Search Results for: prisoners/page/19/ministers have been procrastinating on the issue, fearing that it will prove unpopular with the electorate.
29 February 2016 by Charlotte Bellamy
In the news
The UK government is letting companies “off the hook” for human rights abuses, according to Amnesty International. In an 80-page report, Obstacle course: How the UK’s National Contact Point handles human rights complaints under the OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises, Amnesty claims that the National Contact Point (NCP) within the Department for Business Innovation and Skills – who is charged with handling complaints that private contracts may conflict with human rights commitments – is “unqualified to make complex human rights judgments”. The NCP is a non-judicial mechanism tasked with holding companies to account over breaches of the international standards set by the Organisation of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) – but has, it seems, rejected 60% of human rights complaints in the past five years without full investigation.
Amnesty describes the NCP as “totally failing in numerous ways”, with its complaint handling procedure being “inconsistent, unreliable and biased towards businesses” resulting in companies being let “off the hook”. The failures to investigate include allegations of serious abuse, such as claims that Vodafone, BT and others allowed GCHQ to access its networks for the mass interception of phone calls, emails and Facebook posts, which it shared with the US authorities under the Tempora program.
The all-party foreign affairs select committee is currently investigating whether the Foreign Office has downgraded its commitment to defending human rights in favour of trade. MPs on the committee decided to hold an enquiry after the permanent secretary at the Foreign Office, Sir Simon McDonald, commented that human rights no longer had the same profile within his department that they had in the past.
A BIS spokesperson has said in response that their review process meets all the obligations under the OECD guidelines for trading and that there should be no suggestion the government is not committed to human rights.
Last week also saw David Cameron describe UK arms exports to Saudi Arabia as “brilliant” – on the same day that the European Parliament voted for an arms embargo on the country for its aerial bombings on Yemen.
Other news
- Last week a seven-judge Supreme Court heard a case on whether the minimum-income visa requirements for UK nationals to bring over a non-EU spouse are in contravention of the right to respect for private and family life under Article 8, the Guardian reports. Under the Family Migration Rules, which changed in July 2012, UK nationals must have available funds equivalent to a minimum gross income of £18,600 to bring over a non-EU spouse, rising to £22,400 if they have a child of non-British citizenship. Two of the appellants, Abdul Majid and Shabana Javed, are British and married to Pakistani nationals; another, MM, is a Lebanese refugee; and the fourth, AF (also MM’s nephew) is a refugee from the Democratic Republic of Congo. The appellant counsel described the threshold as “completely unachievable” for many. Judgment is expected within six months.
- Proposals to replace the Human Rights Act with a British Bill of Rights have been “put on ice”. Though it is claimed that the legislation is finished and “sitting on a desk inside No.10”, Downing Street is refusing to publish it, allegedly due to Gove’s decision to “defect to the Out camp” in the referendum. An unsurprised David Allen Green comments that the Human Rights Act is not likely to be repealed in this Parliament, saying that the hurdles to doing so still remain (such as the Good Friday Agreement), and suggests that the Conservatives may have begun to realise that its repeal and replacement “is not worth the time and effort”.
In the Courts
- Civek v Turkey – The Court held unanimously that the Turkish authorities had violated Article 2 (right to life) by failing to protect the life of a woman who had been seriously threatened by her husband, HC. Ms Civek had made continued complaints of harassment to the Turkish authorities yet they had failed to take measures reasonably available to them to avoid her murder. Ms Civek had been subjected to sustained abuse from her husband culminating in 2010 in his remand in custody and a court order to refrain from being violent towards his wife. After his release in November 2010 (under judicial supervision), Ms Civek had complained that he was threatening to kill her. Again in December 2010 Ms Civek lodged a complaint, which led to HC being charged with threatening to kill her – but the State Prosecutor took no practical action, even though the husband could have been legitimately arrested for non-compliance with court orders. The Court found the authorities should have acted to protect Ms Civek’s life, and through their failure, her husband had been able to murder her on a street in January 2011, stabbing her 22 times.
- Société de Conception de Presse et d’Édition v. France – An order by the French domestic courts that an unauthorised photograph published by Choc magazine be blacked out was not a violation of freedom of expression under article 10. Choc magazine, published by the applicant company, had published photos of a young man, IH, taken whilst he was in captivity, wearing shackles, and showing visible signs of torture. He had later died from his injuries. The Court found that the photograph had never been intended for public viewing, permission had not been obtained from IH’s relatives, and that its publication showed a grave disregard for the grief of his family. It was therefore a serious interference with the private life of IH’s relatives. The Paris Court of Appeal had ordered that the photograph in question be blacked out in all magazines put on sale, rather than withdrawn completely. The European Court of Human Rights found that such a restriction on freedom of expression was proportionate, as the text of the report remained unchanged, and that in the circumstances the penalty imposed would not have a “chilling effect” on freedom of expression.
- Nasr and Ghali v Italy – This case concerned the CIA abduction and extraordinary rendition (the transfer of a person without legal process to another country for interrogation where there is a risk they might be tortured) with the cooperation of the Italian authorities, of the Egyptian imam Abu Omar (also known as Osama Nasr), who had been granted political asylum in Italy. He was held in secret in Egypt for several months in cramped and unhygienic cells where he was periodically interrogated and tortured. An investigation into Mr Nasr’s disappearance had been carried out by the national authorities but this had been ineffective due to the executive’s invocation of ‘State secrecy’ – which resulted in those responsible being granted impunity.
- The Court found in respect of Mr Nasr violations of Article 3 prohibition on torture (in previous cases the Court had already held that the treatment of detainees under the CIA’s extraordinary rendition programme amounted to torture), Article 5 (right to liberty and security) – due to the unlawful nature of the detention; Article 8 (right to respect for private and family life) and Article 13 (right to effective remedy) read together with Articles 3, 5 and 8. The Court also found in respect of Ms Ghali, Mr Nasr’s wife, violations of Article 3 (because she had suffered significant non-pecuniary damage as a result of her husband’s sudden disappearance), Article 8 and Article 13.
Previous Posts
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26 August 2010 by Adam Wagner
Updated, 1 Sep | The high-profile criminal trial of a German popstar who caused her former partner to be infected with HIV has resulted in a 2-year suspended sentence. In other words, she has been convicted but escaped jail. What would happen in similar circumstances in the UK?
The facts of Nadja Benaissa’s case were relatively simple. She had been infected with HIV since the age of 16 and is 28 years old now. She had sex with three people without telling them she was infected, and as a result one of them became infected himself. She claimed that she did not intend to infect him, and that she had been told by doctors the risk of passing on the disease were “practically zero”.
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29 February 2012 by Adam Wagner
Not me giving evidence
Last month I was asked to provide a witness statement to the Leveson Inquiry into Culture, Practice and Ethics of the Press. Yesterday it was “read into evidence”, which means I can now publish it. You can download the entire statement here, and I have reproduced (what I think are) the interesting bits below and in a follow-up post. The questions in bold are those asked by the Inquiry in their request. I have not been asked to give oral evidence.
The extent to which you consider what ethics can and should play a role in the blogosphere, and what you consider ‘ethics’ to mean in this context.
The definition of “blogging” is now extremely wide, so much so that the term “blog” has become in essence meaningless.
A blog can be a “web log” within the original meaning of the word, that is a “personal journey published on the World Wide Web consisting of discrete entries (“posts”)” (Wikipedia), but it can also be a news and comment website such as UKHRB, a photo-sharing website, a website promoting a business – practically any website can call itself a blog. Mainstream newspapers now produce “blogs” online and as such the boundary between traditional journalism and blogging has also become unclear.
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3 April 2015 by Guest Contributor
When late last year the US Senate Select Committee on Intelligence published parts of its 6,700 page report on the CIA’s detention and interrogation programme, it shed light – remarkable light – on how the ‘war on terror’ had been conducted by the US for some time.
It very rightly prompted questions for this country. The most immediate and top level question was, if that is what the US did, what did Britain do? But one need barely scratch the surface of the matter before encountering some difficult questions about method – how do we find out what Britain did? – and about scrutiny – are there lessons to be learned about oversight and accountability?
We review here some of the expert opinions and highlight five issues that, if the experts are right, are likely to lie at the heart of debate for some time to come.
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9 August 2017 by Rosalind English
Just posted: Marina Wheeler QC in conversation with Rosalind English about efforts to preempt and limit the influence of extremist materials on children in the family courts. In this interview Marina also discusses the implementation of the government’s counterterrorism “Prevent” strategy against adults who are suspected of starting down a pathway towards terrorism but who have as yet committed no crime. The podcast is now available on iTunes as Episode 8 in our series.
To listen, click on the Law Pod UK banner on the top right hand of the home page. You can access this and other free episodes of Law Pod UK, including David Hart QC on the Brexit Bill and its implications for the environment. Read more about David Hart’s concerns about the potential loss of right to sue for breach of EU law under the rule in Francovich in The Times: https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/brexit-bill-will-remove-right-to-sue-government-750dhfjj3?shareToken=09ea60e3150edafe920c43e542df0351
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22 October 2014 by Rosalind English
A NHS Foundation Trust v Ms X (By her litigation friend, the Official Solicitor), 8 October 2014 [2014] EWCOP 35 – read judgment
The issues that arose before the Court of Protection in this case encapsulate the difficulties involved in applying legal tools to the organic swamp of human pathology. Everything that one may envisage, for example, in planning a “living will” (or, more precisely, an Advance Decision under the Mental Capacity Act), may have no application at the critical time because the human body – or rather the way it falls apart – does not fit in to neat legal categories. In such a situation it is often the right to autonomy that is most at risk, since what you plan for your own medical and physiological future may not square with what the authorities you decide you were capable of planning. Cobb J’s sensitive and humane judgement in this sad case is a very encouraging sign that courts are beginning to resist the tyrannous claims of Article 2 and the obligation to preserve life at all costs.
Factual and legal background
Ms X, a young woman who lives alone in a private rented bed-sit, has suffered from anorexia nervosa for the last 14 years. She also suffers an alcohol dependence syndrome which has caused chronic and, by the time of this hearing, “end-stage” and irreversible liver disease, cirrhosis; this followed many years of abuse of alcohol. The combination of anorexia nervosa and alcohol dependence syndrome is unusual, and has always been medically acutely difficult to manage. This is a vicious cycle of self destructiveness and treatment, and as Cobb J observed,
The causes of her distress are multi-factorial but include the treatment for her anorexia itself and the removal of her personal autonomy when treated
So damaging had been the previous admissions for compulsory feeding, her doctors regarded it as “clinically inappropriate, counter-productive and increasingly unethical” to cause her to be readmitted; their experience revealed that on each recent admission, she had been more and more unwell (as a result of her anxiety to reverse the weight gained in hospital during the previous visit, combined with renewed alcohol abuse). In fact Ms X had been on an ‘end of life pathway’ twice in recent months and it was said that her physical condition “is now so fragile that her life is in imminent danger.”
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27 August 2010 by Adam Wagner
Hoovering up the latest human rights news
We recently started adding links to interesting new articles and case-law on the right the sidebar under the heading “Selected news sources”.
These articles now appear on our Twitter feed (@ukhumanrightsb) and Facebook fan page too. Below is a quick rundown of some of the most recent stories. The full list of links can be found here.
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12 August 2013 by Rosalind English
Navarathnam v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2013] EWHC 2383 (QB) – read judgment
There was no unfairness in the Secretary of State for the Home Department refusing a Sri Lankan asylum seeker leave to remain in the United Kingdom, despite the ruling from the Strasbourg court that to return him would violate his rights under Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights 1950.
A decision had been made to grant the applicant six months discretionary leave to remain but he had absconded before it could be implemented, and by the time he resurfaced the secretary of state had been entitled to review the case and determine that the circumstances in Sri Lanka had changed so that he was no longer at risk if returned.
Factual Background
The claimant was a Sri Lankan national who had been subject to removal action after his asylum claim was refused. In 2008 the Strasbourg Court declared that the circumstances in Sri Lanka were such that his expulsion to Sri Lanka would violate the prohibition on torture and inhuman treatment under Article 3 (AA v United Kingdom). The UK authorities consequently confirmed that removal directions would not be applied to him, and stated that he would be granted six months discretionary leave to remain (DLR).
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1 October 2010 by Guest Contributor
To celebrate our six-month birthday, and following the Inforrm Blog’s lead, here are our 10 most popular posts of all time.
We launched the UK Human Rights Blog on 31 March 2010 and since then have had 86,070 page views, with over 20,000 coming this month alone. So thank you to all of our readers, and enjoy the top 10! As always we welcome your comments on any aspect of the blog.
- British Airways strike and human rights – The union strikes back
- Pilot accused of 9/11 plot entitled to compensation
- Rooney, Coulson and Hague scandals reveal the need for stronger protection of the press
- Human Rights Act may be safe under new Justice secretary Ken Clarke
- European Court of Human Rights sharpens its teeth
- Sarah Ferguson scandal raises debate on right to privacy
- Sex offenders’ lifelong living and travel restrictions were breach of human rights
- Religious versus other freedoms: the future of Article 9?
- Lord Bingham of Cornhill dies, loss of eloquent advocate for individual rights
- France expulsion of Roma: the EU law perspective
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6 May 2017 by Rosalind English
We have finished an overhaul of the Convention rights pages to reflect recent political and legal developments since they were last reviewed. The most important of these is the vote to leave the European Union and what implications this might have for the UK’s obligations under the European Charter of Fundamental Rights and Freedoms. For the moment I have left in place the editorial material matching each of the Charter rights with the Convention rights but the Charter and the role of the ECJ in UK legal affairs may be one of the first features of the post-Brexit landscape to change (see Marina Wheeler’s post on how that court might have overstepped the mark with the Charter, and David Hart’s discussion on the topic of ECJ muscle-flexing here, here and here).
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21 June 2011 by Adam Wagner
The long-awaited Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Bill has been published. I have reproduced it below via Scribd. The Ministry of Justice’s press release is here.
The Ministry of Justice has also released its response to its formal consultation on legal aid reforms (also reproduced via Scribd below the page break).
The Bill contains:
- the government’s proposals on civil (section 7 onwards) and criminal (section 12 onwards) legal aid;
- new arrangements for litigation funding and costs (section 41 onwards);
- The (controversial) proposals for criminal sentencing reforms.
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1 November 2013 by David Hart KC
More naturism and the law, in the light of Mr Gough’s travails: see my post of yesterday.
For many years, the beautiful beach upon which Ms Paltrow was seen in Shakespeare in Love (my pic) has been a haven for naturists, even on the chilliest of days when the wind whips in from the north-east. However, things have changed this year. Initially, naturism was banned from the beach completely. The ban has now been lifted for the area of sand below the mean high water mark, but remains in place for the sand dunes.
How so?
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10 May 2011 by Rosalind English
The Strasbourg Court has ruled that the United Kingdom has not breached the right to privacy by failing to have in place a “pre-notification” requirement that would have alerted Max Mosley to the News of the World’s impending publication of covertly filmed footage – read judgment.
Adam Wagner’s prediction is bang to rights; although in this particular case the Court agreed that the newspaper had “flagrantly” violated Max Mosley’s right to privacy, it has refrained from ruling that UK law fell short of adequate protection of Article 8. “Particular care” had to be taken when examining constraints which might operate as a form of censorship prior to publication and generally have a chilling effect on journalism.
A new attitude of diffidence characterises this judgment in that the Court expressly refrains from considering the application of Convention rights to the facts of this case, since the UK Court had already decided on it. This suggests that Strasbourg is beginning to take on board criticisms that it is tending to arrogate to itself the role of supra-national court of appeal. There was no reconsideration therefore of the High Court’s assessment of the newspaper’s public interest defence nor of the balancing act that the judge had conducted between the right to privacy and the right to freedom of expression. The focus of this ruling was on the question of whether a legally binding pre-notification rule was required.
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8 November 2010 by Adam Wagner
Today marks the beginning of National Pro Bono Week, with events being held across the country to celebrate the range and impact of pro bono work undertaken by solicitors, barristers and legal executives. A calendar of events can be found here.
How much pro-bono, or free, work should a lawyer do? This is a question which I have heard asked surprisingly rarely. I cannot recall the topic being addressed during my legal training, although pro-bono work was generally encouraged not just as charity but also as an excellent way of gaining legal experience with a view to finding a job. This was certainly my experience, and I cannot stress enough how valuable my work at the Free Representation Unit was in providing an interesting and valuable insight into representing real clients.
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29 January 2015 by Rosalind English
Most law undergraduates are familiar with Jeremy Bentham’s dismissal of natural rights as “nonsense on stilts”. This is a slight misrepresentation of what he said, which was that “Natural rights is simple nonsense: natural and imprescriptible rights, rhetorical nonsense — nonsense upon stilts“. But let’s take the stilts away and consider rights in their ordinary sense. They furnish not only arguments before courts, but reasons for going to war and toppling whole regimes. As Israeli historian Yuval Noah Harari points out in his recent book:
No one was lying when, in 2011, the UN demanded that the Libyan government respect the human rights of its citizens, even though the UN, Libya, and human rights are all figments of our fertile imaginations.
So, might the author have added, are “citizens”, since in a reality without cities and states, it is a non-sequitur to talk of citizens.
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