Dominic Raab’s paper seen as fulfilment of quest to destroy Human Rights Act
Analysis: critics think man who once said ‘I don’t believe in economic and social rights’ is reaching goal of 12-year campaign
It may bear the unassuming title of a “consultation paper”. But critics believe that the document released by Dominic Raab’s department on Tuesday is the culmination of a steady 12-year campaign by the justice secretary to rip up the Human Rights Act.
Footage of Raab from 2009 shows the then backbench MP looking into the camera and saying: “I don’t support the Human Rights Act and I don’t believe in economic and social rights.”
A few months after the footage was recorded, he released a book entitled The Assault on Liberty: What Went Wrong With Rights in which he argued that the law had opened the door to a slew of new court claims.
“The spread of rights has become contagious and, since the Human Rights Act, opened the door to vast new categories of claims, which can be judicially enforced against the government through the courts,” he wrote.
The book also articulated a theme that has become a rallying cry for many in the post-Brexit Conservative party: that the UK can never truly leave the EU while the nation’s laws are trumped by European courts.
“The very enactment of the Human Rights Act has served as a trigger for the formulation of claims by lawyers and judicial reasoning by courts, using human rights arguments that would never have been dared before,” he said.
Conservative critics of Boris Johnson say Raab was demoted from foreign secretary in September’s reshuffle in part because his predecessor Robert Buckland would not take on the legal establishment with the gusto required. One ally of Buckland said: “They wanted a wrecking ball, and Raab fits the bill.”
Johnson remains keen to further curb the power of the judiciary over parliament. He is still said to be furious after his 2019 decision to delay the opening of parliament, which many saw as an attempt to prevent MPs scrutinising the government’s Brexit plans, was reversed by the supreme court as a result of a successful judicial review.
But Tuesday’s plans have attracted criticisms from unusual sources, who may yet force some changes.
MI5, MI6 and GHCQ have told ministers that changes to the Human Rights Act could make it harder for them to defend cases in courts. In evidence to the independent Human Rights Act review committee, which could recommend changes, the security services said it would be unhelpful if the government went too far.
They warned that unless the government was careful, terrorist suspects could take their cases directly to the European court of human rights in Strasbourg, where such evidence could not be submitted in secret.
Buckland and other senior Conservatives, including several government officials, are expected to resist changes and could well gain support in the House of Lords.
Labour have pledged to oppose any move to radically change the act. Steve Reed MP, the shadow justice secretary, said Raab was tinkering with human rights laws as a distraction from the “avalanche of corruption” that had overwhelmed the government.
He said: “Our criminal justice system is in crisis, with record backlogs in the crown courts, huge delays in prosecuting criminals, and shamefully low conviction rates for rape and sexual offences. Ministers should be focusing on sorting out the failures in our courts, prisons and probation services that are stoking, rather than stopping, crime.”
Footage of Raab from 2009 shows the then backbench MP looking into the camera and saying: “I don’t support the Human Rights Act and I don’t believe in economic and social rights.”
A few months after the footage was recorded, he released a book entitled The Assault on Liberty: What Went Wrong With Rights in which he argued that the law had opened the door to a slew of new court claims.
“The spread of rights has become contagious and, since the Human Rights Act, opened the door to vast new categories of claims, which can be judicially enforced against the government through the courts,” he wrote.
The book also articulated a theme that has become a rallying cry for many in the post-Brexit Conservative party: that the UK can never truly leave the EU while the nation’s laws are trumped by European courts.
“The very enactment of the Human Rights Act has served as a trigger for the formulation of claims by lawyers and judicial reasoning by courts, using human rights arguments that would never have been dared before,” he said.
Conservative critics of Boris Johnson say Raab was demoted from foreign secretary in September’s reshuffle in part because his predecessor Robert Buckland would not take on the legal establishment with the gusto required. One ally of Buckland said: “They wanted a wrecking ball, and Raab fits the bill.”
Johnson remains keen to further curb the power of the judiciary over parliament. He is still said to be furious after his 2019 decision to delay the opening of parliament, which many saw as an attempt to prevent MPs scrutinising the government’s Brexit plans, was reversed by the supreme court as a result of a successful judicial review.
But Tuesday’s plans have attracted criticisms from unusual sources, who may yet force some changes.
MI5, MI6 and GHCQ have told ministers that changes to the Human Rights Act could make it harder for them to defend cases in courts. In evidence to the independent Human Rights Act review committee, which could recommend changes, the security services said it would be unhelpful if the government went too far.
They warned that unless the government was careful, terrorist suspects could take their cases directly to the European court of human rights in Strasbourg, where such evidence could not be submitted in secret.
Buckland and other senior Conservatives, including several government officials, are expected to resist changes and could well gain support in the House of Lords.
Labour have pledged to oppose any move to radically change the act. Steve Reed MP, the shadow justice secretary, said Raab was tinkering with human rights laws as a distraction from the “avalanche of corruption” that had overwhelmed the government.
He said: “Our criminal justice system is in crisis, with record backlogs in the crown courts, huge delays in prosecuting criminals, and shamefully low conviction rates for rape and sexual offences. Ministers should be focusing on sorting out the failures in our courts, prisons and probation services that are stoking, rather than stopping, crime.”
