Should the European Human Rights Act be replaced with a new British Bill of rights?
Cameron has been a bit slippery on this. He has never said that he would leave the ECHR. He has said that he might repeal the Human Rights Act. That would mean that domestic government and courts would not be under an obligation to apply convention rights at a domestic level. However, if they didn’t, and someone’s human rights were breached, they could still take their case to the court in Strasbourg and receive satisfaction there. That’s what used to happen before 1998 and it was a rubbish system, it just meant that domestic courts had to make decisions in accordance with English law no matter what the human rights consequences, only for the person to go through several stages of appeal here with the same answer and then to get the answer they were going to get all along following an appeal to Strasbourg. What a waste of time and money. Better the decision is made right the first time. That’s the benefit of the Human Rights Act. If you don’t like the decisions that come out of our mem
