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Tories want a UK Bill of Rights The Conservatives
will replace the Human Rights Act with a US-style Bill of Rights if
they get into power, Tory leader David Cameron has promised. A British Bill of Rights would better reflect the rights and responsibilities of citizens and make the UK a better place, he argued. But Attorney General Lord Goldsmith said the suggestion was "muddled, misconceived and dangerous". The pledge comes after Tony Blair called for the criminal justice system to be rebalanced in favour of the victims of crime. The Tories say Mr Blair is describing the problems his own human rights laws are making worse. 'Hampering crime fight' The Human Rights Act has come under repeated attack in recent years from critics who say it puts a "rights culture" ahead of a common sense view of cases. The act came into force in 2000 to install the European Convention on Human Rights into British law so people did not have to take claims to the European courts in Strasbourg. A US-style Bill of Rights would outline the rights of citizens, while the Human Rights Act incorporates European rules into British law. Mr Cameron said the Human Rights Act had enjoyed successes but generally was not working.
In a speech to the Centre for Policy Studies in London, he said the Human Rights Act had prevented Britain deporting suspected terrorists whatever the circumstances. "Some public bodies are now so frightened of being sued under the Human Rights Acts that they try to protect themselves by making decisions that are often absurd and occasionally very dangerous," he argued. Mr Cameron said the new document setting out people's rights would ensure human rights laws were based on British traditions. "It would differ because we would be going about it in a British way and doing things that work for this country to get what we need, which is a balance between rights on the one hand and also security on the other," he told BBC News. 'No pulling out' Mr Cameron said people would still be able to pursue their claims in the European courts but judges would have a British Bill of Rights to base their rulings upon. To help give certainty, future governments could be banned from using the Parliament Act to force through changes to the new Bill of Rights, he said. But he stressed he did not want to withdraw from the European convention as such a move would send a message that human rights were incompatible with fighting terrorism and crime. Mr Cameron acknowledged it would be hugely complicated to draft a Bill of Rights. He is appointing a panel of distinguished lawyers to unravel those challenges for him. 'More confusion' Speaking on Sunday night, Lord Goldsmith said the suggestion was "dangerous". "I think it would lead to more, not less, confusion about the best way to strike the balance between protecting the public and individual liberties," said the attorney general. Lord Chancellor Lord Falconer said: "You don't rewrite basic human rights because they seem inconvenient." The Liberal Democrats have long campaigned for a British Bill of Rights and a written British constitution. But Lib Dem spokesman Simon Hughes said: "David Cameron's trying to make it sound as if it would be different when in fact we'd be governed by the same principles which we, Britain, wrote after the war because we thought they were the right ones." Ex-Conservative chairman Lord Tebbit warned that any British Bill of Rights could be overridden in Strasbourg as long as the UK remains signed up to the European convention. ---------------------------------------------------
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