Human rights are universal

At a meeting yesterday, I asked about/EU/UK cooperation within the justice pillar. I asked if in order to develop further cooperation, the UK would need to sign up to the EU’s charter of fundamental rights. The senior MEP present stated that they thought that self-exclusion was a barrier to fuller cooperation; the Labour minister present confused the Charter of Fundamental Rights with the European Convention on Human Rights

The Court building —

He stated that non-compliance, particularly on issues of the right to family life were reasonable. To me, this is a proof point of the consensus in Westminster or at least in the Labour Party, that haggling with the EU ‘to win’ all the time, is acceptable behaviour of good citizenship.

It’s not and the UK Justice Pillar opt-outs should be a source of shame. The reason we had so many opt-outs from the Justice Pillar is that the New Labour government didn’t want their immigration and trade union laws tested by the CJEU. As a ‘boomarang’ act, I read that some senior ‘blue labour’ spokespersons/thinkers are even questioning whether we should remain signatories to the ECHR.

How impactful is it on British law?

In 2024, there were three cases at the ECtHR, and the UK lost one; the plaintiff was the Daily Mail who were complaining about lawyers’ fees in cases where they settled, they claimed it was in breach…