"It's not just the European Union that needs sorting out," UK Prime Minister David Cameron told his Party Conference this week, "it's the European Court of Human Rights." This is not the first time he has said that: he said it to the judges' faces a couple of years back, at the ECHR's gleaming headquarters in leafy Strasbourg. They were not overly impressed. But his audience this week thinks he is spot on, and most people in the UK probably agree.
The ECHR is not an EU body but emerged out of the postwar European Convention on Human Rights. In other words, no Parliament agreed to it, no British citizen voted for it, no Prime Minister signed a treaty authorizing its power. Like Topsy, it 'just growed.'
We are all in favour of human rights, of course, but countries disagree on exactly what those rights should be and how they should be enforced. The UK, in particular, has a very different legal tradition from other European countries – one that has served them a long time, and which they are justly proud of. But being empowered to overturn the decision of the courts in the UK and other countries, the ECHR is effectively imposing one legal regime – a judge-led regime – on everyone.
But why do we want the law of different countries to be identical? We can learn a lot from different countries running their affairs in different ways, then looking to see which way is preferable. Imposing a single legal view on a large number of countries prevents that learning from taking place.
And why should an unelected body deign to override the decisions of different countries' courts and legislators anyway? Originally, the plan was that the ECHR would simply influence governments to 'do the right thing'. But now, though it has no democratic legitimacy, it can override the decisions of UK courts and elected UK representatives. So in effect, law is being made by ECHR judges, and countries like the UK are bound by its decisions. That, as Lord Judge pointed out, gives us "a very serious problem with sovereignty".
That is a particularly serious problem when a country thinks that its entire security is at risk. More than once, the ECHR stopped the deportations of suspects to face serious charges, including terrorism and genocide charges, to face trial overseas. Indeed, the ECHR has stopped deportations of foreign nationals already found guilty of serious offences abroad. Often, the grounds for such decisions have been the UK family ties of the accused, or their 'right' to the UK's generous healthcare system. But what really got ministers' goat was the Court's blocking, for a long time, of the deportation of the radical Abu Qatada, wanted on terrorism charges in Jordan.
So now, the UK is to have its own new Bill of Rights, passed by Parliament. Actually, our old one, dating from 1689, has served us pretty well. I only hope that in drafting the new Bill, ministers do not fall for the nonsense perpetrated in the postwar settlement – things like the 'right' to free education. Because every right is someone else's responsibility to provide. You can be sure that every lobby group will be out there, campaigning for 'rights' to this or that or the other, all at taxpayers' expense of course, to be included in the Bill.
But in fact, all we need is one right - the right to be left alone without other people, and especially governments, pushing us around.
If Mr Cameron calls, I will gladly give him a draft.
