Blog: We can ’t let the government take away crucial legal safety nets

It’s dangerous when any government thinks it can decide who deserves access to human rights and who doesn’t. The UK’s Human Rights Act (HRA) is a safety net and a crucial source of legal protection for people across all UK nations who have been mistreated or failed by the system.   But the government has just launched a consultation on its plan to replace it with a weaker bill of rights. The new bill from the Ministry of Justice would distance UK courts from case law of the European Court of Human Rights and the European Convention on Human Rights. Human rights legislation is all about people, power, and how they are balanced. The current act protects all of us when we’re at our most vulnerable, but the new bill is based on the false premise that basic human rights for all somehow take away rights from others. We’re talking about protections that have ensured elderly couples aren’t separated by hundreds of miles when just one of them needs care; about protections that have safeguarded women under threat of domestic violence, so they can keep their police-recommended panic room, without having their benefits penalised under the ‘bedroom tax’ rules. The HRA also led to cases that secured rights for the LGBT+ community and those with mental or physical disabilities. And of course, without the European Convention on Human Rights, the gross negligence behind the deaths at Hillsborough would never have been uncovered. These and many other cases have relied on the...
Source: UNISON Health care news - Category: UK Health Authors: Tags: General secretary's blog News Christina McAnea Human Rights Act Source Type: news