UK Parliament / Open data

Human Rights Act

Proceeding contribution from Neil Carmichael (Conservative) in the House of Commons on Tuesday, 30 June 2015. It occurred during Debate on Human Rights Act.

My way at looking at things in terms of English law is that I prefer to assume that I have a right unless Parliament has told me that I do not. That is how we should be operating.

Doing something different from what we have done in the past also has international implications. As we have already heard, the architect of the European Court of Human Rights was a former Conservative Home Secretary who was not a libertarian in the true sense of the word. Leaving the Court would be to depart from that tradition and would risk our international reputation while making it harder still for other nations to think in terms of their own aspirations for rights, and might not discourage others in their intention not to give rights. The issue is not only legal, but one of foreign policy.

In short, we must consider the matter carefully. I would prefer to have legislation that improves what we already have, rather than undermining and changing the structure that we have become used to.

Type
Proceeding contribution
Reference
597 c423WH 
Session
2015-16
Chamber / Committee
Westminster Hall
Legislation
Human Rights Act 1998
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