Europe is out of kilter on human rights cases
By Kenneth Clarke, Published on March 31, 2012
HUMAN rights in Europe and beyond need to be protected. In a month’s time the governments of the 47 members of the Council of Europe, the international steward of fundamental freedoms, will be asked to agree vital reforms that could address longstanding weaknesses in the shelter they afford 800 million people.
As one of the original architects of the European Convention of Human Rights, and currently the Chair of the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe, the UK strongly believes in its values. We have witnessed at first hand how, through the European Court of Human Rights, it has helped to promote the rule of law in Europe, and transform the lives of many Europeans. Those who might question its importance need only to look at recent events in Libya, and now Syria, to see brutality and oppression are not in the past – nor that basic human freedoms retain an enduring, universal appeal.
Yet the protection of human rights is being hampered by problems in how they are given effect. The UK wants to put new momentum behind efforts to tackle a key challenge: the huge backlog of cases in the Court in Strasbourg. This now stands at over 150,000 with an average delay of 5 years, and reflects a system in which the balance of responsibilities is out of kilter. The Court is being asked to spread itself too thinly, and the member states are not pulling their weight.
The Court itself has recognised the backlog and is making progress in addressing part of it, but even if current reforms succeed, an estimated 1,000 cases per year more than the Court is capable of handling would still be found to need a reasoned judgement.
This unsustainably growing queue is not a trivial matter. It means that significant, urgent cases – for example, those involving individuals subject to unfair trial or denied free speech – will continue to be delayed. The problem amounts to something of an existential crisis for the Convention system which now has jurisdiction of over 800 million people.
The best way to fix this problem is to ensure that the component parts of the system deliver on their responsibilities. If Member States genuinely uphold the convention domestically, this will begin to reduce the pressure on the Court. So we propose that governments do more to implement the Convention themselves, through introducing national human rights institutions, domestic legislation enshrining the Convention, and better human rights training for civil servants and judges.
As Member States do more, so the Court needs to be able to say no to cases which it feels do not require consideration at international level. We therefore propose to enshrine within the Convention itself the ability for the Court to refuse cases which have already been fairly decided by national courts in a way which accords with the Convention. This would not reduce the right of individuals to apply to have their case heard in Strasbourg. The Court would continue to decide which cases are admissible, and all Member States would continue to be held accountable, but this would give the Court a vital extra tool with which to focus its caseload on the most serious abuses.
These common sense reforms are based on the programmes agreed by all 47 member states at Izmir and Interlaken, and on work the Court itself has begun. They include proposals brought forward by other member states. As Chair, the UK is committed to securing consensus on reforms which, taken together, will strengthen the Court’s ability to bring speedy justice to the victims of serious human rights abuses, protect the vital right of individual petition, and ensure that the Court continues to hold all Member States to account. The goal is a Court able to focus swiftly on the most serious violations of human rights, unencumbered by an endless backlog.
We do not underestimate the challenge facing the 47 countries in achieving a consensus on these proposals. But the reforms will ensure that institutions which we have established to guard against over-bearing governments and abuse of human rights are modern, effective and focus on the most serious cases. We urge all governments to back them. The result will be stronger rights, more easily enforced, more widely respected.
Kenneth Clarke is Britain’s Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice
Comment: Given that the UK is a human rights violator, for example, Hirst v UK (No2) it is hypocritical of Kenneth Clarke to speak about the Court's backlog of cases when as a result of the UK ignoring complying with Hirst No2 there are now 3,500 more prisoners cases added to this backlog!
A mixture of law, politics, autobiography and humour. Once described as "The Devilish Advocate" (Guardian), I do have the ability to provoke a response. Sometimes it comes from someone who uses a thought process, and sometimes from jerks usually associated with the knee.
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Friday, March 30, 2012
‘Jobs for boys’ as police body pays ex-chiefs £1,100 a day
‘Jobs for boys’ as police body pays ex-chiefs £1,100 a day
Published on Friday 23 March 2012 23:09
THE country’s most influential policing body has paid hundreds of thousands of pounds to consultants without applying the spending controls it tells forces up and down the country to abide by, the Yorkshire Post can reveal.
Despite the severe cuts being implemented across the police service, the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) has handed out the contracts – often to former senior police officers – at pay rates as high as £1,100 a day without being able to detail why they were not openly advertised or who set the pay levels.
In contrast, ACPO has sent out a binding procurement strategy for the country’s 43 police forces including the key principle of forces “securing further supplier competition and price leverage”.
The revelations prompted strong criticism from Yorkshire Parliamentarians last night. Skipton and Ripon Tory MP Julian Smith said the appointments created the impression of a “gold-plated jobs for the boys club” and he would raise the issue with the Home Secretary.
Baroness Harris, former Lib Dem police spokeswoman in the House of Lords and a former chairman of North Yorkshire Police Authority, said the situation smacked of ACPO indulging in an unacceptable “old pals’ act”.
ACPO said it would be reviewing its procedures and police cuts had “sharply reduced” its use of consultants.
The payments – which totalled £205,982 in one case – were nearly all made to private companies set up by the consultants, raising a fresh question mark against the use of such payment mechanisms amid concerns they maybe used to avoid income tax.
However, the Government, which, along with police authorities, provides most of ACPO’s funding, admits it had no knowledge of the consultant contracts. Despite the funding and ACPO’s high-profile public role, the Home Office was unaware of the payments because ACPO is actually constituted as a private company.
Instead, they have been obtained through freedom of information requests made by the Yorkshire Post in the wake of ACPO joining the list of public bodies covered by the Freedom of Information (FOI) Act.
The payments include £194,517 paid for the services of former Essex Chief Constable David Stevens, initially at a rate of £900 a day and subsequently £1,100 a day. The payments were made to his consultancy company, Devana Services.
Former Detective Superintendent Brian Shelby was paid £205,982 through his company, Pyrope Solutions, while former Cumbria Assistant Chief Constable Graham Sunderland received £182,223 through his company, Epic (GS).
In total, more than £800,000 was paid to 10 consultants, largely over the last three years, from ACPO’s central office. The total does not, however, include other consultants contracted by what ACPO terms as separate “business areas”. ACPO said it was unable to locate costs relating to all consultants within the timescale allowed under the FOI Act.
As a private company, ACPO is not subject to public sector contract rules which usually insist on competition to ensure fairness and best value.
An ACPO spokeswoman said the organisation did have its own financial regulations which required three alternative quotes for spending above £1,000 and a tendering for amounts above £50,000.
But pressed on how consultants were contracted, ACPO said its human resources department held virtually no information on the appointments. It was unable to detail who made the appointments or who set the pay rates.
Instead, a spokeswoman said: “The regulations state that where realistically feasible, alternative sources should be compared to obtain best value for money. Where temporary appointments were made based on a requirement for specialist knowledge and skills, this may not have been realistic or possible. In these cases payments would be commensurate withprevious experience or rates of pay in comparable police service roles.”
In a statement, ACPO added: “Temporary appointments such as these are the exception and have sharply reduced in line with financial pressures. ACPO will also review procedures for use of temporary staff to ensure they are up to date.”
But Mr Smith said he was “shocked” by the consultancy arrangements, adding APCO must be “fully transparent”.
“Further questions that need answering include the basis for paying these huge amounts of money, who authorised them and what process of procurement was used,” the MP said. “In addition, APCO needs to come clean as to how many other consultants were engaged in this way and not wait for investigations such as the one run by the Yorkshire Post to uncover them.
Mr Smith said he would be raising concerns with the Home Secretary and Sir Hugh Orde, president of APCO. He will also be contacting HM Revenue and Customs to ensure tax regulations have been complied with over payments to personal service companies.
He added: “This story yet again raises very serious questions about the status of APCO as a private company when it relies on so much taxpayer cash. It is surely the moment to call time on the current set-up and put in place a new structure that allows the spotlight to be shone on everything it does.
“Whether through appearance or reality, this story makes APCO look more like a gold-plated jobs for the boys club rather than the above reproach leadership organisation for our country’s police forces that it has to be.”
Baroness Harris said close connections within senior officer ranks were potentially unhealthy when awarding contracts. “If they feel that they know somebody who could do the job without having to go to all the expense of tendering maybe they feel it’s not necessary. If that is the case, it can’t be right. It should be open, that’s the whole point.” She added it was “entirely wrong” that ACPO was a private firm and said it had to be much more open and transparent.
The Home Office said: “Like all organisations reliant on public money, ACPO has a responsibility to spend appropriately. As part of the work to create a new police professional body, we are engaged in discussions with ACPO about their future role and funding.”
Details missing from crucial documentation
Published on Saturday 24 March 2012 06:00
SENIOR police officers began lucrative consultancy work with Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) only days after retirement from their “day jobs”, it can be revealed.
Graham Sunderland, who served for 25 years with West Yorkshire Police, left his job as Cumbria Assistant Chief Constable in February 2009 and took up a contract for his services with ACPO at the beginning of March.
And David Stevens left his role as Chief Constable of Essex Police at the end of June 2005 and began work as a £900 a day ACPO consultant at the start of the following month.
ACPO said Mr Sunderland was taken on to formalise a UK-wide strategy for Disaster Victim Identification (DVI) at major incidents.
While a serving officer at Cumbria, Mr Sunderland did work in the same area for ACPO while continuing to carry out his role as an assistant chief constable.
Many senior chief officers take on specialist roles with ACPO to formulate policies across the policing service and carry out those duties out alongside their full-time jobs with the forces that pay their wages.
Mr Sunderland was paid about £90,000 a year as Cumbria’s Assistant Chief Constable but ACPO paid his company EPIC (GS) £182,223 over two years for solely working on the DVI role.
The payments were funded by the Home Office and Foreign and Commonwealth Office but the contract was with ACPO.
ACPO said he was given two year-long contracts in 2009 and 2010, with each specifying a payment of £60,000 to Mr Sunderland’s company for not less than 120 days work.
A spokeswoman said the extra £62,223 related to payments for travel, accommodation, VAT and extra days worked beyond the stipulated minimum of 120.
Copies of Mr Sunderland’s contracts, obtained under a freedom of information request, did not mention pay rates for any work beyond 120 days and said £60,000 was the agreed payment for the duration of the contract.
ACPO also said the strategic role for DVI was now again being carried out by a serving chief officer.
A similar scenario was presented by ACPO for a series of contracts given to Mr Stevens’ private company which resulted in total payments of £194,517. A spokeswoman said he was brought in to chair a programme to improve information sharing across the service following the Bichard Inquiry into the Soham murders. ACPO said Mr Stevens had been chair of the same programme board while Essex chief constable and “was therefore retained to ensure delivery of this project”.
But the contracts awarded by ACPO included three with no apparent clarity on how much work Mr Stevens was required to do or any limits on potential payment.
His company Devana Services was initially given a three-month contract in July 2005 which began after his retirement from Essex Police the previous month. It said he was required to work a minimum of 40 days at a rate of £900 a day.
A second contract followed in October 2005 running for two months which said Mr Stevens would work for a maximum of 40 days at the same rate.
It was two-and-a-half years until the next ACPO contract began in May 2008, running to March 2009. The rate was now £1,100 a day but the contract did not stipulate any minimum or maximum number of days.
Year-long contracts for 2009/10 and 2010/11 then followed, at the same rate and with no qualification on the number of days worked.
ACPO was able to provide an internal record of Mr Stevens’ agreeing to take the role for an initial three months in 2005 but could not provide any further records.
In common with other consultancy contracts, ACPO was unable to provide any specific rationale for the pay rates. It was also unable to clarify why there was a two-and-a-half year gap between Mr Stevens’ contracts in 2005 and 2008.
Asked who had actually made the appointments, a spokeswoman said: “The people responsible for making the appointments are the people with the oversight for that line of work.”
Although ACPO is a private company it does have financial regulations which state a tendering process should be undertaken for contracts above £50,000.
The spokeswoman said: “Where temporary appointments were made based on a requirement for specialist knowledge and skills, this may not have been realistic or possible.
“In these cases payments would be commensurate with previous experience or rates of pay in comparable police service roles.”
Published on Friday 23 March 2012 23:09
THE country’s most influential policing body has paid hundreds of thousands of pounds to consultants without applying the spending controls it tells forces up and down the country to abide by, the Yorkshire Post can reveal.
Despite the severe cuts being implemented across the police service, the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) has handed out the contracts – often to former senior police officers – at pay rates as high as £1,100 a day without being able to detail why they were not openly advertised or who set the pay levels.
In contrast, ACPO has sent out a binding procurement strategy for the country’s 43 police forces including the key principle of forces “securing further supplier competition and price leverage”.
The revelations prompted strong criticism from Yorkshire Parliamentarians last night. Skipton and Ripon Tory MP Julian Smith said the appointments created the impression of a “gold-plated jobs for the boys club” and he would raise the issue with the Home Secretary.
Baroness Harris, former Lib Dem police spokeswoman in the House of Lords and a former chairman of North Yorkshire Police Authority, said the situation smacked of ACPO indulging in an unacceptable “old pals’ act”.
ACPO said it would be reviewing its procedures and police cuts had “sharply reduced” its use of consultants.
The payments – which totalled £205,982 in one case – were nearly all made to private companies set up by the consultants, raising a fresh question mark against the use of such payment mechanisms amid concerns they maybe used to avoid income tax.
However, the Government, which, along with police authorities, provides most of ACPO’s funding, admits it had no knowledge of the consultant contracts. Despite the funding and ACPO’s high-profile public role, the Home Office was unaware of the payments because ACPO is actually constituted as a private company.
Instead, they have been obtained through freedom of information requests made by the Yorkshire Post in the wake of ACPO joining the list of public bodies covered by the Freedom of Information (FOI) Act.
The payments include £194,517 paid for the services of former Essex Chief Constable David Stevens, initially at a rate of £900 a day and subsequently £1,100 a day. The payments were made to his consultancy company, Devana Services.
Former Detective Superintendent Brian Shelby was paid £205,982 through his company, Pyrope Solutions, while former Cumbria Assistant Chief Constable Graham Sunderland received £182,223 through his company, Epic (GS).
In total, more than £800,000 was paid to 10 consultants, largely over the last three years, from ACPO’s central office. The total does not, however, include other consultants contracted by what ACPO terms as separate “business areas”. ACPO said it was unable to locate costs relating to all consultants within the timescale allowed under the FOI Act.
As a private company, ACPO is not subject to public sector contract rules which usually insist on competition to ensure fairness and best value.
An ACPO spokeswoman said the organisation did have its own financial regulations which required three alternative quotes for spending above £1,000 and a tendering for amounts above £50,000.
But pressed on how consultants were contracted, ACPO said its human resources department held virtually no information on the appointments. It was unable to detail who made the appointments or who set the pay rates.
Instead, a spokeswoman said: “The regulations state that where realistically feasible, alternative sources should be compared to obtain best value for money. Where temporary appointments were made based on a requirement for specialist knowledge and skills, this may not have been realistic or possible. In these cases payments would be commensurate withprevious experience or rates of pay in comparable police service roles.”
In a statement, ACPO added: “Temporary appointments such as these are the exception and have sharply reduced in line with financial pressures. ACPO will also review procedures for use of temporary staff to ensure they are up to date.”
But Mr Smith said he was “shocked” by the consultancy arrangements, adding APCO must be “fully transparent”.
“Further questions that need answering include the basis for paying these huge amounts of money, who authorised them and what process of procurement was used,” the MP said. “In addition, APCO needs to come clean as to how many other consultants were engaged in this way and not wait for investigations such as the one run by the Yorkshire Post to uncover them.
Mr Smith said he would be raising concerns with the Home Secretary and Sir Hugh Orde, president of APCO. He will also be contacting HM Revenue and Customs to ensure tax regulations have been complied with over payments to personal service companies.
He added: “This story yet again raises very serious questions about the status of APCO as a private company when it relies on so much taxpayer cash. It is surely the moment to call time on the current set-up and put in place a new structure that allows the spotlight to be shone on everything it does.
“Whether through appearance or reality, this story makes APCO look more like a gold-plated jobs for the boys club rather than the above reproach leadership organisation for our country’s police forces that it has to be.”
Baroness Harris said close connections within senior officer ranks were potentially unhealthy when awarding contracts. “If they feel that they know somebody who could do the job without having to go to all the expense of tendering maybe they feel it’s not necessary. If that is the case, it can’t be right. It should be open, that’s the whole point.” She added it was “entirely wrong” that ACPO was a private firm and said it had to be much more open and transparent.
The Home Office said: “Like all organisations reliant on public money, ACPO has a responsibility to spend appropriately. As part of the work to create a new police professional body, we are engaged in discussions with ACPO about their future role and funding.”
Details missing from crucial documentation
Published on Saturday 24 March 2012 06:00
SENIOR police officers began lucrative consultancy work with Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) only days after retirement from their “day jobs”, it can be revealed.
Graham Sunderland, who served for 25 years with West Yorkshire Police, left his job as Cumbria Assistant Chief Constable in February 2009 and took up a contract for his services with ACPO at the beginning of March.
And David Stevens left his role as Chief Constable of Essex Police at the end of June 2005 and began work as a £900 a day ACPO consultant at the start of the following month.
ACPO said Mr Sunderland was taken on to formalise a UK-wide strategy for Disaster Victim Identification (DVI) at major incidents.
While a serving officer at Cumbria, Mr Sunderland did work in the same area for ACPO while continuing to carry out his role as an assistant chief constable.
Many senior chief officers take on specialist roles with ACPO to formulate policies across the policing service and carry out those duties out alongside their full-time jobs with the forces that pay their wages.
Mr Sunderland was paid about £90,000 a year as Cumbria’s Assistant Chief Constable but ACPO paid his company EPIC (GS) £182,223 over two years for solely working on the DVI role.
The payments were funded by the Home Office and Foreign and Commonwealth Office but the contract was with ACPO.
ACPO said he was given two year-long contracts in 2009 and 2010, with each specifying a payment of £60,000 to Mr Sunderland’s company for not less than 120 days work.
A spokeswoman said the extra £62,223 related to payments for travel, accommodation, VAT and extra days worked beyond the stipulated minimum of 120.
Copies of Mr Sunderland’s contracts, obtained under a freedom of information request, did not mention pay rates for any work beyond 120 days and said £60,000 was the agreed payment for the duration of the contract.
ACPO also said the strategic role for DVI was now again being carried out by a serving chief officer.
A similar scenario was presented by ACPO for a series of contracts given to Mr Stevens’ private company which resulted in total payments of £194,517. A spokeswoman said he was brought in to chair a programme to improve information sharing across the service following the Bichard Inquiry into the Soham murders. ACPO said Mr Stevens had been chair of the same programme board while Essex chief constable and “was therefore retained to ensure delivery of this project”.
But the contracts awarded by ACPO included three with no apparent clarity on how much work Mr Stevens was required to do or any limits on potential payment.
His company Devana Services was initially given a three-month contract in July 2005 which began after his retirement from Essex Police the previous month. It said he was required to work a minimum of 40 days at a rate of £900 a day.
A second contract followed in October 2005 running for two months which said Mr Stevens would work for a maximum of 40 days at the same rate.
It was two-and-a-half years until the next ACPO contract began in May 2008, running to March 2009. The rate was now £1,100 a day but the contract did not stipulate any minimum or maximum number of days.
Year-long contracts for 2009/10 and 2010/11 then followed, at the same rate and with no qualification on the number of days worked.
ACPO was able to provide an internal record of Mr Stevens’ agreeing to take the role for an initial three months in 2005 but could not provide any further records.
In common with other consultancy contracts, ACPO was unable to provide any specific rationale for the pay rates. It was also unable to clarify why there was a two-and-a-half year gap between Mr Stevens’ contracts in 2005 and 2008.
Asked who had actually made the appointments, a spokeswoman said: “The people responsible for making the appointments are the people with the oversight for that line of work.”
Although ACPO is a private company it does have financial regulations which state a tendering process should be undertaken for contracts above £50,000.
The spokeswoman said: “Where temporary appointments were made based on a requirement for specialist knowledge and skills, this may not have been realistic or possible.
“In these cases payments would be commensurate with previous experience or rates of pay in comparable police service roles.”
Why ACPO stinks like a pig sty!
Why ACPO stinks like a pig sty!
Chief Constable to take on ACPO role
Posted on 23rd March 2012 13:32
Nottinghamshire’s Chief Constable Julia Hodson is to spend the last five months of her police service leading on a piece of work for the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) in preparation for the introduction of Police and Crime Commissioners later this year.
Ms Hodson is due to take up the role at the beginning of April when the force’s DCC Chris Eyre will become Acting Chief Constable.
Last year she announced she would retire at the end of August 2012, at which time Mr Eyre will succeed her.
In a message to all officers and staff Ms Hodson said: “It’s been a privilege to serve here for four years and an honour to work with so many talented and dedicated officers, staff, volunteers and partners.
“I move on to my new role with every confidence that the force will go from strength to strength, feeling safe and reassured as a resident on the patch.”
Comment:
1. Why is a serving Chief Constable working for a private company during time she should be working in the Police Service?
2. Will she be drawing her salary from the Police Service even though she is not turning up for work for 5 months?
3. Will she be getting paid by the private company ACPO whilst still a serving Chief Constable?
4. Will the Deputy Chief Constable Chris Eyre get a raise in salary when he becomes Acting Chief Constable?
5. Why couldn't Chief Constable Julia Hodson take up the new job when she retired instead of moonlighting whilst still a serving police officer?
Chief Constable to take on ACPO role
Posted on 23rd March 2012 13:32
Nottinghamshire’s Chief Constable Julia Hodson is to spend the last five months of her police service leading on a piece of work for the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) in preparation for the introduction of Police and Crime Commissioners later this year.
Ms Hodson is due to take up the role at the beginning of April when the force’s DCC Chris Eyre will become Acting Chief Constable.
Last year she announced she would retire at the end of August 2012, at which time Mr Eyre will succeed her.
In a message to all officers and staff Ms Hodson said: “It’s been a privilege to serve here for four years and an honour to work with so many talented and dedicated officers, staff, volunteers and partners.
“I move on to my new role with every confidence that the force will go from strength to strength, feeling safe and reassured as a resident on the patch.”
Comment:
1. Why is a serving Chief Constable working for a private company during time she should be working in the Police Service?
2. Will she be drawing her salary from the Police Service even though she is not turning up for work for 5 months?
3. Will she be getting paid by the private company ACPO whilst still a serving Chief Constable?
4. Will the Deputy Chief Constable Chris Eyre get a raise in salary when he becomes Acting Chief Constable?
5. Why couldn't Chief Constable Julia Hodson take up the new job when she retired instead of moonlighting whilst still a serving police officer?
Thursday, March 29, 2012
Will the Tories be rocked by another bombshell in Brighton?
Will the Tories be rocked by another bombshell in Brighton?
In relation to reform of the European Court of Human Rights Amnesty International; Justice; European Human Rights Advocacy Centre (EHRAC); Liberty; Human Rights Watch; Redress; Interights; Aire Centre states:
“Past and future applicants to the Court have an interest in ensuring its future at least equal to that of member states. Representatives of civil society across the Council of Europe region should be consulted, and their views taken into account before any further reforms to the Court are made”.
If these views are correct then as the applicant in Hirst v UK (No2) I should be entitled to go to the High-Level Conference in Brighton.
In relation to reform of the European Court of Human Rights Amnesty International; Justice; European Human Rights Advocacy Centre (EHRAC); Liberty; Human Rights Watch; Redress; Interights; Aire Centre states:
“Past and future applicants to the Court have an interest in ensuring its future at least equal to that of member states. Representatives of civil society across the Council of Europe region should be consulted, and their views taken into account before any further reforms to the Court are made”.
If these views are correct then as the applicant in Hirst v UK (No2) I should be entitled to go to the High-Level Conference in Brighton.
Caroline Lucas MP responds to JHL
Caroline Lucas MP responds to JHL
Our ref: CL.JH.C0082.LM.29.03.12
Dear John,
Thank you for your email about prisoners’ voting rights. I am sorry for not replying sooner; we had a staff shortage in my office earlier this year, which, together with high levels of correspondence, has meant I’ve not been able to respond as quickly as normal.
I am proud to have voted last year in support of the rights of prisoners to vote. I believe that a blanket ban is contrary to the rule of law and undermines the principle that in a democracy, voting is both a right and a responsibility. Moreover, by failing to comply with the European Court judgement, the UK risks having to pay enormous compensation claims, an unnecessary waste of UK taxpayers' money. I've spoken with many in the criminal justice system who believe that removal of the vote runs counter to the rehabilitation of offenders, and I've discussed the issue with constituents in Brighton. Many of them share my views, and those of Dr Peter Selby, former Bishop to HM Prisons and now President of the National Council for Independent Monitoring Boards for Prisons who stated that “Denying convicted prisoners the right to vote serves no purpose of deterrence or reform. What it does is to state in the clearest terms society's belief that once convicted you are a non-person...and as such has no place in expressing a civilised attitude towards those in prison”.
As you outline, in April 2011 the government lost its final appeal against giving prisoners the right to vote, following a ruling by the European Court of Human Rights, but the government is continuing to use the case of Scoppola (no. 3) v. Italy to justify yet further delay. The deadline for the UK to submit an Action Plan has been extended to six months after the judgement, which is expected this year. This will provide a further opportunity for me to argue for the right decision.
I am also aware that the UK is seeking to limit the role of the ECHR, proposals for which will be discussed at a Council of Europe Summit next month in Brighton. I will be doing my utmost to highlight the need for the government to uphold the human rights of prisoners and others in the UK.
Thank you again for taking the time to write to me. I wish you all the best with your health, and please be reassured that I will continue to fight for the voting rights of prisoners and human rights more widely. Please do also raise this with your own MP if you have not already done so.
Best wishes,
Caroline
Caroline Lucas, MP for Brighton Pavilion
House of Commons
London SW1A 0AA
Tel: 020 7219 7025
Email: caroline.lucas.mp@parliament.uk
Our ref: CL.JH.C0082.LM.29.03.12
Dear John,
Thank you for your email about prisoners’ voting rights. I am sorry for not replying sooner; we had a staff shortage in my office earlier this year, which, together with high levels of correspondence, has meant I’ve not been able to respond as quickly as normal.
I am proud to have voted last year in support of the rights of prisoners to vote. I believe that a blanket ban is contrary to the rule of law and undermines the principle that in a democracy, voting is both a right and a responsibility. Moreover, by failing to comply with the European Court judgement, the UK risks having to pay enormous compensation claims, an unnecessary waste of UK taxpayers' money. I've spoken with many in the criminal justice system who believe that removal of the vote runs counter to the rehabilitation of offenders, and I've discussed the issue with constituents in Brighton. Many of them share my views, and those of Dr Peter Selby, former Bishop to HM Prisons and now President of the National Council for Independent Monitoring Boards for Prisons who stated that “Denying convicted prisoners the right to vote serves no purpose of deterrence or reform. What it does is to state in the clearest terms society's belief that once convicted you are a non-person...and as such has no place in expressing a civilised attitude towards those in prison”.
As you outline, in April 2011 the government lost its final appeal against giving prisoners the right to vote, following a ruling by the European Court of Human Rights, but the government is continuing to use the case of Scoppola (no. 3) v. Italy to justify yet further delay. The deadline for the UK to submit an Action Plan has been extended to six months after the judgement, which is expected this year. This will provide a further opportunity for me to argue for the right decision.
I am also aware that the UK is seeking to limit the role of the ECHR, proposals for which will be discussed at a Council of Europe Summit next month in Brighton. I will be doing my utmost to highlight the need for the government to uphold the human rights of prisoners and others in the UK.
Thank you again for taking the time to write to me. I wish you all the best with your health, and please be reassured that I will continue to fight for the voting rights of prisoners and human rights more widely. Please do also raise this with your own MP if you have not already done so.
Best wishes,
Caroline
Caroline Lucas, MP for Brighton Pavilion
House of Commons
London SW1A 0AA
Tel: 020 7219 7025
Email: caroline.lucas.mp@parliament.uk
Wednesday, March 28, 2012
Sex and drugs and private cells: Behind bars in South America
Sex and drugs and private cells: Behind bars in South America
A deadly riot in Mexico and an inferno in Honduras have turned the searchlight on conditions in Latin America's overcrowded and anarchic prisons. Simeon Tegel spends a day behind bars in Peru
The cluster of shirtless, tattooed inmates in the prison courtyard make no effort to hide the joint as a policeman wanders by. Instead, one turns up the volume on the salsa booming out of a portable stereo. Unconcerned by the clouds of cannabis smoke billowing from the group, the officer does not miss a beat as he carries on patrolling the grimy maze of corridors and patios that make up Lurigancho, Peru's largest jail.
Built for 2,500 inmates, Lurigancho's crumbling walls are currently home to some 7,000 prisoners. Of Peru's 66 desperately overcrowded jails, this human clearing house on the arid outskirts of Lima is the most overcrowded.
Conditions are appalling. According to Peru's official human rights watchdog, the Defensoría del Pueblo, there are only 63 doctors and one psychiatrist attending to the country's 49,000 prisoners. Rates of HIV and Aids are three times higher than outside, and TB is 20 times more common.
Other than for sexual offenders, there is no segregation of inmates at Lurigancho. Armed robbers, hitmen and drug kingpins mingle with adolescents sent down for stealing a pair of trainers. Most are Peruvians but there is also a smattering of foreigners, everything from Africans to Americans, mainly convicted of acting as cocaine couriers.
Yet prisoners here have far more personal freedom than in most jails in the UK. They wear their own clothes, are allowed up to two conjugal visits a week, and from 6am to 6pm are largely free to wander around Lurigancho's labyrinthine facilities. Although there are several internal police checks, the biggest obstacles are the security controls organised by the prisoners themselves at the entrance to each wing.
"We don't want people we don't know from other wings coming here and causing trouble," one inmate tells me. "The prison authorities don't care, so we have to do it ourselves. Everything good here has been done by the prisoners. The authorities have just left us here to rot."
Inside, in the dingy corridors, inmates play cards and cook lunch on small gas stoves. Cannabis smoke scents the air, while stereos and old television sets are set to deafening volumes. In a nearby courtyard lies the prison "market", where entrepreneurial convicts trade fresh fruit and vegetables, used clothes and pirate DVDs. One rents out cellphones – supposedly banned by the National Penitentiary Institute (INPE).
In another courtyard, the walls are covered in murals. There are homages to Alianza Lima and Universitario, Peru's two biggest football clubs, both of which attract tribal, often violent, followings. Yet there are also colourful – if shaky – representations of Spider-Man and Winnie the Pooh, one of various poignant efforts made by the convicts to welcome their children on visiting days.
Meanwhile, just inside the main gate, two prostitutes negotiate with a group of inmates. Today is supposed to be a visiting day for men only – yet no one thinks anything of it until I ask one inmate. "Nurses," he says with a wry smile. Another tells me that without female sex workers, the prison would erupt.
Dreadful acts of violence occur here and Lurigancho is sometimes described as one of Latin America's more ferocious jails. Recently, one Dutch inmate was found to have battered and strangled his Peruvian girlfriend to death and entombed her corpse in concrete beneath the floor of his cell.
But Lurigancho is far less dangerous than many other prisons in the region. It takes only 150 police officers to supervise the thousands of inmates, even as they mingle freely together – conditions that would be unthinkable in jails in Central America or Mexico, housing some of the world's most vicious gang members.
Last month, the world watched in shock as more than 300 prisoners died after an inferno swept through a jail in Honduras. The blaze in Comayagua, about 45 miles north of the Honduran capital Tegucigalpa, was the country's third major prison fire since 2003. In Mexico, fighting between two drug cartels in February was reported to have led to the killing of more than 40 inmates at a prison near the Monterrey prison.
At Lurigancho, the incident with the Dutch inmate once again shone a spotlight on the corruption that, according to the Defensoría del Pueblo, is "institutionalised" in Peru's jails. Unresolved questions include how the prisoner acquired the sacks of concrete mix, and how was he able to spend hours banging his way through the rock-hard floor without the police guards stopping him?
Inmates with money or power inhabit well-equipped private cells, which, it is said, start at £2,000. Those without the means to bribe prison guards, convicts say, end up sleeping in the corridors. "You are like an orphan," one says. "INPE just dumps you here. They don't even give you a cell or a mattress. It is down to you whether you make it or not."
INPE also largely fails to live up to its legal obligations to provide vocational training and help prisoners prepare for release. There are huge pottery and textile workshops at Lurigancho, even exporting products to Japan. Yet these were set up by a non-profit group founded by the Catholic Church.
According to the prisoners who work there – and who ply me with gifts of their ceramics – guards levy bribes for raw materials brought into the jail and finished products brought out. The corruption is so rampant it is impossible to avoid even during a brief visit. To enter Lurigancho, visitors pass a series of security checks, with the police officers shamelessly, casually, blatantly demanding bribes.
"It's for a soft drink," one policeman says, demanding one Sol, roughly 25p, to allow me through. I demur but he insists. "It's hot today," he says. "I'm thirsty." Afterwards, a prisoner asks in disgust: "Who sells their dignity for a Sol?"
Unusually, Lurigancho is run by Peru's notoriously corrupt police. Yet if anything, the jails run by INPE personnel may be even more corrupt. Part of the problem lies in the lack of training or professional career path for INPE workers, according to Leonardo Caparrós, a former acting head of INPE. Promotion is based on the whims of superiors and there is no attempt to objectively judge job performance.
Meanwhile, INPE's top salary, including for the director of Piedras Gordas, the country's highest security jail, is the equivalent of less than £400. The police colonel in charge of Lurigancho earns around three times that amount.
INPE denied requests for an interview with its current boss, José Luis Pérez Guadalupe, as he battled to contain multiple corruption scandals, including a mass escape from Challapalca, a high-security jail at 13,000ft near the Bolivian border, often used to house recalcitrant prisoners from the coast.
Yet few in Peru, a country where many still live in grinding poverty, are willing to argue for more resources for convicted criminals. Meanwhile, populist politicians and tabloid newspapers regularly demand stiffer sentences when most criminologists agree that what is really needed is for the police to simply enforce existing laws. "The political use of jail adversely affects the proper functioning of the prison system," José Ávila, head of the Defensoría del Pueblo's prison programme, says diplomatically.
As I queue up to leave Lurigancho, the man behind me helpfully explains that I need to pay yet another bribe to avoid waiting hours for the police officer to return my ID. Behind us, as dusk settles on Lurigancho, the prisoners take one last breath of fresh air before filing into the heaving wings for the night.
Curious case of the president's brother
While prisoners across the region languish in appalling conditions, one high-profile inmate in Peru appears to be doing just fine, allegedly conducting business from his prison cell. Antauro Humala, the brother of the Peruvian President Ollanta Humala and a former army major sentenced to 19 years for leading a military uprising, has been making headlines after being transferred from Piedras Gordas prison to a secure unit at a military base.
The official explanation is that Humala's safety was at risk after the arrest of the leader of the remnants of the Shining Path terrorists, known as Artemio, who was also sent to Piedras Gordas. The authorities have not explained why they cannot protect Humala at Peru's highest security prison.
Revelations about luxurious conditions enjoyed by Humala and the supposed influence he wields from behind bars have sparked criticism of the president.
Fernando Rospigliosi, a former interior minister, called on the president to "acknowledge his responsibility for Antauro's privileges and announce his transfer to a common prison".
Antauro Humala's use of a prohibited cellphone and photos of him slow-dancing with his girlfriend have caused particular outrage. He has also been receiving business propositions from as far away as the US and China.
The allegations are just the latest in a long series of scandals surrounding the conditions of some of Peru's highest-profile prisoners, most notably Alberto Fujimori, the former president now serving 25 years for embezzlement and ordering extrajudicial killings.
Most of the revelations about Antauro Humala come from the hacking of his email account by Peruvian journalists. One email includes a "business model" for lucrative land deals. Correspondents also request his support for relatives applying for public-sector jobs.
A deadly riot in Mexico and an inferno in Honduras have turned the searchlight on conditions in Latin America's overcrowded and anarchic prisons. Simeon Tegel spends a day behind bars in Peru
The cluster of shirtless, tattooed inmates in the prison courtyard make no effort to hide the joint as a policeman wanders by. Instead, one turns up the volume on the salsa booming out of a portable stereo. Unconcerned by the clouds of cannabis smoke billowing from the group, the officer does not miss a beat as he carries on patrolling the grimy maze of corridors and patios that make up Lurigancho, Peru's largest jail.
Built for 2,500 inmates, Lurigancho's crumbling walls are currently home to some 7,000 prisoners. Of Peru's 66 desperately overcrowded jails, this human clearing house on the arid outskirts of Lima is the most overcrowded.
Conditions are appalling. According to Peru's official human rights watchdog, the Defensoría del Pueblo, there are only 63 doctors and one psychiatrist attending to the country's 49,000 prisoners. Rates of HIV and Aids are three times higher than outside, and TB is 20 times more common.
Other than for sexual offenders, there is no segregation of inmates at Lurigancho. Armed robbers, hitmen and drug kingpins mingle with adolescents sent down for stealing a pair of trainers. Most are Peruvians but there is also a smattering of foreigners, everything from Africans to Americans, mainly convicted of acting as cocaine couriers.
Yet prisoners here have far more personal freedom than in most jails in the UK. They wear their own clothes, are allowed up to two conjugal visits a week, and from 6am to 6pm are largely free to wander around Lurigancho's labyrinthine facilities. Although there are several internal police checks, the biggest obstacles are the security controls organised by the prisoners themselves at the entrance to each wing.
"We don't want people we don't know from other wings coming here and causing trouble," one inmate tells me. "The prison authorities don't care, so we have to do it ourselves. Everything good here has been done by the prisoners. The authorities have just left us here to rot."
Inside, in the dingy corridors, inmates play cards and cook lunch on small gas stoves. Cannabis smoke scents the air, while stereos and old television sets are set to deafening volumes. In a nearby courtyard lies the prison "market", where entrepreneurial convicts trade fresh fruit and vegetables, used clothes and pirate DVDs. One rents out cellphones – supposedly banned by the National Penitentiary Institute (INPE).
In another courtyard, the walls are covered in murals. There are homages to Alianza Lima and Universitario, Peru's two biggest football clubs, both of which attract tribal, often violent, followings. Yet there are also colourful – if shaky – representations of Spider-Man and Winnie the Pooh, one of various poignant efforts made by the convicts to welcome their children on visiting days.
Meanwhile, just inside the main gate, two prostitutes negotiate with a group of inmates. Today is supposed to be a visiting day for men only – yet no one thinks anything of it until I ask one inmate. "Nurses," he says with a wry smile. Another tells me that without female sex workers, the prison would erupt.
Dreadful acts of violence occur here and Lurigancho is sometimes described as one of Latin America's more ferocious jails. Recently, one Dutch inmate was found to have battered and strangled his Peruvian girlfriend to death and entombed her corpse in concrete beneath the floor of his cell.
But Lurigancho is far less dangerous than many other prisons in the region. It takes only 150 police officers to supervise the thousands of inmates, even as they mingle freely together – conditions that would be unthinkable in jails in Central America or Mexico, housing some of the world's most vicious gang members.
Last month, the world watched in shock as more than 300 prisoners died after an inferno swept through a jail in Honduras. The blaze in Comayagua, about 45 miles north of the Honduran capital Tegucigalpa, was the country's third major prison fire since 2003. In Mexico, fighting between two drug cartels in February was reported to have led to the killing of more than 40 inmates at a prison near the Monterrey prison.
At Lurigancho, the incident with the Dutch inmate once again shone a spotlight on the corruption that, according to the Defensoría del Pueblo, is "institutionalised" in Peru's jails. Unresolved questions include how the prisoner acquired the sacks of concrete mix, and how was he able to spend hours banging his way through the rock-hard floor without the police guards stopping him?
Inmates with money or power inhabit well-equipped private cells, which, it is said, start at £2,000. Those without the means to bribe prison guards, convicts say, end up sleeping in the corridors. "You are like an orphan," one says. "INPE just dumps you here. They don't even give you a cell or a mattress. It is down to you whether you make it or not."
INPE also largely fails to live up to its legal obligations to provide vocational training and help prisoners prepare for release. There are huge pottery and textile workshops at Lurigancho, even exporting products to Japan. Yet these were set up by a non-profit group founded by the Catholic Church.
According to the prisoners who work there – and who ply me with gifts of their ceramics – guards levy bribes for raw materials brought into the jail and finished products brought out. The corruption is so rampant it is impossible to avoid even during a brief visit. To enter Lurigancho, visitors pass a series of security checks, with the police officers shamelessly, casually, blatantly demanding bribes.
"It's for a soft drink," one policeman says, demanding one Sol, roughly 25p, to allow me through. I demur but he insists. "It's hot today," he says. "I'm thirsty." Afterwards, a prisoner asks in disgust: "Who sells their dignity for a Sol?"
Unusually, Lurigancho is run by Peru's notoriously corrupt police. Yet if anything, the jails run by INPE personnel may be even more corrupt. Part of the problem lies in the lack of training or professional career path for INPE workers, according to Leonardo Caparrós, a former acting head of INPE. Promotion is based on the whims of superiors and there is no attempt to objectively judge job performance.
Meanwhile, INPE's top salary, including for the director of Piedras Gordas, the country's highest security jail, is the equivalent of less than £400. The police colonel in charge of Lurigancho earns around three times that amount.
INPE denied requests for an interview with its current boss, José Luis Pérez Guadalupe, as he battled to contain multiple corruption scandals, including a mass escape from Challapalca, a high-security jail at 13,000ft near the Bolivian border, often used to house recalcitrant prisoners from the coast.
Yet few in Peru, a country where many still live in grinding poverty, are willing to argue for more resources for convicted criminals. Meanwhile, populist politicians and tabloid newspapers regularly demand stiffer sentences when most criminologists agree that what is really needed is for the police to simply enforce existing laws. "The political use of jail adversely affects the proper functioning of the prison system," José Ávila, head of the Defensoría del Pueblo's prison programme, says diplomatically.
As I queue up to leave Lurigancho, the man behind me helpfully explains that I need to pay yet another bribe to avoid waiting hours for the police officer to return my ID. Behind us, as dusk settles on Lurigancho, the prisoners take one last breath of fresh air before filing into the heaving wings for the night.
Curious case of the president's brother
While prisoners across the region languish in appalling conditions, one high-profile inmate in Peru appears to be doing just fine, allegedly conducting business from his prison cell. Antauro Humala, the brother of the Peruvian President Ollanta Humala and a former army major sentenced to 19 years for leading a military uprising, has been making headlines after being transferred from Piedras Gordas prison to a secure unit at a military base.
The official explanation is that Humala's safety was at risk after the arrest of the leader of the remnants of the Shining Path terrorists, known as Artemio, who was also sent to Piedras Gordas. The authorities have not explained why they cannot protect Humala at Peru's highest security prison.
Revelations about luxurious conditions enjoyed by Humala and the supposed influence he wields from behind bars have sparked criticism of the president.
Fernando Rospigliosi, a former interior minister, called on the president to "acknowledge his responsibility for Antauro's privileges and announce his transfer to a common prison".
Antauro Humala's use of a prohibited cellphone and photos of him slow-dancing with his girlfriend have caused particular outrage. He has also been receiving business propositions from as far away as the US and China.
The allegations are just the latest in a long series of scandals surrounding the conditions of some of Peru's highest-profile prisoners, most notably Alberto Fujimori, the former president now serving 25 years for embezzlement and ordering extrajudicial killings.
Most of the revelations about Antauro Humala come from the hacking of his email account by Peruvian journalists. One email includes a "business model" for lucrative land deals. Correspondents also request his support for relatives applying for public-sector jobs.
Tuesday, March 27, 2012
Criminal Cases Review Commission must be reformed, say campaigners
Criminal Cases Review Commission must be reformed, say campaigners
Lawyers and former CCRC members list 44 cases of 'plausible' claims of innocence that have had applications turned down
Release of the Birmingham Six at the Old Bailey in 1991. The Criminal Cases Review Commission was set up after this and other high-profile miscarriage of justice cases. Photograph: Rex Features
Innocent people wrongly convicted of serious crimes are being routinely failed by the body set up to investigate miscarriages of justice, according to lawyers and campaigners. They will call this week for urgent reform of the Criminal Cases Review Commission – set up in the wake of high profile miscarriages of justice including the Birmingham Six and Guildford Four – on the 15th anniversary of the formation of the independent review body.
The campaigners – who include lawyers and former members of the CCRC – have released to the Guardian a list of 45 cases of individuals whom they say have a plausible claim of innocence, but have had applications to the CCRC turned down.
Michael Naughton, senior law lecturer at Bristol University and founder of the Innocence Network UK, which is running the campaign, said drastic reform was needed because the CCRC was not fit for purpose. "The CCRC was supposed to be the extra safeguard for innocent victims of miscarriages of justice that are failed by the court of appeal," he said. "The CCRC needs to be independent of the court of appeal so that it can focus on whether applicants are innocent or guilty as was intended by the royal commission that recommended it be set up."
In response the CCRC, which has publicly highlighted how its funding has been cut back for several years, pointed to its "considerable achievements" over the last 15 years. Its deputy chair, Alastair MacGregor QC, said that 320 of the 480 convictions referred by the commission to the court of appeal in 15 years have been successfully overturned.
Other statistics, however, show that every year the CCRC on average rejects 96% of applications from individuals claiming they have been wrongfully convicted. Naughton and others argue many of the cases rejected involve legitimate claims of innocence which are not being investigated by the miscarriage of justice body. Among those raising concerns about the CCRC at the campaign launch on Friday is Prof Michael Zander, a member of the Runciman royal commission which recommended the body be set up after the cases of the Birmingham Six, Guildford Four and Maguire Seven, all of whom were wrongfully convicted of being involved in the IRA bombing campaign in the 1970s. Zander believes the CCRC needs to use a little known power to refer cases to the court of appeal even when no new evidence has been uncovered, if there is a serious doubt about the conviction.
"They could exercise this power more, I think," Zander said. "Innocent people are in the greatest of difficulties once they have been convicted. It is not always the case that something new can be found, even with the best will in the world and all the investigations that can be mustered.
"So it is very important that the CCRC which has this power to use in exceptional cases exercises it. It is not an attack on the jury system to do so and the royal commission said that." He also criticised the body for relying too much on a paper analysis of the evidence, and not visiting individuals in prison as part of their investigations, something the royal commission had recommended.
The miscarriage of justice body mounts reviews of cases where it considers there is a "real possibility" that the conviction will be overturned on referral to the court of appeal. But some criminal lawyers say it is too negatively interpreting the meaning of "real possibility" and leaving hundreds of people to languish in prison with no one to investigate their innocence. Others – including Naughton – are calling for the "real possibility" requirement to be abolished. Speakers at a campaign launch symposium on Friday include Paddy Hill, one of the Birmingham Six, and Laurie Elks, a former CCRC commissioner, who believes the organisation has "lost its edge".
MacGregor, deputy chair of the CCRC – which pointed out it had not been invited to the symposium – admitted the current system did sometimes fail victims of miscarriages of justice and it was important to press for improvements. "The commission makes no claim to perfection," said MacGregor. "It does suggest that those who express concerns … should first acknowledge its considerable achievements."He said the "real possibility" test was imposed by parliament, and questioned what purpose would be served by referring cases to the court of appeal where there was no real possibility that the convictions would be quashed. He also said there was a cost issue of referring cases where there was no real possibility of the conviction being overturned. He did however call for changes to allow the commission to be empowered to obtain material from private as well as public bodies, when investigating cases.
The campaign to reform the CCRC follows criticism from others outside of Innocence Network UK, including Vera Baird QC, the former solicitor general, and criminal barrister John Cooper, QC.
Cooper said the CCRC needed to be more bullish. "The commission is too hesitant in challenging the position of the court of appeal and they interpret the legislation around 'real possibility' too pessimistically," he said. "There is growing concern amongst rank and file lawyers and the families of people in prison that the CCRC doesn't seem to be up for the fight." But Cooper – like others – acknowledges the body has had repeated budget cuts since it was set up. It now receives £5.9m a year.
He said: "If a fraction of the money given to the Crown Prosecution Service was siphoned off to the CCRC I suspect they would be able to function better."
Lawyers and former CCRC members list 44 cases of 'plausible' claims of innocence that have had applications turned down
Innocent people wrongly convicted of serious crimes are being routinely failed by the body set up to investigate miscarriages of justice, according to lawyers and campaigners. They will call this week for urgent reform of the Criminal Cases Review Commission – set up in the wake of high profile miscarriages of justice including the Birmingham Six and Guildford Four – on the 15th anniversary of the formation of the independent review body.
The campaigners – who include lawyers and former members of the CCRC – have released to the Guardian a list of 45 cases of individuals whom they say have a plausible claim of innocence, but have had applications to the CCRC turned down.
Michael Naughton, senior law lecturer at Bristol University and founder of the Innocence Network UK, which is running the campaign, said drastic reform was needed because the CCRC was not fit for purpose. "The CCRC was supposed to be the extra safeguard for innocent victims of miscarriages of justice that are failed by the court of appeal," he said. "The CCRC needs to be independent of the court of appeal so that it can focus on whether applicants are innocent or guilty as was intended by the royal commission that recommended it be set up."
In response the CCRC, which has publicly highlighted how its funding has been cut back for several years, pointed to its "considerable achievements" over the last 15 years. Its deputy chair, Alastair MacGregor QC, said that 320 of the 480 convictions referred by the commission to the court of appeal in 15 years have been successfully overturned.
Other statistics, however, show that every year the CCRC on average rejects 96% of applications from individuals claiming they have been wrongfully convicted. Naughton and others argue many of the cases rejected involve legitimate claims of innocence which are not being investigated by the miscarriage of justice body. Among those raising concerns about the CCRC at the campaign launch on Friday is Prof Michael Zander, a member of the Runciman royal commission which recommended the body be set up after the cases of the Birmingham Six, Guildford Four and Maguire Seven, all of whom were wrongfully convicted of being involved in the IRA bombing campaign in the 1970s. Zander believes the CCRC needs to use a little known power to refer cases to the court of appeal even when no new evidence has been uncovered, if there is a serious doubt about the conviction.
"They could exercise this power more, I think," Zander said. "Innocent people are in the greatest of difficulties once they have been convicted. It is not always the case that something new can be found, even with the best will in the world and all the investigations that can be mustered.
"So it is very important that the CCRC which has this power to use in exceptional cases exercises it. It is not an attack on the jury system to do so and the royal commission said that." He also criticised the body for relying too much on a paper analysis of the evidence, and not visiting individuals in prison as part of their investigations, something the royal commission had recommended.
The miscarriage of justice body mounts reviews of cases where it considers there is a "real possibility" that the conviction will be overturned on referral to the court of appeal. But some criminal lawyers say it is too negatively interpreting the meaning of "real possibility" and leaving hundreds of people to languish in prison with no one to investigate their innocence. Others – including Naughton – are calling for the "real possibility" requirement to be abolished. Speakers at a campaign launch symposium on Friday include Paddy Hill, one of the Birmingham Six, and Laurie Elks, a former CCRC commissioner, who believes the organisation has "lost its edge".
MacGregor, deputy chair of the CCRC – which pointed out it had not been invited to the symposium – admitted the current system did sometimes fail victims of miscarriages of justice and it was important to press for improvements. "The commission makes no claim to perfection," said MacGregor. "It does suggest that those who express concerns … should first acknowledge its considerable achievements."He said the "real possibility" test was imposed by parliament, and questioned what purpose would be served by referring cases to the court of appeal where there was no real possibility that the convictions would be quashed. He also said there was a cost issue of referring cases where there was no real possibility of the conviction being overturned. He did however call for changes to allow the commission to be empowered to obtain material from private as well as public bodies, when investigating cases.
The campaign to reform the CCRC follows criticism from others outside of Innocence Network UK, including Vera Baird QC, the former solicitor general, and criminal barrister John Cooper, QC.
Cooper said the CCRC needed to be more bullish. "The commission is too hesitant in challenging the position of the court of appeal and they interpret the legislation around 'real possibility' too pessimistically," he said. "There is growing concern amongst rank and file lawyers and the families of people in prison that the CCRC doesn't seem to be up for the fight." But Cooper – like others – acknowledges the body has had repeated budget cuts since it was set up. It now receives £5.9m a year.
He said: "If a fraction of the money given to the Crown Prosecution Service was siphoned off to the CCRC I suspect they would be able to function better."
Student jailed for racist Fabrice Muamba tweets
Student jailed for racist Fabrice Muamba tweets
Liam Stacey sentenced to 56 days in prison for posting offensive comments on Twitter after footballer's cardiac arrest
Liam Stacey said he was drunk when he sent racist tweets after Fabrice Muamba collapsed during a match. Photograph: Daniel Hambury/PA
A student has been jailed for 56 days for posting offensive comments on Twitter about the on-pitch collapse of Bolton Wanderers footballer Fabrice Muamba.
Liam Stacey was arrested after his tweets were reported to police by Twitter users from across Britain, including the former England striker Stan Collymore. The 21-year-old admitted incitement to racial hatred.
He posted his offensive comments shortly after Muamba suffered a cardiac arrest during his team's FA Cup quarter-final tie against Tottenham Hotspur.
Stacey cried throughout the hearing and held his head in his hands when he was sentenced. He was led away in handcuffs.
District judge John Charles told Stacey: "It was racist abuse via a social networking site instigated as a result of a vile and abhorrent comment about a young footballer who was fighting for his life.
"At that moment, not just the footballer's family, not just the footballing world but the whole world were literally praying for his life. Your comments aggravated this situation.
"I have no choice but to impose an immediate custodial sentence to reflect the public outrage at what you have done.
"You committed this offence while you were drunk and it is clear you immediately regretted it. But you must learn how to handle your alcohol better."
Following Stacey's original posts, other Twitter users criticised him strongly. This prompted him to post a series of offensive and racist insults, some of a sexual nature, aimed at those who had attacked him.
In mitigation, Gareth Jones, defending, said: "The first comment [he] wrote was in relation to Fabrice Muamba. He does not bear him any grudge and he is glad he is making a good recovery. My client simply lost his head and posted these disgusting comments to both the bitter shame of himself and his parents."
Jones said Stacey feared his university career was over: "He is no longer welcome at the institution because he has damaged their reputation and there are fears of reprisals."
Swansea University, where Stacey is a biology undergraduate, said after the hearing that he had been suspended and a disciplinary hearing would be held.
Lisa Jones, prosecuting, told Swansea magistrates at an earlier hearing: "Fabrice Muamba collapsed on the pitch and was believed to have died. Shortly after, Stacey posted on Twitter: 'LOL, Fuck Muamba. He's dead.'"
After other Twitter users criticised Stacey, prompting him to post further offensive and racist comments, users reported him to police forces around Britain.
The court heard that Stacey tried to claim his account had been hacked. He also tried to delete his page.
He texted a friend to say: "I said something about Muamba that I shouldn't have and tweeted back to some people who abused me. Getting police on me now, which isn't good at all."
Police arrested him in Swansea the day after Muamba's collapse. When interviewed, Stacey said he was drunk at the time, having been drinking since early Saturday afternoon while watching the Wales v France Six Nations rugby match.
He told police: "I was at the bar when I heard what had happened to Muamba. I don't know why I posted it. I'm not racist and some of my friends are from different cultural backgrounds."
The swiftness of the arrest demonstrates how seriously police are taking the posting of potentially criminal comments on social networking sites by so-called trolls.
After his initial court appearance, where he was warned he could be jailed, Stacey was released on bail on condition that he stayed off Twitter and other social networking sites.
A statement released on Monday by Barts and the London NHS Trust, where the footballer is being treated, said: "Fabrice Muamba remains in intensive care at the London chest hospital where his condition is serious but stable. He continues to make encouraging progress in his recovery.
"Over the weekend he has been able to sit out of bed for a short time, watch television and has begun to eat. However, he will need to continue to be closely monitored by the medical team for some time."
Liam Stacey sentenced to 56 days in prison for posting offensive comments on Twitter after footballer's cardiac arrest
A student has been jailed for 56 days for posting offensive comments on Twitter about the on-pitch collapse of Bolton Wanderers footballer Fabrice Muamba.
Liam Stacey was arrested after his tweets were reported to police by Twitter users from across Britain, including the former England striker Stan Collymore. The 21-year-old admitted incitement to racial hatred.
He posted his offensive comments shortly after Muamba suffered a cardiac arrest during his team's FA Cup quarter-final tie against Tottenham Hotspur.
Stacey cried throughout the hearing and held his head in his hands when he was sentenced. He was led away in handcuffs.
District judge John Charles told Stacey: "It was racist abuse via a social networking site instigated as a result of a vile and abhorrent comment about a young footballer who was fighting for his life.
"At that moment, not just the footballer's family, not just the footballing world but the whole world were literally praying for his life. Your comments aggravated this situation.
"I have no choice but to impose an immediate custodial sentence to reflect the public outrage at what you have done.
"You committed this offence while you were drunk and it is clear you immediately regretted it. But you must learn how to handle your alcohol better."
Following Stacey's original posts, other Twitter users criticised him strongly. This prompted him to post a series of offensive and racist insults, some of a sexual nature, aimed at those who had attacked him.
In mitigation, Gareth Jones, defending, said: "The first comment [he] wrote was in relation to Fabrice Muamba. He does not bear him any grudge and he is glad he is making a good recovery. My client simply lost his head and posted these disgusting comments to both the bitter shame of himself and his parents."
Jones said Stacey feared his university career was over: "He is no longer welcome at the institution because he has damaged their reputation and there are fears of reprisals."
Swansea University, where Stacey is a biology undergraduate, said after the hearing that he had been suspended and a disciplinary hearing would be held.
Lisa Jones, prosecuting, told Swansea magistrates at an earlier hearing: "Fabrice Muamba collapsed on the pitch and was believed to have died. Shortly after, Stacey posted on Twitter: 'LOL, Fuck Muamba. He's dead.'"
After other Twitter users criticised Stacey, prompting him to post further offensive and racist comments, users reported him to police forces around Britain.
The court heard that Stacey tried to claim his account had been hacked. He also tried to delete his page.
He texted a friend to say: "I said something about Muamba that I shouldn't have and tweeted back to some people who abused me. Getting police on me now, which isn't good at all."
Police arrested him in Swansea the day after Muamba's collapse. When interviewed, Stacey said he was drunk at the time, having been drinking since early Saturday afternoon while watching the Wales v France Six Nations rugby match.
He told police: "I was at the bar when I heard what had happened to Muamba. I don't know why I posted it. I'm not racist and some of my friends are from different cultural backgrounds."
The swiftness of the arrest demonstrates how seriously police are taking the posting of potentially criminal comments on social networking sites by so-called trolls.
After his initial court appearance, where he was warned he could be jailed, Stacey was released on bail on condition that he stayed off Twitter and other social networking sites.
A statement released on Monday by Barts and the London NHS Trust, where the footballer is being treated, said: "Fabrice Muamba remains in intensive care at the London chest hospital where his condition is serious but stable. He continues to make encouraging progress in his recovery.
"Over the weekend he has been able to sit out of bed for a short time, watch television and has begun to eat. However, he will need to continue to be closely monitored by the medical team for some time."
Monday, March 26, 2012
Help! The European Court of Human Rights is drowning!
Help! The European Court of Human Rights is drowning!
By Hoge Raad, President of the Dutch Supreme Court, Geert Corstens and Reindert Kuiper
The title of this article is a cry for help: no other opening would do justice to the scale and urgency of the caseload problem facing the European Court of Human Rights. A huge backlog of over 150,000 cases awaits a decision in Strasbourg. We need both constructive solutions and the political will to put them into effect, even if it means extra expenditure.
The Court is too important to fail, as can be seen from the survey of its case law in its annual report. This summarises judgments in a few sentences, but its cross-section of the Court’s case law makes one thing crystal clear: serious human rights violations are still commonplace and are not adequately remedied in national legal systems. Addressing this fundamental failure on the part of the member states of the Council of Europe should be a top priority. The inescapable conclusion is that legal protection for individuals, as afforded by the Court, is essential.
Of course, the problem of the caseload did not appear out of the blue. The President of the Court has spoken of ‘the inevitable consequence of the enlargement of the Council of Europe to include post-communist states as they embraced democracy’. So the big question is: what are the member states prepared to do to keep their promise to respect the human rights of their peoples?
The worrying thing is that just when the Court needs all the support it can get, a public debate is under way that connects the caseload with what some people regard as too broad an interpretation of some of the rights enshrined in the Convention. Of course, the latter issue should be debated too. Criticisms have been voiced in the Netherlands and elsewhere of parts of the Court’s case law, and sometimes with good reason. But the two issues should not be conflated. If they are, people soon get the impression that the excessive caseload is the Court’s own fault.
A government’s willingness to help solve the caseload problem must never depend on any undertaking by the Court to interpret the Convention to that government’s liking. If there is one area where the saying ‘he who pays the piper calls the tune’ can never apply, either in theory or in practice, it is in the administration of justice. In that sense Montesquieu’s doctrine of the separation of powers is not one jot out of date.
What is more, separating the debate about the Court’s caseload from the debate on its interpretation of Convention rights allows us to address the real issue. In fact, most of the cases currently before the Court do not stem from controversial judgments. Even the most outspoken critics will acknowledge as much. So where should we seek the solution to the caseload problem?
Number of incoming cases – capacity to handle cases ≤ 0: the formula for a healthy Court of Human Rights is simple. But that goal has still not been reached, even now that the 14th Protocol has entered into force. Although, the capacity to handle cases has increased sharply as a result, it is still not enough to deal with the influx. Last year, the Court disposed of 52,188 cases. However, 64,500 new applications were lodged. At present, the main problem is not the mass of applications that are manifestly ill-founded or inadmissible. They can be disposed of in a single-judge formation, at little cost in terms of the judges’ time. The real problem lies in the cases where a violation of human rights may actually have taken place. The intractability of this problem is reflected in the statistics. Of the cases disposed of last year, 50,677 were either declared inadmissible or were struck out of the list of cases; 1,157 required a substantive decision.
These figures, and the knowledge that some 30,000 of the 150,000 cases currently pending will require a substantive decision, force us once more to face up to the need for a speedy solution. The figures show that the member states are not adequately discharging their responsibilities under the Convention. This is particularly obvious in regard to ‘repetitive cases’, where decisions given previously are repeated because member states have not taken the appropriate action. Such cases should simply not come before the Court. The Strasbourg system stands or falls by the member states’ compliance with the Convention. If they fail to discharge their responsibilities, if they delay amending their legislation in accordance with a Court judgment, the Court will inevitably be swamped by a deluge of applications.
To remind you of the figures: 30,000 cases require a substantive decision and there is capacity to dispose of only 1,500 cases annually. The Convention system will collapse if justified applications have to wait over ten years for a decision. Academics, politicians and legal practitioners must pool their resources. Fortunately, awareness of this need is growing. We should like to draw attention to an initiative launched by Professors Janneke Gerards and Ashley Terlouw. March 2012 saw the publication of Amici Curiae, a volume edited by them in which over 30 experts in the field, including practitioners, turn their minds to devising possible solutions. The editors hope that this volume will stimulate a constructive debate on the problems facing the Court. We invite the readers of this article to contribute their suggestions too: the more good ideas the better.
We have not yet seen the contributions of the other writers. So we shall confine ourselves to some of the proposals put forward in our own contribution to the volume. We believe that both short- and long-term measures are required. In the short term, the member states should make a large number of highly qualified jurists available to the Court on a temporary basis, to eliminate the backlog. If the Court is to function effectively in the long term, it must be made easier for it to change its own procedures. In addition, legal representation for applicants during the proceedings should be made compulsory, legal representatives should be required to specialise, and a quota system should be introduced for the number of applications that can be submitted by the bar of a particular country. In this way, national bars would share responsibility for Strasbourg’s caseload. Of course, this will only be possible in countries that have an independent bar and a proper system of subsidised legal aid. The most important thing, however, is for the member states to do far more to bring their legal systems into line with the Convention, and to hold one another to account if they fail to do so. One option would be a fine mechanism, which would forge a link between the funding of the Court and the use of the right of individual petition.
We knew that the enlargement of the Council of Europe would create problems for the Court. Now it is time for academics, politicians and legal practitioners to join forces and devote their energies to tackling these problems. And even in these hard times we must never be prepared to reduce the safeguards the Court provides. Surely we are prepared to spend more than €0.08 per person per year to protect human rights?
Source.
By Hoge Raad, President of the Dutch Supreme Court, Geert Corstens and Reindert Kuiper
The title of this article is a cry for help: no other opening would do justice to the scale and urgency of the caseload problem facing the European Court of Human Rights. A huge backlog of over 150,000 cases awaits a decision in Strasbourg. We need both constructive solutions and the political will to put them into effect, even if it means extra expenditure.
The Court is too important to fail, as can be seen from the survey of its case law in its annual report. This summarises judgments in a few sentences, but its cross-section of the Court’s case law makes one thing crystal clear: serious human rights violations are still commonplace and are not adequately remedied in national legal systems. Addressing this fundamental failure on the part of the member states of the Council of Europe should be a top priority. The inescapable conclusion is that legal protection for individuals, as afforded by the Court, is essential.
Of course, the problem of the caseload did not appear out of the blue. The President of the Court has spoken of ‘the inevitable consequence of the enlargement of the Council of Europe to include post-communist states as they embraced democracy’. So the big question is: what are the member states prepared to do to keep their promise to respect the human rights of their peoples?
The worrying thing is that just when the Court needs all the support it can get, a public debate is under way that connects the caseload with what some people regard as too broad an interpretation of some of the rights enshrined in the Convention. Of course, the latter issue should be debated too. Criticisms have been voiced in the Netherlands and elsewhere of parts of the Court’s case law, and sometimes with good reason. But the two issues should not be conflated. If they are, people soon get the impression that the excessive caseload is the Court’s own fault.
A government’s willingness to help solve the caseload problem must never depend on any undertaking by the Court to interpret the Convention to that government’s liking. If there is one area where the saying ‘he who pays the piper calls the tune’ can never apply, either in theory or in practice, it is in the administration of justice. In that sense Montesquieu’s doctrine of the separation of powers is not one jot out of date.
What is more, separating the debate about the Court’s caseload from the debate on its interpretation of Convention rights allows us to address the real issue. In fact, most of the cases currently before the Court do not stem from controversial judgments. Even the most outspoken critics will acknowledge as much. So where should we seek the solution to the caseload problem?
Number of incoming cases – capacity to handle cases ≤ 0: the formula for a healthy Court of Human Rights is simple. But that goal has still not been reached, even now that the 14th Protocol has entered into force. Although, the capacity to handle cases has increased sharply as a result, it is still not enough to deal with the influx. Last year, the Court disposed of 52,188 cases. However, 64,500 new applications were lodged. At present, the main problem is not the mass of applications that are manifestly ill-founded or inadmissible. They can be disposed of in a single-judge formation, at little cost in terms of the judges’ time. The real problem lies in the cases where a violation of human rights may actually have taken place. The intractability of this problem is reflected in the statistics. Of the cases disposed of last year, 50,677 were either declared inadmissible or were struck out of the list of cases; 1,157 required a substantive decision.
These figures, and the knowledge that some 30,000 of the 150,000 cases currently pending will require a substantive decision, force us once more to face up to the need for a speedy solution. The figures show that the member states are not adequately discharging their responsibilities under the Convention. This is particularly obvious in regard to ‘repetitive cases’, where decisions given previously are repeated because member states have not taken the appropriate action. Such cases should simply not come before the Court. The Strasbourg system stands or falls by the member states’ compliance with the Convention. If they fail to discharge their responsibilities, if they delay amending their legislation in accordance with a Court judgment, the Court will inevitably be swamped by a deluge of applications.
To remind you of the figures: 30,000 cases require a substantive decision and there is capacity to dispose of only 1,500 cases annually. The Convention system will collapse if justified applications have to wait over ten years for a decision. Academics, politicians and legal practitioners must pool their resources. Fortunately, awareness of this need is growing. We should like to draw attention to an initiative launched by Professors Janneke Gerards and Ashley Terlouw. March 2012 saw the publication of Amici Curiae, a volume edited by them in which over 30 experts in the field, including practitioners, turn their minds to devising possible solutions. The editors hope that this volume will stimulate a constructive debate on the problems facing the Court. We invite the readers of this article to contribute their suggestions too: the more good ideas the better.
We have not yet seen the contributions of the other writers. So we shall confine ourselves to some of the proposals put forward in our own contribution to the volume. We believe that both short- and long-term measures are required. In the short term, the member states should make a large number of highly qualified jurists available to the Court on a temporary basis, to eliminate the backlog. If the Court is to function effectively in the long term, it must be made easier for it to change its own procedures. In addition, legal representation for applicants during the proceedings should be made compulsory, legal representatives should be required to specialise, and a quota system should be introduced for the number of applications that can be submitted by the bar of a particular country. In this way, national bars would share responsibility for Strasbourg’s caseload. Of course, this will only be possible in countries that have an independent bar and a proper system of subsidised legal aid. The most important thing, however, is for the member states to do far more to bring their legal systems into line with the Convention, and to hold one another to account if they fail to do so. One option would be a fine mechanism, which would forge a link between the funding of the Court and the use of the right of individual petition.
We knew that the enlargement of the Council of Europe would create problems for the Court. Now it is time for academics, politicians and legal practitioners to join forces and devote their energies to tackling these problems. And even in these hard times we must never be prepared to reduce the safeguards the Court provides. Surely we are prepared to spend more than €0.08 per person per year to protect human rights?
Source.
Sunday, March 25, 2012
The Council of Europe, the ECHR, and the Human Rights Act 1998
The Council of Europe, the ECHR, and the Human Rights Act 1998
March 20, 2012 12:46 AM
By Michael Chizlett
There has been much debate in the wake of the ruling of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) in Hirst v United Kingdom[1] in October 2005 that the UK had breached international human rights law by denying prisoners the right to vote. This debate has fuelled calls by conservatives for the repeal of the Human Rights Act and the creation of a UK Bill of Rights however the debate has often been mischaracterised and misconstrued. This article seeks to answer some basic questions about the Council of Europe, the ECHR, and the Human Rights Act, clarify what the real issues are being discussed and why we should keep the Human Rights Act intact.
What is the Council of Europe?
The Council of Europe is an organisation wholly separate from the European Union[2], born out of the horrors of World War 2. Its founding was a collective response to the radical evil of totalitarian states which brought the entire continent to its knees. The founding document states as a basic condition of membership that Member States "must accept the principles of the rule of law and of the enjoyment by all persons within its jurisdiction of human rights and fundamental freedoms"[3] these principles would be upheld in a new Convention signed in 1950 commonly known as the European Convention of Human Rights[4].
What is the ECHR?
The European Convention of Human Rights enshrines within its pages a commitment to uphold inter alia the right to life liberty and security, a fair trial, the freedoms of thought conscience and religion, expression assembly and association, and the prohibition of torture slavery and discrimination.
It sought to hold signatories accountable by providing a supranational court which could hear cases of human rights violations from across Europe.
What is the ECtHR?
Based in Strasbourg the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) is the ultimate authority on the interpretation of the Convention. Any "person, non-government organisation or group of individuals claiming to be the victim of a violation" of their convention rights has a right to apply to the Court conditional upon meeting the admissibility criteria which stipulate that applicants must have exhausted all avenues of legal challenge in their own national courts and any action must be taken within 6 months of the final decision date of the national tribunal appealed to.
The ECtHR interprets the Convention and can declare whether a national measure is in breach of the convention. Signatories "undertake to abide by the final judgement of the Court"[5]; if they refuse the Court may find a violation of paragraph 1 of the ECHR and "refer the case to the Committee of Ministers for consideration of the measures to be taken"[6] the measure has no real affect in law other than being labelled a human rights violator, this is often enough to ensure compliance.
Why was the Human Rights Act Enacted?
When the ECHR was signed it was assumed that the UK, with a long tradition in the assertion of individual rights, didn't need to integrate Convention rights into national law, as time passed however it became more and more clear that this simply wasn't true. Draconian legislation[7] designed to prosecute IRA terrorists in Northern Ireland demonstrated the fragility of liberty in the face of threats of violence and the need for a law to protect human rights and fundamental freedoms.
Prior to the Human Rights Act applications could still be made to the ECtHR but due to the admissibility criteria the average application took 5 years and £30,000 to get to Strasbourg[8]. As the convention was not part of the UK legal system national courts could not enforce the convention or ECtHR case law even though they knew that the applicant would succeed if it ever made it to the Strasbourg Court.
In response the Labour Party in its 1997 manifesto promised to "incorporate the European Convention on Human Rights into UK law to bring these rights home and allow our people access to them in their national courts"[9] after the election the government produced a white paper 'Rights Brought Home: the Human Rights Bill Cm 3782', the Human Rights Act was enacted in 1998 and brought into force in October 2002.[10]
What does the Human Rights Act do?
The Human Rights Act 1998 does not import the Convention wholesale into UK law rather it provides that national courts must interpret national law so far as is possible compatibly with the Convention[11] where it cannot do so it must make a declaration of incompatibility[12] which triggers the optional power of a government minister to amend legislation in order to resolve the issue.[13] Such a declaration is only done as a last resort and does not affect the validity of an Act of Parliament unless a government minister decides to amend it.[14] The HRA also obliges government bodies to act compatibly with Convention rights[15]
What is the Debate About?
In 2010 the Conservatives declared in their manifesto that if elected they intended to "replace the Human Rights Act with a UK Bill of Rights"[16] On 18th March 2011the government established an independent Commission on a Bill of Rights to consider the reforming the way our international obligations on human rights are enforced in the UK.[17]
Essentially the point of the creation of a UK Bill of Rights and the repeal of the Human Rights Act 1998 is to decuple UK law from the rulings of the ECtHR. Applicants could still apply to the ECtHR but national courts would not have to take the Strasbourg Courts rulings into account, the aim being to prevent rulings of the ECtHR from having a direct affect on UK law.
[1] Hirst v United Kingdom (No. 2) (2006) 42 EHRR 41
[2] Council of Europe Website: Council of Europe in brief, 'Do not get Confused' (http://www.coe.int/aboutCoe/index.asp?page=nepasconfondre&l=en)
[3] The Statute of the Council of Europe 1949, Article 3 (http://conventions.coe.int/Treaty/en/Treaties/html/001.htm)
[4] The European Convention of Human Rights (http://www.echr.coe.int/NR/rdonlyres/D5CC24A7-DC13-4318-B457-5C9014916D7A/0/CONVENTION_ENG_WEB.pdf)
[5] Article 46 (1) ECHR
[6] Article 46 (5) ECHR
[7] The Prevention of Terrorism Act 1974, The Prevention of Terrorism Act 1976, The Prevention of Terrorism Act 1984 and The Prevention of Terrorism Act 1989
[8] DAVIS, 'Human Rights Law', 2nd edn 2009, OUP, ISBN 978-0-19-955434-8, p62
[9]WARNING POOR SOURCE -'new Labour because Britain deserves better' 1997 Labour Party Manifesto, Richard Kimber's Political Science Resources (http://www.politicsresources.net/area/uk/man/lab97.htm) cf: BBC News Website 'Labour's 1997 pledges: Home Affairs' 6th May 2002 (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/in_depth/uk_politics/2002/blair_years/1959859.stm)
[10] DAVIS, 'Human Rights Law', 2nd edn 2009, OUP, ISBN 978-0-19-955434-8, p61
[11] s3 HRA 1998 (http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1998/42/section/3)
[12] s4 HRA 1998 (http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1998/42/section/4)
[13] S5 HRA 1998 (http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1998/42/section/5)
[14] R v A (No 2) [2002] 1 AC 45, Per Lord Steyn p68 para 44
[15] s6 HRA 1998 (http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1998/42/section/6)
[16] 'Invitation to Join the Government of Britain' - The Conservative Manifesto 2010, pp 79 (http://media.conservatives.s3.amazonaws.com/manifesto/cpmanifesto2010_lowres.pdf)
[17] The Justice Website: Commission on a Bill of Rights (http://www.justice.gov.uk/about/cbr)
March 20, 2012 12:46 AM
By Michael Chizlett
There has been much debate in the wake of the ruling of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) in Hirst v United Kingdom[1] in October 2005 that the UK had breached international human rights law by denying prisoners the right to vote. This debate has fuelled calls by conservatives for the repeal of the Human Rights Act and the creation of a UK Bill of Rights however the debate has often been mischaracterised and misconstrued. This article seeks to answer some basic questions about the Council of Europe, the ECHR, and the Human Rights Act, clarify what the real issues are being discussed and why we should keep the Human Rights Act intact.
What is the Council of Europe?
The Council of Europe is an organisation wholly separate from the European Union[2], born out of the horrors of World War 2. Its founding was a collective response to the radical evil of totalitarian states which brought the entire continent to its knees. The founding document states as a basic condition of membership that Member States "must accept the principles of the rule of law and of the enjoyment by all persons within its jurisdiction of human rights and fundamental freedoms"[3] these principles would be upheld in a new Convention signed in 1950 commonly known as the European Convention of Human Rights[4].
What is the ECHR?
The European Convention of Human Rights enshrines within its pages a commitment to uphold inter alia the right to life liberty and security, a fair trial, the freedoms of thought conscience and religion, expression assembly and association, and the prohibition of torture slavery and discrimination.
It sought to hold signatories accountable by providing a supranational court which could hear cases of human rights violations from across Europe.
What is the ECtHR?
Based in Strasbourg the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) is the ultimate authority on the interpretation of the Convention. Any "person, non-government organisation or group of individuals claiming to be the victim of a violation" of their convention rights has a right to apply to the Court conditional upon meeting the admissibility criteria which stipulate that applicants must have exhausted all avenues of legal challenge in their own national courts and any action must be taken within 6 months of the final decision date of the national tribunal appealed to.
The ECtHR interprets the Convention and can declare whether a national measure is in breach of the convention. Signatories "undertake to abide by the final judgement of the Court"[5]; if they refuse the Court may find a violation of paragraph 1 of the ECHR and "refer the case to the Committee of Ministers for consideration of the measures to be taken"[6] the measure has no real affect in law other than being labelled a human rights violator, this is often enough to ensure compliance.
Why was the Human Rights Act Enacted?
When the ECHR was signed it was assumed that the UK, with a long tradition in the assertion of individual rights, didn't need to integrate Convention rights into national law, as time passed however it became more and more clear that this simply wasn't true. Draconian legislation[7] designed to prosecute IRA terrorists in Northern Ireland demonstrated the fragility of liberty in the face of threats of violence and the need for a law to protect human rights and fundamental freedoms.
Prior to the Human Rights Act applications could still be made to the ECtHR but due to the admissibility criteria the average application took 5 years and £30,000 to get to Strasbourg[8]. As the convention was not part of the UK legal system national courts could not enforce the convention or ECtHR case law even though they knew that the applicant would succeed if it ever made it to the Strasbourg Court.
In response the Labour Party in its 1997 manifesto promised to "incorporate the European Convention on Human Rights into UK law to bring these rights home and allow our people access to them in their national courts"[9] after the election the government produced a white paper 'Rights Brought Home: the Human Rights Bill Cm 3782', the Human Rights Act was enacted in 1998 and brought into force in October 2002.[10]
What does the Human Rights Act do?
The Human Rights Act 1998 does not import the Convention wholesale into UK law rather it provides that national courts must interpret national law so far as is possible compatibly with the Convention[11] where it cannot do so it must make a declaration of incompatibility[12] which triggers the optional power of a government minister to amend legislation in order to resolve the issue.[13] Such a declaration is only done as a last resort and does not affect the validity of an Act of Parliament unless a government minister decides to amend it.[14] The HRA also obliges government bodies to act compatibly with Convention rights[15]
What is the Debate About?
In 2010 the Conservatives declared in their manifesto that if elected they intended to "replace the Human Rights Act with a UK Bill of Rights"[16] On 18th March 2011the government established an independent Commission on a Bill of Rights to consider the reforming the way our international obligations on human rights are enforced in the UK.[17]
Essentially the point of the creation of a UK Bill of Rights and the repeal of the Human Rights Act 1998 is to decuple UK law from the rulings of the ECtHR. Applicants could still apply to the ECtHR but national courts would not have to take the Strasbourg Courts rulings into account, the aim being to prevent rulings of the ECtHR from having a direct affect on UK law.
[1] Hirst v United Kingdom (No. 2) (2006) 42 EHRR 41
[2] Council of Europe Website: Council of Europe in brief, 'Do not get Confused' (http://www.coe.int/aboutCoe/index.asp?page=nepasconfondre&l=en)
[3] The Statute of the Council of Europe 1949, Article 3 (http://conventions.coe.int/Treaty/en/Treaties/html/001.htm)
[4] The European Convention of Human Rights (http://www.echr.coe.int/NR/rdonlyres/D5CC24A7-DC13-4318-B457-5C9014916D7A/0/CONVENTION_ENG_WEB.pdf)
[5] Article 46 (1) ECHR
[6] Article 46 (5) ECHR
[7] The Prevention of Terrorism Act 1974, The Prevention of Terrorism Act 1976, The Prevention of Terrorism Act 1984 and The Prevention of Terrorism Act 1989
[8] DAVIS, 'Human Rights Law', 2nd edn 2009, OUP, ISBN 978-0-19-955434-8, p62
[9]WARNING POOR SOURCE -'new Labour because Britain deserves better' 1997 Labour Party Manifesto, Richard Kimber's Political Science Resources (http://www.politicsresources.net/area/uk/man/lab97.htm) cf: BBC News Website 'Labour's 1997 pledges: Home Affairs' 6th May 2002 (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/in_depth/uk_politics/2002/blair_years/1959859.stm)
[10] DAVIS, 'Human Rights Law', 2nd edn 2009, OUP, ISBN 978-0-19-955434-8, p61
[11] s3 HRA 1998 (http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1998/42/section/3)
[12] s4 HRA 1998 (http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1998/42/section/4)
[13] S5 HRA 1998 (http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1998/42/section/5)
[14] R v A (No 2) [2002] 1 AC 45, Per Lord Steyn p68 para 44
[15] s6 HRA 1998 (http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1998/42/section/6)
[16] 'Invitation to Join the Government of Britain' - The Conservative Manifesto 2010, pp 79 (http://media.conservatives.s3.amazonaws.com/manifesto/cpmanifesto2010_lowres.pdf)
[17] The Justice Website: Commission on a Bill of Rights (http://www.justice.gov.uk/about/cbr)
Panasonic’s ultimate television
Panasonic’s ultimate television
£599,995
At 152", Panasonic’s television costs £600,000, weighs 600kg, and uses 4K2K technology that has four times as many pixels as a conventional high definition TV set. It even creates a separate 3D image in HD for each eye.
The screen is the same size as nine 50” displays stacked in three rows, featuring a 4096 x 2160 resolution. Unsurprisingly, the TH-152UX1W is ordinarily sold as a professional display.
Comment: If I went in for you have to be in it to win it, and I won it, one of these would be nice for the lounge in my mansion...
£599,995
At 152", Panasonic’s television costs £600,000, weighs 600kg, and uses 4K2K technology that has four times as many pixels as a conventional high definition TV set. It even creates a separate 3D image in HD for each eye.
The screen is the same size as nine 50” displays stacked in three rows, featuring a 4096 x 2160 resolution. Unsurprisingly, the TH-152UX1W is ordinarily sold as a professional display.
Comment: If I went in for you have to be in it to win it, and I won it, one of these would be nice for the lounge in my mansion...
Cash for access
Cash for access
We're all in this together: The poor join the soup kitchen queue, whilst the Tory toffs pay £250,000 for dinner with Call Me Dave!
We're all in this together: The poor join the soup kitchen queue, whilst the Tory toffs pay £250,000 for dinner with Call Me Dave!
Scotch Coffee
Scotch Coffee
by Steve Gaythorpe
Why is it that when we add whisky to coffee we use Irish whiskey, never Scotch whisky?
I discovered recently that, historically, 'Scotch Coffee' had nothing to do with whisky or coffee. Scotch Coffee was drunk in times of hardship when supplies of coffee had run out. It consisted of hot water, milk, sugar and a handful of burnt breadcrumbs. This foul concoction was "popular" from the time coffee was first introduced into the UK. The name is, obviously, derived from the supposed tight-fistedness of the Scots.
I would like to reclaim "Scotch Coffee", and the honour of the Scots. The Irish may have invented whisky (that's going to upset some people) but the Scots perfected the art of making it. Also, Scotch whisky regions are so varied that the potential exists for a unique coffee experience with every mug.
Scotch Coffee
Scotch Coffee Ingredients
A mug
A shot of espresso
A shot of your favourite single malt Scotch whisky (e.g., Highland Park)
Sugar (if desired)
Milk - to steam and froth
Method
Take your favourite mug and pour the shot of espresso and the shot of single malt Scotch whisky into the mug.
Steam and froth the milk and pour over the coffee/whisky.
Dust with your favourite topping.
Enjoy.
Comment: Before I found this article, when the Irish whiskey ran out I made a Scotch coffee. I did not notice any difference in taste, but I noticed that the Scotch whisky cost £10 per bottle less than the Irish whiskey!
by Steve Gaythorpe
Why is it that when we add whisky to coffee we use Irish whiskey, never Scotch whisky?
I discovered recently that, historically, 'Scotch Coffee' had nothing to do with whisky or coffee. Scotch Coffee was drunk in times of hardship when supplies of coffee had run out. It consisted of hot water, milk, sugar and a handful of burnt breadcrumbs. This foul concoction was "popular" from the time coffee was first introduced into the UK. The name is, obviously, derived from the supposed tight-fistedness of the Scots.
I would like to reclaim "Scotch Coffee", and the honour of the Scots. The Irish may have invented whisky (that's going to upset some people) but the Scots perfected the art of making it. Also, Scotch whisky regions are so varied that the potential exists for a unique coffee experience with every mug.
Scotch Coffee Ingredients
A mug
A shot of espresso
A shot of your favourite single malt Scotch whisky (e.g., Highland Park)
Sugar (if desired)
Milk - to steam and froth
Method
Take your favourite mug and pour the shot of espresso and the shot of single malt Scotch whisky into the mug.
Steam and froth the milk and pour over the coffee/whisky.
Dust with your favourite topping.
Enjoy.
Comment: Before I found this article, when the Irish whiskey ran out I made a Scotch coffee. I did not notice any difference in taste, but I noticed that the Scotch whisky cost £10 per bottle less than the Irish whiskey!
More than 100,000 offenders to be electronically tagged
More than 100,000 offenders to be electronically tagged
Revamp of community sentencing will see tagging extended to ease pressure on UK's prison system
More than 100,000 offenders a year will be made to wear electronic tags under government plans to toughen community sentences that critics will see as an attempt to alleviate pressure on the prison system.
The Ministry of Justice is struggling to accommodate offenders. Ministers hope a widespread increase in tagging will see many diverted from jail to community sentences. A consultation paper to be launched on Monday, making the case for overhauling community sentences, will be presented as a way of restoring confidence in the sentences, widely seen as a soft option.
The new sentences, which will involve more intense supervision and unpaid work, will involve round-the-clock surveillance by GPS systems. Courts will be able to sentence individuals to wear electronic tags for up to 16 hours a day, up to 12 months a year.
Harry Fletcher, assistant general secretary of the probation service union Napo, said the tougher the supervision, the more likely it was to fail. The new measures, contained in the legal aid and sentencing bill, are likely to be a bonanza for private companies awarded tagging contracts.
Napo estimates that, under the plans, as many as 120,000 people will be on an electronic tag at any one time.
Revamp of community sentencing will see tagging extended to ease pressure on UK's prison system
More than 100,000 offenders a year will be made to wear electronic tags under government plans to toughen community sentences that critics will see as an attempt to alleviate pressure on the prison system.
The Ministry of Justice is struggling to accommodate offenders. Ministers hope a widespread increase in tagging will see many diverted from jail to community sentences. A consultation paper to be launched on Monday, making the case for overhauling community sentences, will be presented as a way of restoring confidence in the sentences, widely seen as a soft option.
The new sentences, which will involve more intense supervision and unpaid work, will involve round-the-clock surveillance by GPS systems. Courts will be able to sentence individuals to wear electronic tags for up to 16 hours a day, up to 12 months a year.
Harry Fletcher, assistant general secretary of the probation service union Napo, said the tougher the supervision, the more likely it was to fail. The new measures, contained in the legal aid and sentencing bill, are likely to be a bonanza for private companies awarded tagging contracts.
Napo estimates that, under the plans, as many as 120,000 people will be on an electronic tag at any one time.
Summer's officially here (and so's the sun)
Summer's officially here (and so's the sun)
British Summer Time kicks off this weekend with the first summery weather of the year, with bright sunshine and temperatures in some places expected to reach 21 or even 22C.
Anyone know what happened to Spring?
British Summer Time kicks off this weekend with the first summery weather of the year, with bright sunshine and temperatures in some places expected to reach 21 or even 22C.
Anyone know what happened to Spring?
Friday, March 23, 2012
Upgrading security at "Fort Knox"
Upgrading security at "Fort Knox"
A couple of days ago I bought a Tevion Colour Surveillance Camera. It is wireless and does not effect the wireless internet router. It has a microphone and black and white night vision. It cost £49.99 from Aldi.
Yesterday I bought a Tevion 19 inch TV/DVD combo for £109.99 from Aldi to use as a CCTV monitor.
All I need now is a stand alone DVR to record images. The one below is £169.99 from Maplins.
A couple of days ago I bought a Tevion Colour Surveillance Camera. It is wireless and does not effect the wireless internet router. It has a microphone and black and white night vision. It cost £49.99 from Aldi.
Yesterday I bought a Tevion 19 inch TV/DVD combo for £109.99 from Aldi to use as a CCTV monitor.
All I need now is a stand alone DVR to record images. The one below is £169.99 from Maplins.
Thursday, March 22, 2012
Wednesday, March 21, 2012
Bargain of the day in Hull
Bargain of the day in Hull
Following on from yesterday's post I went back to Aldi's but they had sold out of Irish coffee, therefore I was unable to get the 2 other glasses to make up a set of 6. Nevertheless I bought a bottle of Clontarf Irish Whiskey for £14.99...
...normally priced at £25.95...
...and a tub of Emlee Double Cream from Nisa for £1.09. Using the recipe below I made my own Irish coffee. Dare I say it tastes better than the stuff I bought yesterday...
Irish Coffee Recipe – How To Make Irish Coffee
Following on from yesterday's post I went back to Aldi's but they had sold out of Irish coffee, therefore I was unable to get the 2 other glasses to make up a set of 6. Nevertheless I bought a bottle of Clontarf Irish Whiskey for £14.99...
...normally priced at £25.95...
...and a tub of Emlee Double Cream from Nisa for £1.09. Using the recipe below I made my own Irish coffee. Dare I say it tastes better than the stuff I bought yesterday...
Irish Coffee Recipe – How To Make Irish Coffee
Tuesday, March 20, 2012
Bargain Hunt in Hull
Bargain Hunt in Hull
I bought a Convector Heater 2000W from Wilkinson's down from £24.00 to £12.00.
I bought a couple of packs...
Shannon's Irish Coffee
£5.25 Per Pack: Aldi price £3.99!
I bought a Convector Heater 2000W from Wilkinson's down from £24.00 to £12.00.
I bought a couple of packs...
Shannon's Irish Coffee
£5.25 Per Pack: Aldi price £3.99!
Monday, March 19, 2012
Sir Nicolas Bratza in the dock?
Sir Nicolas Bratza in the dock?
Q143 Mr Sharma: Can you explain in which article of the Convention or Protocol there is expressly set out a right of prisoner voting? Are you aware of the travaux, which demonstrate clearly that states agreed to retain narrow exemptions to the franchise?
Sir Nicolas Bratza: I think I must confine myself to saying that, although it has been suggested that the Hirst case was the first case in which the right of a person or an individual to vote was established, that is not in fact so. This is a right that has been interpreted since the 1980s certainly and perhaps even further back than that in a case called Mathieu-Mohin v Belgium. It is not something that one has invented for the first time in the Hirst case. As you will appreciate, I do not want to go into the details of the Hirst case because, as you are probably aware, the judgment of the Grand Chamber there is currently under challenge in a case against Italy in which the UK intervened on behalf of the respondent state in raising a similar issue to that raised in the Hirst case, and in which the UK Government are arguing that the Hirst case was wrongly decided. That case is still pending before us and I am involved in it, so I would rather not go further in talking about the Hirst case.
When I heard Sir Nicolas Bratza give his oral evidence I got the impression from what he said that the UK is appealing against my case within the Scoppola case before the Grand Chamber. If this is the case then I have cause for alarm because under the ECHR it states that the decision in my case is final, and that means there is no provision for another appeal.
So why is Sir Nicolas Bratza allowing this abuse of process and breach of the ECHR by the UK and the Court?
Q143 Mr Sharma: Can you explain in which article of the Convention or Protocol there is expressly set out a right of prisoner voting? Are you aware of the travaux, which demonstrate clearly that states agreed to retain narrow exemptions to the franchise?
Sir Nicolas Bratza: I think I must confine myself to saying that, although it has been suggested that the Hirst case was the first case in which the right of a person or an individual to vote was established, that is not in fact so. This is a right that has been interpreted since the 1980s certainly and perhaps even further back than that in a case called Mathieu-Mohin v Belgium. It is not something that one has invented for the first time in the Hirst case. As you will appreciate, I do not want to go into the details of the Hirst case because, as you are probably aware, the judgment of the Grand Chamber there is currently under challenge in a case against Italy in which the UK intervened on behalf of the respondent state in raising a similar issue to that raised in the Hirst case, and in which the UK Government are arguing that the Hirst case was wrongly decided. That case is still pending before us and I am involved in it, so I would rather not go further in talking about the Hirst case.
When I heard Sir Nicolas Bratza give his oral evidence I got the impression from what he said that the UK is appealing against my case within the Scoppola case before the Grand Chamber. If this is the case then I have cause for alarm because under the ECHR it states that the decision in my case is final, and that means there is no provision for another appeal.
So why is Sir Nicolas Bratza allowing this abuse of process and breach of the ECHR by the UK and the Court?
Fabrice Muamba tweets could land Twitter 'troll' in prison
Fabrice Muamba tweets could land Twitter 'troll' in prison
Student admits incitement to racial hatred for remarks celebrating Bolton player's collapse
A student faces jail after admitting posting offensive comments on Twitter about the on-pitch collapse of footballer Fabrice Muamba.
Liam Stacey was arrested after his tweets were reported to police by Twitter users from across Britain, including former England striker Stan Collymore.
Stacey, 21, spent Sunday night in custody and was brought before magistrates in Swansea on Monday, where he admitted incitement to racial hatred. He was released on bail on condition that he stayed off Twitter and other social networking sites and will be sentenced next week. Stacey was told he could be jailed.
The swiftness of the arrest demonstrates how seriously police forces are taking the posting of potentially criminal comments on social networking sites by so-called "trolls".
Bolton Wanderers midfielder Muamba suffered a cardiac arrest during his team's FA Cup sixth round tie at Tottenham on Saturday night.
Lisa Jones, prosecuting, said: "Fabrice Muamba collapsed on the pitch and was believed to have died. Shortly after, Stacey posted on Twitter: "LOL, Fuck Muamba. He's dead."
Jones said other Twitter users criticised Stacey, prompting him to post a series of other offensive and racist comments.
Swansea magistrates heard that police around Britain had Stacey's comments reported to them by users including Collymore.
The court heard Stacey tried to claim his account had been hacked. He also tried to delete his page.
He texted a friend to say: "I said something about Muamba that I shouldn't have and tweeted back to some people who abused me. Getting police on me now, which isn't good at all."
Police arrested him on Sunday in Swansea. When interviewed, Stacey said he was drunk after drinking since early afternoon on Saturday while watching the Wales v France Six Nations rugby match.
He told police: "I was at the bar when I heard what had happened to Muamba.
I don't know why I posted it. I'm not racist and some of my friends are from different cultural backgrounds."
Stacey, a biology undergraduate, was close to tears as the evidence was given about his tweets. The case was adjourned for reports to be prepared.
He was told that all sentencing options would be considered, including custody.
Muamba remained in a critical but stable condition on Monday morning.
Student admits incitement to racial hatred for remarks celebrating Bolton player's collapse
A student faces jail after admitting posting offensive comments on Twitter about the on-pitch collapse of footballer Fabrice Muamba.
Liam Stacey was arrested after his tweets were reported to police by Twitter users from across Britain, including former England striker Stan Collymore.
Stacey, 21, spent Sunday night in custody and was brought before magistrates in Swansea on Monday, where he admitted incitement to racial hatred. He was released on bail on condition that he stayed off Twitter and other social networking sites and will be sentenced next week. Stacey was told he could be jailed.
The swiftness of the arrest demonstrates how seriously police forces are taking the posting of potentially criminal comments on social networking sites by so-called "trolls".
Bolton Wanderers midfielder Muamba suffered a cardiac arrest during his team's FA Cup sixth round tie at Tottenham on Saturday night.
Lisa Jones, prosecuting, said: "Fabrice Muamba collapsed on the pitch and was believed to have died. Shortly after, Stacey posted on Twitter: "LOL, Fuck Muamba. He's dead."
Jones said other Twitter users criticised Stacey, prompting him to post a series of other offensive and racist comments.
Swansea magistrates heard that police around Britain had Stacey's comments reported to them by users including Collymore.
The court heard Stacey tried to claim his account had been hacked. He also tried to delete his page.
He texted a friend to say: "I said something about Muamba that I shouldn't have and tweeted back to some people who abused me. Getting police on me now, which isn't good at all."
Police arrested him on Sunday in Swansea. When interviewed, Stacey said he was drunk after drinking since early afternoon on Saturday while watching the Wales v France Six Nations rugby match.
He told police: "I was at the bar when I heard what had happened to Muamba.
I don't know why I posted it. I'm not racist and some of my friends are from different cultural backgrounds."
Stacey, a biology undergraduate, was close to tears as the evidence was given about his tweets. The case was adjourned for reports to be prepared.
He was told that all sentencing options would be considered, including custody.
Muamba remained in a critical but stable condition on Monday morning.
EU outraged after Belarus executes two men accused of Metro bombing
EU outraged after Belarus executes two men accused of Metro bombing
Alexander Lukashenko, 'the last dictator in Europe', ignores pleas for clemency as critics question fairness of trial
The EU and human rights groups have strongly condemned the execution of two young men in Belarus following their conviction for a deadly attack on the Minsk metro last April.
Late on Saturday, state television reported that Vladislav Kovalyov and Dmitry Konovalov, both 26, had been put to death. In Belarus, execution is performed by a shot to the back of the head. Kovalyov's mother said she had received a note from the authorities saying the death sentence on her son had been carried out.
European governments said they were dismayed by the sentence and described the men's trial as deeply flawed. The Belarus president, Alexander Lukashenko, described as "Europe's last dictator" by the former US secretary of state Condoleezza Rice, had rejected pleas for clemency from the EU.
"Belarus is the only country in Europe which still executes people," Thorbjørn Jaglan, the secretary general of the Council of Europe, said. "With its disrespect of basic human rights and democratic standards, the government of Belarus is increasingly isolating its country and its people from the rest of the world."
Alexander Lukashenko, 'the last dictator in Europe', ignores pleas for clemency as critics question fairness of trial
The EU and human rights groups have strongly condemned the execution of two young men in Belarus following their conviction for a deadly attack on the Minsk metro last April.
Late on Saturday, state television reported that Vladislav Kovalyov and Dmitry Konovalov, both 26, had been put to death. In Belarus, execution is performed by a shot to the back of the head. Kovalyov's mother said she had received a note from the authorities saying the death sentence on her son had been carried out.
European governments said they were dismayed by the sentence and described the men's trial as deeply flawed. The Belarus president, Alexander Lukashenko, described as "Europe's last dictator" by the former US secretary of state Condoleezza Rice, had rejected pleas for clemency from the EU.
"Belarus is the only country in Europe which still executes people," Thorbjørn Jaglan, the secretary general of the Council of Europe, said. "With its disrespect of basic human rights and democratic standards, the government of Belarus is increasingly isolating its country and its people from the rest of the world."
Sunday, March 18, 2012
Saturday, March 17, 2012
The civil servants are the masters now – and our democracy suffers
The civil servants are the masters now – and our democracy suffers
Attempts to reform human rights law are being frustrated by liberal bureaucrats.
By Charles Moore, Daily Telegraph, 7:58PM GMT 16 Mar 2012
Islamist fanatics want rule by the sharia, their version of the law of God. They reject what they call “man-made” laws – the laws by which most nations live. For the same reason, Islamists reject democracy. It is a sham, they say, and an offence against God.
Those who support the untrammelled power of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) are the secular equivalent. They think that the European Convention on Human Rights and the Strasbourg court which enforces it are sacred. They believe these rights should be forced upon people everywhere, regardless of how anyone votes. Human rights are their sharia.
In Iran, the Guardian Council of senior clergy makes the final decision about whether anything passed by the parliament is compatible with Islamic law. In Europe, the ECHR has the same absolute authority over the decisions of all the member parliaments, including our own. True, its punishments do not (yet) involve stoning or the cutting off of hands, but the principle is the same: “We,” says the priesthood of human rights lawyers, “are in possession of the truth: no other power may stand against us.”
Even before he became Prime Minister, David Cameron was suspicious of the human rights theocrats. Once he had reached 10 Downing Street, he tried to do something about it. He set up a commission on a British Bill of Rights. The idea was not to get rid of human rights, but to bring them home. At present we have a situation in which, for example, the ECHR can rule that Britain must give prisoners the vote. No major political party and no large section of public opinion agree. Yet, under the present arrangements, there is absolutely nothing that our elected representatives can do about it.
Because we live under a coalition, and because Nick Clegg has made constitutional questions one of his special subjects, the membership of Mr Cameron’s commission is split between Liberals and Conservatives. The appointment of four Lib Dem choices and four Conservative ones gives the Liberals a power disproportionate to their parliamentary numbers. The chairman of the commission, Sir Leigh Lewis, formerly the top bureaucrat at the Department for Work and Pensions, has a Cleggy view of the world.
Last week, Dr Michael Pinto-Duchinsky, one of the nominees from the Cameron camp, resigned from the commission. His essential complaint was that he could not get it to focus on the heart of the matter. In its 21 months of work, it has devoted only one solitary meeting to the question which, in his view – and that of the Prime Minister who set it up – is central. Dr Pinto-Duchinsky calls it “the politics of the last say”. If you wanted to be more constitutionally high-falutin, you could call it parliamentary sovereignty. He does not want to remove human rights from our law. He accepts and even welcomes the fact that judges’ decisions will sometimes challenge the decisions of politicians. But what he also argues is that elected legislators must have some power of “democratic override”.
At present, there is none. At least in the United States, where the Supreme Court is extremely strong, it is possible, though not easy, for the Congress to amend the constitution and thus the court’s powers. (You can see why this might be necessary when you recall that the Supreme Court in the mid-19th century upheld slavery in the US on the grounds that it was a property right. It took the Civil War to sort things out.) There is no last-resort ability to intervene with the ECHR. Although there is something called “the margin of appreciation” which allows the Strasbourg court to give discretion to member states in how they apply its judgments, this discretion is bestowed by the court itself, and cannot be expanded by the members. The 47 judges, some of them from countries such as Russia, Albania and Azerbaijan, where the phrase “human rights” attracts only a puzzled stare, are, in the politics of the last say, our dictators. As dictators are free to do, they take their time. The court has a backlog of more than 150,000 cases.
So if the commission won’t address this question of parliamentary sovereignty, its conclusions, expected at the end of this year, will make no difference. Anything it recommends will be a mere relabelling, some pious restatements of human rights, wrapped, for Mr Cameron’s political convenience, in the Union flag.
How is it, then, that a government is frustrated by the very people it appoints? Here we come to the huge problem nowadays of our permanent official and semi-official classes. So weak is Parliament, and so nervous is government of looking over-political, that these classes fill the gap left by “here today, gone tomorrow” politicians.
If you look, for example, at the public appointments rules introduced in the name of procedural correctness, or of “diversity” (which, by an Orwellian effect, really means uniformity), you will see that they are run by civil servants. Naturally, they choose people appealing to the civil servant’s cast of mind. Everywhere – in the appointment of peers or quangocrats, in IPSA, the body which decides on MPs’ expenses, or on the Committee for Standards in Public Life – unelected people lay down the moral law for the elected. They welcome the opinions of interest groups, and exclude those of the public and the people the public elect.
Thus, for example, all those charged with looking at the matter keep advocating that there should be state funding for political parties (in effect, nationalising them), despite the known reluctance of actual taxpayers to come across with the money for such a rotten cause. Even in Downing Street, itself, Mr Cameron has allowed the permanent machine to outmanoeuvre the political appointments brought in to enact his will. Off, on his bicycle, pedals his brilliant adviser, Steve Hilton. In the driving seat of the Rolls-Royce of officialdom purrs the ever more powerful new Cabinet Secretary, Sir Jeremy Heywood.
I am not arguing, of course, that elected people are personally morally better or wiser than unelected ones. We have many able and decent public servants (and several fairly useless MPs). My point is that the word “servant” is the key. You now hear the phrase “independent civil servants” as if such a thing were a part of our constitution. Yet it is a contradiction in terms. The civil servant serves. If he becomes “independent”, whom does he serve? The servant becomes master.
The problem came up this week in Parliament. The Public Accounts Committee wants to be able to question civil servants freely, forcing them to answer its questions. You can see why, when they now seem to act without any even theoretical reference to ministers. Yet if ministers are no longer responsible to Parliament for the actions of officials, then what are ministers for? The word “bureaucrat” means one who has power by virtue of occupying his office (the “bureau”). Democracies are supposed to be suspicious of that.
It is not a coincidence that such people favour the European Court of Human Rights. Great liberal jurists like Lord Lester, one of the Lib Dem members of the commission, instinctively dislike democracy. He calls the idea of ultimate democratic override of a court “reactionary”. Such people think of democracy as little more than a series of unenlightened opinion polls in which majorities vote to oppress minorities. For them, the ECHR is perfect. It is publicly funded, internationally guaranteed, unanswerable to anyone elected by anybody, and stuffed with people like themselves. For those same reasons, the rest of us should fear it.
Comment: It takes some stretch of the imagination to compare the ECHR with sharia law.
Attempts to reform human rights law are being frustrated by liberal bureaucrats.
By Charles Moore, Daily Telegraph, 7:58PM GMT 16 Mar 2012
Islamist fanatics want rule by the sharia, their version of the law of God. They reject what they call “man-made” laws – the laws by which most nations live. For the same reason, Islamists reject democracy. It is a sham, they say, and an offence against God.
Those who support the untrammelled power of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) are the secular equivalent. They think that the European Convention on Human Rights and the Strasbourg court which enforces it are sacred. They believe these rights should be forced upon people everywhere, regardless of how anyone votes. Human rights are their sharia.
In Iran, the Guardian Council of senior clergy makes the final decision about whether anything passed by the parliament is compatible with Islamic law. In Europe, the ECHR has the same absolute authority over the decisions of all the member parliaments, including our own. True, its punishments do not (yet) involve stoning or the cutting off of hands, but the principle is the same: “We,” says the priesthood of human rights lawyers, “are in possession of the truth: no other power may stand against us.”
Even before he became Prime Minister, David Cameron was suspicious of the human rights theocrats. Once he had reached 10 Downing Street, he tried to do something about it. He set up a commission on a British Bill of Rights. The idea was not to get rid of human rights, but to bring them home. At present we have a situation in which, for example, the ECHR can rule that Britain must give prisoners the vote. No major political party and no large section of public opinion agree. Yet, under the present arrangements, there is absolutely nothing that our elected representatives can do about it.
Because we live under a coalition, and because Nick Clegg has made constitutional questions one of his special subjects, the membership of Mr Cameron’s commission is split between Liberals and Conservatives. The appointment of four Lib Dem choices and four Conservative ones gives the Liberals a power disproportionate to their parliamentary numbers. The chairman of the commission, Sir Leigh Lewis, formerly the top bureaucrat at the Department for Work and Pensions, has a Cleggy view of the world.
Last week, Dr Michael Pinto-Duchinsky, one of the nominees from the Cameron camp, resigned from the commission. His essential complaint was that he could not get it to focus on the heart of the matter. In its 21 months of work, it has devoted only one solitary meeting to the question which, in his view – and that of the Prime Minister who set it up – is central. Dr Pinto-Duchinsky calls it “the politics of the last say”. If you wanted to be more constitutionally high-falutin, you could call it parliamentary sovereignty. He does not want to remove human rights from our law. He accepts and even welcomes the fact that judges’ decisions will sometimes challenge the decisions of politicians. But what he also argues is that elected legislators must have some power of “democratic override”.
At present, there is none. At least in the United States, where the Supreme Court is extremely strong, it is possible, though not easy, for the Congress to amend the constitution and thus the court’s powers. (You can see why this might be necessary when you recall that the Supreme Court in the mid-19th century upheld slavery in the US on the grounds that it was a property right. It took the Civil War to sort things out.) There is no last-resort ability to intervene with the ECHR. Although there is something called “the margin of appreciation” which allows the Strasbourg court to give discretion to member states in how they apply its judgments, this discretion is bestowed by the court itself, and cannot be expanded by the members. The 47 judges, some of them from countries such as Russia, Albania and Azerbaijan, where the phrase “human rights” attracts only a puzzled stare, are, in the politics of the last say, our dictators. As dictators are free to do, they take their time. The court has a backlog of more than 150,000 cases.
So if the commission won’t address this question of parliamentary sovereignty, its conclusions, expected at the end of this year, will make no difference. Anything it recommends will be a mere relabelling, some pious restatements of human rights, wrapped, for Mr Cameron’s political convenience, in the Union flag.
How is it, then, that a government is frustrated by the very people it appoints? Here we come to the huge problem nowadays of our permanent official and semi-official classes. So weak is Parliament, and so nervous is government of looking over-political, that these classes fill the gap left by “here today, gone tomorrow” politicians.
If you look, for example, at the public appointments rules introduced in the name of procedural correctness, or of “diversity” (which, by an Orwellian effect, really means uniformity), you will see that they are run by civil servants. Naturally, they choose people appealing to the civil servant’s cast of mind. Everywhere – in the appointment of peers or quangocrats, in IPSA, the body which decides on MPs’ expenses, or on the Committee for Standards in Public Life – unelected people lay down the moral law for the elected. They welcome the opinions of interest groups, and exclude those of the public and the people the public elect.
Thus, for example, all those charged with looking at the matter keep advocating that there should be state funding for political parties (in effect, nationalising them), despite the known reluctance of actual taxpayers to come across with the money for such a rotten cause. Even in Downing Street, itself, Mr Cameron has allowed the permanent machine to outmanoeuvre the political appointments brought in to enact his will. Off, on his bicycle, pedals his brilliant adviser, Steve Hilton. In the driving seat of the Rolls-Royce of officialdom purrs the ever more powerful new Cabinet Secretary, Sir Jeremy Heywood.
I am not arguing, of course, that elected people are personally morally better or wiser than unelected ones. We have many able and decent public servants (and several fairly useless MPs). My point is that the word “servant” is the key. You now hear the phrase “independent civil servants” as if such a thing were a part of our constitution. Yet it is a contradiction in terms. The civil servant serves. If he becomes “independent”, whom does he serve? The servant becomes master.
The problem came up this week in Parliament. The Public Accounts Committee wants to be able to question civil servants freely, forcing them to answer its questions. You can see why, when they now seem to act without any even theoretical reference to ministers. Yet if ministers are no longer responsible to Parliament for the actions of officials, then what are ministers for? The word “bureaucrat” means one who has power by virtue of occupying his office (the “bureau”). Democracies are supposed to be suspicious of that.
It is not a coincidence that such people favour the European Court of Human Rights. Great liberal jurists like Lord Lester, one of the Lib Dem members of the commission, instinctively dislike democracy. He calls the idea of ultimate democratic override of a court “reactionary”. Such people think of democracy as little more than a series of unenlightened opinion polls in which majorities vote to oppress minorities. For them, the ECHR is perfect. It is publicly funded, internationally guaranteed, unanswerable to anyone elected by anybody, and stuffed with people like themselves. For those same reasons, the rest of us should fear it.
Comment: It takes some stretch of the imagination to compare the ECHR with sharia law.
Friday, March 16, 2012
Rights Gone Wrong?
Rights Gone Wrong?
Rights Gone Wrong is couched as a question: it’s a documentary to explore the roots of British human rights, the cornerstone of fairness, and the muddying influence of European law.
BBC Journalist Andrew Neil is tasked with travelling to parts of the UK, and then to Europe, to ask people why the British justice system is in ruin. Neil, who wears a selection of beguiling, continental scarves throughout, is on a crusade to restore faith in human rights to Britain.
Assumptions are made from the outset. The accepted belief is the British public is fed up with Europe because thanks to the court in Strasbourg, Abu Qatada stays in Britain, crooks can’t appear on Wanted posters and prisoners can vote (although this has yet to be enforced).
Sensationalist newspaper clippings slope onto the screen – “End the human rights farce” – and onto this Neil slathers emotive phrases to signpost the viewer towards his thinking – that Britain should usurp Europe with its own bill of human rights. That Europe is troublesome.
“I love Europe,” says Neil as he takes a sip of champagne and raises an eyebrow. He leans in: “But have we been lumbered with Europe’s zealous obsession with human rights?” It’s language to plant the seed – another idea disguised as a question.
He shows the fall out of European justice: a man whose daughter was run over by an asylum seeker from Kurdistan who, once he’d served his jail term, remained in the UK. This is because Strasbourg had ruled his marriage to a Briton gave him the right to a family life over here. And yes, the scenario is bitterly unfair – the camera lens sweeps over a graveyard and onto the father who asks “What about my right to a family life?” – but there is a distinct lack of balance here and the overall good Europe does in regulating human rights is left largely unaddressed.
On with the crusade. Neil travels to Strasbourg, to “the heart of darkness” as he calls it, and reveals how other countries like Russia and Italy ignore the court’s rulings while Britain is a stickler for the rules and gets lumbered with the law.
The documentary trumpets the potency and heritage of justice in Britain – there’s a snippet played of Winston Churchill talking about human rights -“A rose out of the ashes of the second world war” – and later, a scene where Neil clutches a photocopy of the Magna Carta wrapped in ribbon and strides through the English countryside.
He reaches a historian who’s stood nearby and plucks out a line from the Magna Carta scroll that says a person can’t be imprisoned without trial. It is evidence of Britain’s long-held commitment to fairness. It paves the way for Neil’s argument for autonomy. The historian tells him ruling powers would ignore this clause when they felt like it.
The documentary isn’t correctly labelled. Rights Gone Wrong? might be “Andrew Neil’s Vision For Justice” – or at least a title without a question mark. Neil doesn’t grapple with the truth, he lays on his own ideas. By the end he’d have you believe human rights law is in the grips of disaster and only British justice can save the day.
Watch the BBC 2 documentary on iPlayer here.
Last Night's Viewing: Rights Gone Wrong?
I do hope someone kept the Wanted poster. At the beginning of Rights Gone Wrong – a rapid-response documentary about the controversial nature of some recent rulings from the European Court of Human Rights – Andrew Neil illustrated some of the wilder stories that had made it into the papers, including the suggestions that a kitten had prevented a criminal's deportation and that a police force hadn't publicised a suspect's picture for fear of breaching his human rights. Cue a mocked-up Police Appeal for Assistance bearing the features of the Daily Politics presenter, a man who has repeatedly breached his own right to dignity in the pursuit of televisual novelty. I still have sweaty flashbacks of him and Portillo doing a cover of "(Is This the Way to) Amarillo" for the 2005 election coverage.
Rights Gone Wrong?, BBC Two, review
Did Andrew Neil prove that human rights laws are failing us? James Walton reviews BBC Two's timely documentary.
Rights Gone Wrong is couched as a question: it’s a documentary to explore the roots of British human rights, the cornerstone of fairness, and the muddying influence of European law.
BBC Journalist Andrew Neil is tasked with travelling to parts of the UK, and then to Europe, to ask people why the British justice system is in ruin. Neil, who wears a selection of beguiling, continental scarves throughout, is on a crusade to restore faith in human rights to Britain.
Assumptions are made from the outset. The accepted belief is the British public is fed up with Europe because thanks to the court in Strasbourg, Abu Qatada stays in Britain, crooks can’t appear on Wanted posters and prisoners can vote (although this has yet to be enforced).
Sensationalist newspaper clippings slope onto the screen – “End the human rights farce” – and onto this Neil slathers emotive phrases to signpost the viewer towards his thinking – that Britain should usurp Europe with its own bill of human rights. That Europe is troublesome.
“I love Europe,” says Neil as he takes a sip of champagne and raises an eyebrow. He leans in: “But have we been lumbered with Europe’s zealous obsession with human rights?” It’s language to plant the seed – another idea disguised as a question.
He shows the fall out of European justice: a man whose daughter was run over by an asylum seeker from Kurdistan who, once he’d served his jail term, remained in the UK. This is because Strasbourg had ruled his marriage to a Briton gave him the right to a family life over here. And yes, the scenario is bitterly unfair – the camera lens sweeps over a graveyard and onto the father who asks “What about my right to a family life?” – but there is a distinct lack of balance here and the overall good Europe does in regulating human rights is left largely unaddressed.
On with the crusade. Neil travels to Strasbourg, to “the heart of darkness” as he calls it, and reveals how other countries like Russia and Italy ignore the court’s rulings while Britain is a stickler for the rules and gets lumbered with the law.
The documentary trumpets the potency and heritage of justice in Britain – there’s a snippet played of Winston Churchill talking about human rights -“A rose out of the ashes of the second world war” – and later, a scene where Neil clutches a photocopy of the Magna Carta wrapped in ribbon and strides through the English countryside.
He reaches a historian who’s stood nearby and plucks out a line from the Magna Carta scroll that says a person can’t be imprisoned without trial. It is evidence of Britain’s long-held commitment to fairness. It paves the way for Neil’s argument for autonomy. The historian tells him ruling powers would ignore this clause when they felt like it.
The documentary isn’t correctly labelled. Rights Gone Wrong? might be “Andrew Neil’s Vision For Justice” – or at least a title without a question mark. Neil doesn’t grapple with the truth, he lays on his own ideas. By the end he’d have you believe human rights law is in the grips of disaster and only British justice can save the day.
Watch the BBC 2 documentary on iPlayer here.
Last Night's Viewing: Rights Gone Wrong?
I do hope someone kept the Wanted poster. At the beginning of Rights Gone Wrong – a rapid-response documentary about the controversial nature of some recent rulings from the European Court of Human Rights – Andrew Neil illustrated some of the wilder stories that had made it into the papers, including the suggestions that a kitten had prevented a criminal's deportation and that a police force hadn't publicised a suspect's picture for fear of breaching his human rights. Cue a mocked-up Police Appeal for Assistance bearing the features of the Daily Politics presenter, a man who has repeatedly breached his own right to dignity in the pursuit of televisual novelty. I still have sweaty flashbacks of him and Portillo doing a cover of "(Is This the Way to) Amarillo" for the 2005 election coverage.
Rights Gone Wrong?, BBC Two, review
Did Andrew Neil prove that human rights laws are failing us? James Walton reviews BBC Two's timely documentary.
Barrister struck off over claim that senior law lord had him kidnapped
Barrister struck off over claim that senior law lord had him kidnapped
A barrister has been struck off after falsely claiming one of Britain’s most senior judges had him kidnapped and blackmailed him into dropping a £1 million claim on behalf of a client.
Alexander Mercouris concocted a web of “tortuous deceit” to convince a client he was pursuing the bogus claim, including forging a Supreme Court judge’s signature, a tribunal heard.
He even alleged that Lord Phillips of Worth Matravers, President of the Supreme Court, had him abducted and offered him a £50,000 bribe to abandon the case.
His lies began after he offered to represent Lorna Jamous, 49, a mother seeking damages from a council over standards of care involving her son, the Bar Standards Board (BSB) heard.
Mrs Jamous had been offered a £5,000 settlement by Westminster City Council, but Mercouris told her in October 2009 that he could take further action to get her hundreds of thousands of pounds.
Mercouris, 51, later told his client he had managed to win her a £983,000 payout, prompting her to rack up debts in expectation of the windfall.
However, when she began questioning why the money had not materialised, Mercouris “embarked on ever more bizarre assertions to hide the truth” that the payout had never been awarded, Stephen Mooney, the BSB’s counsel said.
To convince Mrs Jamous, he showed her a forged letter purporting to be from Baroness Hale, Justice of the Supreme Court, expressing concern that the payment had not arrived.
At one point, he talked the mother-of-two out of attending a hearing at which she would have discovered the truth, claiming her presence would “derail sensitive negotiations”.
Next he told her he had applied for an interim £50,000 payment, then claimed his brother had stolen the whole £983,000.
Mr Mooney said he then made “the most peculiar allegation” - that bogus police officers kidnapped him and took him to a meeting with Lord Phillips.
Mercouris claimed the former Lord Chief Justice of England and Wales pleaded with him to drop the case in exchange for a £50,000 bribe, plus his debts and mortgage paid off.
He also alleged that Lord Phillips threatened to have his 102-year-old grandmother put into a care home.
Mr Mooney described the lies as an “extremely convoluted story” of “tortuous deceit” and that his relationship with his client had gone from “supportive and helpful” to “bizarre, unhelpful and profoundly dishonest”.
“In my opinion, Mr Mercouris is not fully in control of his faculties,” he told the tribunal.
Mercouris, a former Citizens Advice Bureau worker who was called to the bar in 2006, wept as he admitted five counts of bringing his profession into disrepute through misconduct.
“Mr Mooney has referred to some of my actions as bizarre, I cannot dispute that. I’m very sorry. I worked very hard to become a barrister and disbarment is a bitter thought,” he said.
The tribunal heard that Mercouris, who represented himself during the hearing, had worked in the Royal Courts of Justice for 12 years before being called to the bar.
He added that he was diagnosed with depression after a nervous breakdown in 2007 due to caring for his sick grandmother and had been out of work for several months.
Striking him off, panel chairman Crawford Lindsay QC said Mercouris’s “fantasy scheme” was a “sad case”.
“These are extremely serious allegations where you deceived the client, involving two distinguished members of the judiciary. You went completely off the rails,” he said.
Speaking after the hearing, Mrs Jamous, of Belgravia, west London, said: "It was very cruel the way he treated us because we put out trust in him as a barrister and he abused that trust.
"He told us that we had been awarded this money, even showing us a letter from Baroness Hale confirming it, so we had no reason to doubt him.
"I borrowed money, went on holiday and was looking at houses because we thought we had £1 million to spend."
A barrister has been struck off after falsely claiming one of Britain’s most senior judges had him kidnapped and blackmailed him into dropping a £1 million claim on behalf of a client.
Alexander Mercouris concocted a web of “tortuous deceit” to convince a client he was pursuing the bogus claim, including forging a Supreme Court judge’s signature, a tribunal heard.
He even alleged that Lord Phillips of Worth Matravers, President of the Supreme Court, had him abducted and offered him a £50,000 bribe to abandon the case.
His lies began after he offered to represent Lorna Jamous, 49, a mother seeking damages from a council over standards of care involving her son, the Bar Standards Board (BSB) heard.
Mrs Jamous had been offered a £5,000 settlement by Westminster City Council, but Mercouris told her in October 2009 that he could take further action to get her hundreds of thousands of pounds.
Mercouris, 51, later told his client he had managed to win her a £983,000 payout, prompting her to rack up debts in expectation of the windfall.
However, when she began questioning why the money had not materialised, Mercouris “embarked on ever more bizarre assertions to hide the truth” that the payout had never been awarded, Stephen Mooney, the BSB’s counsel said.
To convince Mrs Jamous, he showed her a forged letter purporting to be from Baroness Hale, Justice of the Supreme Court, expressing concern that the payment had not arrived.
At one point, he talked the mother-of-two out of attending a hearing at which she would have discovered the truth, claiming her presence would “derail sensitive negotiations”.
Next he told her he had applied for an interim £50,000 payment, then claimed his brother had stolen the whole £983,000.
Mr Mooney said he then made “the most peculiar allegation” - that bogus police officers kidnapped him and took him to a meeting with Lord Phillips.
Mercouris claimed the former Lord Chief Justice of England and Wales pleaded with him to drop the case in exchange for a £50,000 bribe, plus his debts and mortgage paid off.
He also alleged that Lord Phillips threatened to have his 102-year-old grandmother put into a care home.
Mr Mooney described the lies as an “extremely convoluted story” of “tortuous deceit” and that his relationship with his client had gone from “supportive and helpful” to “bizarre, unhelpful and profoundly dishonest”.
“In my opinion, Mr Mercouris is not fully in control of his faculties,” he told the tribunal.
Mercouris, a former Citizens Advice Bureau worker who was called to the bar in 2006, wept as he admitted five counts of bringing his profession into disrepute through misconduct.
“Mr Mooney has referred to some of my actions as bizarre, I cannot dispute that. I’m very sorry. I worked very hard to become a barrister and disbarment is a bitter thought,” he said.
The tribunal heard that Mercouris, who represented himself during the hearing, had worked in the Royal Courts of Justice for 12 years before being called to the bar.
He added that he was diagnosed with depression after a nervous breakdown in 2007 due to caring for his sick grandmother and had been out of work for several months.
Striking him off, panel chairman Crawford Lindsay QC said Mercouris’s “fantasy scheme” was a “sad case”.
“These are extremely serious allegations where you deceived the client, involving two distinguished members of the judiciary. You went completely off the rails,” he said.
Speaking after the hearing, Mrs Jamous, of Belgravia, west London, said: "It was very cruel the way he treated us because we put out trust in him as a barrister and he abused that trust.
"He told us that we had been awarded this money, even showing us a letter from Baroness Hale confirming it, so we had no reason to doubt him.
"I borrowed money, went on holiday and was looking at houses because we thought we had £1 million to spend."
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