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UK Human Rights Blog - 1 Crown Office Row
Search Results for: environmental/page/25/Freedom of information - right of access) [2015] UKUT 159 (AAC) (30 March 2015)
Yesterday was Magna Carta Day. It is now only 364 days until the 800th anniversary of the sealing of England’s oldest charter of rights, and one of the world’s most influential legal documents.
There will be much celebration in the coming year, and rightly so. Despite its age, Magna Carta is still partly on our statute books. It represents the first legal constraints imposed on the English king by his subjects. It has influenced every major rights law since – notably, the United States Constitution and the European Convention on Human Rights, both of which are very much still in force.
According to the Magna Carta Trust, there will be eight century beer, festivities, new books, an opera, a calypso tribute and even a new roundabout on the A308 at Runnymede. And if a new roundabout isn’t “English” enough for you, there will of course be lots of dressing up in silly costumes.
But along with celebration, there will be disagreement. It has already started. Continue reading →
JA (Ivory Coast) and ES (Tanzania) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2009] EWCA Civ 1353 (CA (Civ Div) (Sedley LJ, Longmore LJ, Aikens LJ)
In these two cases, heard together, the Court of Appeal provided clarification of the circumstances in which Art. 8 of the European Convention of Human Rights entitles foreign nationals’ to remain in the UK in order to receive medical treatment.
In an earlier post I discussed the problem of “vaccine hesitancy” and written evidence to Parliament to Parliament outlining ways in which a vaccination against Covid-19 without consent could be put on a par with capacity under the Mental Capacity Act 2005 and with Section 3 of the Mental Health Act 1983.
Since the announcement of successful clinical trials for the vaccination was made in mid-December, the prospect of population-wide vaccinations has become a reality, and, whilst there are still supply problems, there is no doubt that the issue of medical intervention without consent being made mandatory either through private channels has begun to exercise legal minds across the country. Saga cruise line and the airline Qantas for example have indicated their intention to refuse non vaccinated passengers. Such private prohibitions may have almost as broad an effect as the restrictions on civil liberties passed under the Coronavirus Act since lockdown was declared on March 23 2020 (more specifically, the Health Protection (Coronavirus, Restrictions) (All Tiers) (England) Regulations 2020).
Laura Profumo serves us the latest human rights happenings.
In the News:
Michael Gove appeared before the Justice Select Committee last Wednesday, in the first true baring of his political mettle as justice secretary. Overall, it seems, the MP made a largely favourable impression, though legal commentators remain wary. UKHRB’s own Adam Wagner deftly compared Gove’s success to “when they gave Obama the Nobel Peace Prize…because he wasn’t George Bush”. The “post-Grayling Gove-hope” may, then, prove deceptively shallow, defined by the simple relief that Gove is not Grayling.
Yet Gove’s evidence before the committee was laudable – reasonable, measured, and skifully non-committal. Gove’s comments on the Human Rights Act obliquely signalled the “proposals” will be published “in the autumn”, failing to specify whether they would be accompanied by a draft Bill. His substantive points were similarly vague. The Lord Chancellor invoked the “abuse” of human rights as justification for the repeal of the HRA, before conceding he could not offer a “one-hundred per cent guarantee” that the UK would remain a party to the Convention. Such a position suggests a British Bill of Rights may “seek to limit certain rights”, argues academic Mark Elliot, which would, “quite possibly”, precipitate British withdrawal from Strasbourg altogether. Gove also stressed the role of the judiciary in applying the common law to uphold human rights, holding that “there is nothing in the Convention that is not in the common law”. Such a view is “highly contestable at best, plain wrong at worst”, holds Elliot, whilst Conor Gearty finds it stokes the fantasy of “the civil libertarian common law”. Gove seems to suggest that HRA-repeal and possible ECHR-withdrawal would be “far from earth-shattering events”, Elliot notes, as judges could still invoke a panoply of common-law rights. Whilst Gove is right to remind skeptics that HRA-repeal would not leave domestic judges powerless, such “overstatement” of the common-law rights model “might end up hoist on its own petard….ringing hollower than its cheerleaders”. Continue reading →
THE CHURCH OF JESUS CHRIST OF LATTER-DAY SAINTS v. THE UNITED KINGDOM, ECtHR, 4 March 2014– read judgment
An apparently dry dispute about business rates on one of the Mormons’ temples in Preston (see pic) has reached Strasbourg and raises interesting issues about indirect discrimination on religious grounds. The underlying question was whether the temple was a place of “public religious worship” and therefore exempt from rates.
There are over 12 million Mormons in the world, with 180,000 in the United Kingdom and Ireland. Their organisation is important for this application. Local congregations are called wards, and are presided over by a local bishop. Each ward meets in a local chapel. Five to 15 wards constitutes a “stake”. In each stake one of the larger chapels is designated as a stake centre, where meetings from members of all the wards in the stake can take place.
Preston is one of two temples in the UK. Mormons regard these temples as the holiest places on earth – top of the religious hierarchy. But the question was – is worship there “public”?
Richard Susskind, IT adviser to the Lord Chief Justice, has spent many years looking into the future of the law. In a fascinating podcast paving the way for his new book The Future of the Professions and the updated Tomorrow’s Lawyers, he discusses with OUP’s George Miller the new world of technological advancements in the day to day management of dispute resolution. We have taken the liberty of summarising the podcast here and posting a link to the interview at the end of this post.
Susskind finds, in comparison with the rest of the English speaking world, that the legal institutions of the UK are in some sort of denial about the march of AI. He maintains that the legal world will change more in twenty years than it has in the past two centuries. If we want to improve access to justice in our society, the answer is in technology. But the law schools have not caught up with this idea.
How do we work out what to do in the face of irreversible and inevitable change in the law? Susskind acknowledges that most people want to pay less for legal services, for something that is less complicated, less combative. It’s not that there’s less legal work to do, there’s more legal work to do, but it’s under cost pressure.
The twenties will be the big decade of change. The age of denial ended in 2016; leaders in law are no longer saying the legal world is going to go back to what it was in 2004-6. But the period from 2016 – 2020 is the area of resourcing, put bluntly, finding cheaper people to do the work by outsourcing, as manufacturing did years ago. Once we’re into the twenties, we’ve arrived in an area Susskind calls the decade of disruption. The challenge to lawyers will be to provide not only one to one services in the traditional way, but to work on systems that one day will replace us. The trusted advisor concept is not fundamental to the legal service. That was limited to the print world. The future of the professions is to imagine other ways in which these problems must be sorted out. When a client has a problem, and they say they want a trusted advisor, what they really want is access to reliable expertise, and this is being worked on in the field of AI. Our technology is becoming more and more capable. Future clients will happily go for that even if they lose the surrounding aura or trappings of a traditional legal advisor. Continue reading →
The Guardian and Liberty Investigates have conducted an investigation into the Metropolitan police’s use of “cumulative disruption” as a justification to impost restrictions on protests. Liberty Investigates is an editorially independent investigative journalism group based in the civil liberties organization, Liberty.
According to the research and review of evidence obtained under freedom of information laws, the Met has used “cumulative disruption” against at least protests despite their power to do so being quashed in a May 2025 ruling.
However, the Met has used the cumulative disruption to ban or impose conditions on two pro-Palestinian groups since that ruling. On May 7, 2025, the Met banned the Jewish pro-Palestine group, International Jewish Anti-Zionist Network (IJAN), from holding its weekly meeting in North London citing “cumulative impact on the local Jewish community”. That ban has been renewed weekly since May 2025. In November 2025, the Palestine Coalition was forced to change the route of their march by the Met due to the “cumulative impact on businesses” in the area.
Both the Met and the Home Office assert that officers still have the authority to take cumulative disruption into account when imposing restrictions on protests. The Met argues that their consideration of cumulative disruption is lawful in efforts to balance the right to protest and ensuring that “serious disorder or serious disruption” does not result from protests. The Home Office stated that the Public Order Act 1986 implies the discretionary use of cumulative disruption, but future amendments will make its use explicit.
Welcome back to the UK Human Rights Roundup, your regular winter wonderland of human rights news and views. The full list of links can be found here. You can find previous roundups here. Links compiled by Adam Wagner, post by Celia Rooney.
This week, equality issues dominate the headlines, while elsewhere judicial heavyweights throw their views into the ring on the institutional question of who should have the final say on issues involving human rights.
The number of hate crimes committed in England and Wales has risen since the previous year, according to statistics released by the Home Office. In the year ending March 2025, 115,990 hate crimes were recorded by the police: this marks a 2% increase overall, a 6% increase in race hate crimes, and a 3% increase in religious hate crimes. A 19% increase in religious hate crimes targeting Muslims coincided with the time of the Southport murders and the subsequent race riots across the country.
Kemi Badenoch has confirmed at the Conservative Party Conference that her party would withdraw the UK from the European Convention on Human Rights and repeal the Human Rights Act if they form the next Government. This follows a legal review by the Shadow Attorney General, Lord Wolfson, into the impact of remaining in the ECHR. The Wolfson Report concluded that ‘it is hard to overstate the impact the ECHR has had on government decisions’, placing ‘substantial’ limitations on government policies to do with immigration, veterans’ rights, benefits, and reforms to sentencing and protest laws. Read Rosalind English’s summary of the Report here: The UK can, and should leave the Human Rights Convention (7 October 2025).
In International News:
A ceasefire has been agreed for the war in Gaza. The deal, brokered by the US, provides for a cessation in the conflict between Israel and Hamas which has been ongoing since 2023. The full text of the deal — entitled ‘Implementation steps for President Trump’s proposal for a comprehensive end of Gaza War’ — has not been publicised, though parts have been published by Israeli media. Trump’s 20-point plan, announced last week, provided for Gaza to be a ‘deradicalised terror-free zone’ which will be ‘redeveloped for the benefit of the people of Gaza’; all hostages will be released, and full aid will be sent to the Gaza Strip.
In the Courts:
An asylum seeker unsuccessfully challenged the housing and financial support given to him by Enfield Council. In R (on the application of BLV) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2025] EWHC 2516 (Admin), the Claimant was a disabled man suffering from deafness, impaired eyesight, and major depressive and anxiety disorders. The Defendant was obliged, under the Immigration and Asylum Act 1999, to provide ‘adequate’ accommodation and other ‘essentially living needs’ to the Claimant; under the Equality Act 2010 and Human Rights Act 1998, it was also bound to adjust its general approach to providing support under the IAA 1999 to account for the Claimant’s specific disabilities. The Defendant contended that Enfield’s support was inadequate for two reasons:
His accommodation was inadequate, because it was too far away from his support network and did not have a suitable disabled lift;
His internet access was inadequate, because it was not sufficient for him to access mental health and other support services via video-call (his deafness made it impossible to rely on voice call alone).
The court applied the ‘twin-track’ test, namely: 1) whether the Secretary of State met an objective ‘minimum standard’ for ‘ensur[ing] full respect for human dignity and a dignified standard of living, maintain[ing] an adequate standard of health and meet[ing] the subsistence needs of the asylum seeker’; 2) even if the minimum standard has been met, whether the Secretary of State complied with public law standards including rationality. The court found that (stage 1) the Claimant’s accommodation did meet the minimum standard. Furthermore, (stage 2) the Defendant’s treatment of the Claimant did not violate its duties under the EA 2010, HRA 1998, or other public law principles.
An interesting aspect of this case was that internet video calling was deemed capable of being an ‘essential living need’ because of the Claimant’s disabilities. The court ruled that ‘the concept of ‘need’ is…affected by technological progress and consequent changes in societal expectations’, and that ‘internet-based communication… has become essential for interacting with other people and accessing public services.’
R (on the application of K and AC Jackson and Son) v DEFRA – read judgment.
An interesting ruling in the Administrative Court this week touches on some issues fundamental to public law – the extent to which “macro” policy (such as EC law) should trump principles of good administration; the role of factual evidence in judicial review proceedings, and the connection between public law wrongs and liability in tort.
It all started with Boxster the pedigree bull and notices issued by DEFRA which sealed his fate, or at least appeared to do so when his owners received them in April and July 2010. They were directed to arrange the slaughter of the animal as a result of a positive bovine tuberculosis (bTB) test that had been carried out by DEFRA technicians earlier in the year. The notices of intended slaughter were issued under paragraph 4 of the Tuberculosis (England) Order 2007, an Order made under powers contained in the Animal Health Act 1981. Continue reading →
JR1, Re Judicial Review [2011] NIQB 5 – Read judgment
A decision of the Northern Ireland high court has highlighted the continued narrow definition of “standing”, or the right to bring a claim, under the Human Rights Act 1998.
An 8-year-old child applied to bring a claim, which included a challenge under Article 2 of the European Convention on Human Rights (the right to life), to the decision by police to introduce tasers in Northern Ireland.
Flatela Vava et al v. Anglo American South Africa Ltd [2012] EWHC 1969 (QB) 16 July 2012, Silber J read judgment
Back to the problem of when and where you can sue various members of a group of companies. In the Cape case (for which see my post), a parent company was held liable for failing to ensure that its subsidiary properly managed the risks posed by asbestos. In this case of Vava, the claimants wanted to sue a South African registered holding company (AASA) in the UK, on the basis that the real decisions were taken in the UK, and hence AASA were domiciled in the UK for purposes of suing them.
The case came before Silber J, on an application by the claimants for documents relevant to this jurisdictional issue. AASA resisted, on the basis that there was not a good arguable case that it could be sued in England, and therefore it did not have to produce the documents relevant to this issue.
Following May’s High Court judgment finding former Home Secretary Suella Braverman’s protest regulations unlawful, human rights organisation Liberty claimed last week that the Home Office has decided to continue its appeal. The case, spearheaded by Liberty, sought to challenge the lowering of the threshold for “serious disruption” during protest from “significant” and “prolonged” to “more than minor” by statutory instrument – which opponents claim is an abuse of secondary legislation. Despite the new Labour government initially pausing the former Tory government’s plans to appeal, Liberty have stated that the Home Office have recommenced the appeal after talks to resolve the dispute failed. The director at Liberty, Akiko Hart, has said she believes the legislation to be “undemocratic, unconstitutional and unacceptable” and that the decision to appeal shows “disregard for the rule of law”. Liberty have stated that the appeal will be heard later this year, with a date yet to be confirmed. A spokesperson for the Home Office has said that “the right to protest is fundamental to our democracy, and all public order legislation must balance this right. However, we disagree with the court’s ruling in this case and have appealed their decision.”
Scotland’s Chief Inspector of Prisons has claimed that the country’s “broken” prison system results in inmates being “set up to fail”. Having stepped down from her role at the end of August, Wendy Sinclair-Giebens expressed concerns about the state of Scottish prisons: “The prison service is underfunded and under-resourced for what the public and judiciary expect of it, yet it’s a very big organisation having to deal with the most marginalised, violent and mentally ill in society”. She revealed there is a pool of inmates unable to move further towards parole due to the “huge” waiting lists for the mandatory behavioural programs. The news follows a 2023 ruling by an Irish judge barring the extradition of a man to Scotland on the basis of a “real and substantial risk of inhuman or degrading treatment”, largely a result of the overcrowding of Scottish prisons. The ruling was, however, later overturned on appeal following express assurances from the Crown Office in Edinburgh that the prison would implement a tailored care plan for the respondent. Last week also saw the release of 477 Scottish prisoners as part of an emergency scheme to ease prison overcrowding as Scotland’s justice secretary revealed the prison population has risen by 13% in the last year.
The annual report of the Committee on Fuel Poverty published last week has revealed that fuel poverty is “flatlining rather than falling”. Despite a reduction in fuel poverty of 40% between 2010 and 2019, the last five years has not seen fuel poverty fall “to any meaningful extent”. The government has identified the groups at highest risk of being unable to afford energy and “living in a cold home” as those living in the private rented sector, ethnic minority households, and households using pre-payment meters – the government has emphasised the importance of aligning fuel poverty mitigation measures with wider equality goals. The report follows the controversial announcement by the new Labour government that universal winter fuel payments to pensioners will be scrapped. The energy minister, Miatta Fahnbulleh, has been conducting meetings to consider support measures for households experiencing fuel poverty. The annual report emphasises that it “is not defeatist. The Committee believes fuel poverty can be beaten. But for too many low-income households, the unaffordability of bills, especially in the coldest months, is all too real. We foresee that targeted financial support, possibly including the use of social tariffs, for vulnerable and low-income households may be needed for some years to come.”
In International News
A new “morality” law introduced by the Taliban last week has been met with condemnation by the UN and various human rights organisations. Titled “The Propagation of Virtue and Prevention of Vice Law”, the law seeks to prevent leading men into “vice” by requiring women to be completely veiled in public. Women are also prevented from singing or reading aloud where they could be heard by a non-family member, as well as looking directly at men to whom they are not related. The laws state that “whenever an adult woman leaves her home out of necessity, she is obliged to conceal her voice, face, and body”. The Chief Spokesperson for the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights has stated that the law “effectively attempts to render [women] into faceless, voiceless shadows” and called for its immediate repeal. The head of the United Nations mission in Afghanistan, Roza Otunbayeva, said that the law reveals a “distressing vision” of the country’s future by extending “the already intolerable restrictions on the rights of Afghan women and girls”. The law comes in defiance of Security Council Resolution 2681 (2023) which called on the Taliban to “swiftly reverse its policies and practices restricting women and girls’ enjoyment of their human rights and fundamental freedoms”. It has been reported that Afghan women are posting videos online of themselves singing in protest against the new restrictions.
A UN report published on Friday has further exposed the ongoing human rights violations in Libya. The accompanying press release slams the “lack of accountability and years of impunity” by those committing the violations as further fuelling instability in the country. The report investigates unlawful killings, torture, kidnappings, and sexual violence committed by Al-Kaniyat – a local militia who have conducted what has been termed by the UK Government a “reign of terror” in the region of Tarhuna. The report reveals “serious violations of international humanitarian law”, calling for accountability, the delivery of justice, and effective reparations for victims. The report argues that “leaving root causes and drivers of conflict unaddressed […] will serve to fuel toxic cycles of violence and revenge between communities.” The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, expressed a similar sentiment, stating that “the impunity must end – there must be accountability in accordance with international due process and fair trial standards.”
The Swiss Federal Council voted last Wednesday to affirm Switzerland’s rejection of the groundbreaking KlimaSeniorinnen ECHR judgment from last April, which found that Switzerland was breaching human rights through climate change inaction. Despite previous calls by the dominant party – the Swiss People’s Party – for Switzerland to leave the Council of Europe, the Swiss Federal Council instead reaffirmed in a press release that “the ECHR and membership of the Council of Europe, whose fundamental values of the protection of human rights, democracy and the rule of law include, remain of great importance to Switzerland”. However, it was added that “the case law must not lead to an extension of the scope of the ECHR”. The move has been criticised by the Center for International Environmental Law as an “embarrassment” for Switzerland, who it claims have missed an opportunity to “strengthen its climate policy in accordance with undisputed science”.
AJA and others v Commissioner of Police for the Metropolis [2013] EWCA Civ 1342 – read judgment
The words “personal or other relationship” in the section 26(8)(a) Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 included intimate sexual relationships so that the Investigatory Powers Tribunal had jurisdiction to hear the appellants’ claims that their human rights had been violated by undercover police officers who had allegedly had sexual relationships with them
There were two groups of claimants in this case. The first three were represented by Birnberg Pierce & Partners (referred to as “the Birnberg claimants”). The second three were represented by Tuckers (referred to as “the Tuckers claimants”). Both groups alleged that they had suffered violations of their rights under Articles 3 and 5 by the officers for whom the respondents were responsible and that such conduct was contrary to the Human Rights Act 1998 s.6(1). They appealed against a decision that the Investigatory Powers Tribunal had jurisdiction to decide their human rights claims and that High Court proceedings should be stayed pending the IPT’s determination. Continue reading →
One of the candidates running in Ecuador’s upcoming presidential election has been assassinated. Fernando Villavicencio was shot dead at a campaign rally in Quito. His election platform addressed the issues of corruption and government links to organised crime. There is speculation that the powerful Los Lobos gang is behind the killing. This follows the news two weeks ago of the fatal shooting of Agustín Intriago, a popular city mayor. Formerly hailed as one of the safest countries in South America, Ecuador has been overrun in recent years by organised crime and international drug cartels, while democratic rights of protest have been rolled back by the political establishment.
British water companies are facing lawsuits valued at £800 million for failing to report pollution. Class actions claims are being brought against six water companies on behalf of the public. The claimants allege that the companies’ failure to report the discharge of raw sewage into the supply is a breach of competition law and should have lowered the consumer price. Carolyn Roberts, the environmental and water consultant bringing the claims at the competition tribunal, contends that customers have been overcharged as a result of the water companies abusing their power as privatised monopolies.
A group of asylum seekers which refused to board the Bibby Stockholm barge was warned on Monday that government support would be withdrawn if they did not move onto the accommodation. The Justice Secretary, Alex Chalk, commented that the illegality of the proposal was “something that the courts would have to consider” but that it was “unlikely” to be illegal, also remarking that the asylum accommodation was “sparse and […] a bit austere but, frankly, that is not unreasonable.” The charity Care4Calais have criticised the scheme as likely to cause vulnerable people emotional distress. On Thursday, however, all migrants were removed from the vessel after it was discovered that Legionella bacteria had entered the water supply.
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Yesterday was Magna Carta Day. It is now only 364 days until the 800th anniversary of the sealing of England’s oldest charter of rights, and one of the world’s most influential legal documents.
Welcome back to the UK Human Rights Roundup, your regular winter wonderland of human rights news and views. The full list of links can be found 
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