwath LJ, Smith LJ) 25/2/2010 [2010] EWCA Civ 115

Will prisoners sue if denied voting rights?

7 February 2010 by Adam Wagner

Prisoners could sue if not allowed to vote in the 2010 general election, according to the Barred from Voting Campaign, organised by the Prison Reform Trust.

The group are seeking to remind the Government of the four year old judgment of the European Court of Human Rights in Hirst v UK, which arose out of the 2002 case of R v Home Secretary ex parte Hirst. The European Court held that Section 4 of the Representation of the People Act which prevents prisoners from voting is in breach of the electoral right under Article 1 of Protocol 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights.

The Government has as yet not addressed the Court’s ruling; according to The Guardian, ministers have been procrastinating on the issue, fearing that it will prove unpopular with the electorate. With the election looming, the Government may well be be vulnerable to a legal challenge.

Supreme Court refers question of public interest in disclosure about mobile phone masts to ECJ

29 January 2010 by Rosalind English

Office of Communications v Information Commissioner [2010] UKSC 3

SC (Lord Hope (Deputy President), Lord Saville, Lady Hale, Lord Mance, Lord Collins) January 27 2010

Article 4(2) of the European Directive 2003/4 imposes a duty to disclose environmental information. The Environmental Regulations were passed in 2004 to give effect to the Directive, the duty being contained in Regulation 12.. There are a number of different exceptions to this duty, one of which is the public safety exception in reg 12(5)(a), and another the intellectual property rights exception in reg. 12(5)(c).

The information commissioner had ordered that the respondent (OFCOM) disclose information as to the precise location of mobile telephone base stations in the United Kingdom. The Information Tribunal had dismissed OFCOM’s appeal against the order, finding that although disclosure fell within the scope of the two exceptions under 12(5)(a) and (c), both were outweighed by the public interest in disclosure.

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Landmark stop and search ruling

13 January 2010 by Adam Wagner

Today the European Court of Human Rights ruled that section 44 of the Terrorism Act 2000 (the broad police power for stop and search without suspicion) violates the right to respect for private life guaranteed Article 8 of the Convention on Human Rights.

See the full story on the Liberty Website

Read the Times Law Report

Court sets out producers’ obligations under waste electronic equipment directive

18 September 2009 by Rosalind English

R (on the application of REPIC Ltd) v (1) Secretary of State for Business Enterprise and Regulatory Reform (2) Environment Agency (Defendants) & (1) Scottish Environment Protection Agency (2) Electrolink Recylcing Ltd and (3) WERC Ltd T/A City Compliance Scheme (Interested Parties) [2009] EWHC 2015 (Admin)

QBD (Admin) (Wyn Williams J) 31 July 2009

The Regulations adopted pursuant to the Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment Directive of 2002 were not breached when an operator of a producer compliance scheme collected more waste electrical and electronic equipment from private households than was necessary to meet its obligations.

The claimant, an electronics producer operating a compliance scheme under the WEEE Regulations applied for a declaration, by way of judicial review, that the defendants had failed to discharge their duties to enforce the Regulations when they refused to take action against the over-collection by the Second and Third Interested Parties.

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