Human rights law ‘may be changed’

The UK government might have to bring in new legislation to prevent the Human Rights Act endangering public safety, the lord chancellor has said.

Lord Falconer said cases such as that of rapist Anthony Rice, who murdered a woman while on parole, raised concerns over how the law was working.

The act was also cited when a court ruled nine Afghan asylum seekers who hijacked a plane could stay in the UK.

Human rights groups said the current concerns were not a fault of the act.

“Amending our human rights act because of gross public service failures is like handing a repeat burglar the key to your house,” said Shami Chakrabarti, director of campaign group Liberty.

“Without the act, ordinary people in Britain would have precious little protection from maladministration.”

‘Political clarity’

The European Convention on Human Rights was incorporated into UK law in 1998 through the Human Rights Act.

Lord Falconer said the government did not intend to pull out of the convention but it is considering a programme of education and training or new legislation to make sure it is not wrongly interpreted.

“I think there is real concern about the way the act is operating,” Lord Falconer told the BBC.

“What we need to draw from that is the deployment of human rights is, often wrongly, leading to wrong conclusions to be made about issues of public safety.”

He said there needed to be “political clarity” that the Human Rights Act should have no effect on public safety issues.

“If it requires legislation to make that clear in particular areas then we need to consider that as well,” he said.

In the Afghan hijack case, the government was criticised in the High Court for failing to implement a decision that the men could not be deported as their lives were under threat.

The report into Anthony Rice’s murder of Naomi Bryant in Winchester last year said officials had considered his human rights above their duties to the public.

It recommended the “top priority focus” in future should be on public protection.

Conservative leader David Cameron has pledged to reform, replace or scrap the Human Rights Act if he is elected as he said it is undermining the UK’s ability to deal with foreign criminals.

Liberal Democrat constitutional affairs spokesman Simon Hughes said: “The answer is to seek better collective protection, not rip up human rights obligations which have stood the test of time and are important guarantees for the rights of us all.”

BBC