Before the Human Rights Act (HRA) was enshrined in British Law in 1998, people had to wait several years and spend tens of thousands of pounds to bring their cases to the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg. Now, freedoms protected by the European Convention on Human Rights, such as the right to life and protection from slavery and torture, are upheld in British courts and trials are available to all. However, this could all change if future plans to scrap and replace the HRA post-Brexit come into fruition, a prospect which should scare us all.

Perhaps the most obvious issue with supporting the HRA’s replacement, with the so-called ‘British Bill of Rights’, is that no one actually knows for certain what the new Bill would include (or exclude). In October 2014 a strategy paper was published on the Conservatives’s website containing suggestions for the new Bill and the human rights advocacy group Liberty began analysing the proposals. They found that, if the Bill doesn’t explicitly seek to restrict our human rights, it could make them dependent on fulfilling the “responsibilities” of British citizens. Not only does this raise issues about the status and rights of non-citizens living in Britain, it also destroys the core principle of human rights: we are all born with them and they cannot be changed or taken away. 

The paper goes on to say that the Bill would prevent the HRA from being “misinterpreted”, such as when foreign nationals who have committed crimes use it to remain in the UK rather than be forced to leave and potentially face trial in their home country. Once again we see the paper implying that actually not all humans have equal rights, and therefore some are not worthy of protection. By contrast, it also contains the deeply shocking proposition that British armed forces overseas should not be subject to “persistent human rights claims that undermine their ability to do their job” – i.e. the Army has the immunity to do anything it likes in the name of ‘keeping Britain safe’.

“It is not unpatriotic to support the Human Rights Act.”

The proposed Bill could also likely include a ‘triviality test’ set by Parliament, to stop it being used for ‘minor’ matters. Prior to the HRA, this argument of triviality was used by the government to oppose the legal recognition of gender for trans people, on the basis that applicants did not face any ‘practical disadvantages’ from not having their true gender identity recognised. Not only is this definitely not true, it also isn’t difficult to imagine that, beyond pure practicality, the psychological and personal impact on such people would still constitute a violation of the rights to freedom and protection from discrimination. 

But what I find particularly disturbing about the debate about the HRA is that its replacement is framed to the public as a way to regain sovereignty and return control to British people and courts, rather than being subjected to outside rule by the EU. But this is incredibly misleading. It is not unpatriotic to support the Human Rights Act. In fact, it was made a law in 1998 by a Labour Party that, crucially, had cross-party support for the motion. What is more, the European Convention of Human Rights which the act is based on was explicitly grounded in ‘UK values’ and drawn up in 1950 with the help and influence of British lawyers.

This is reflected in the slogan ‘Rights Brought Home’ which accompanied the law in 1998. The Act made it possible for British people to have their cases heard in British courts. Given all of this, and the fact that the HRA is repeatedly referred to in the strategy paper as “Labour’s Human Rights Act”, it seems that those Tories who want to replace it are motivated more by the prospect of undermining Labour and the EU, rather than by a genuine concern for protecting the rights and freedoms of all people.

But there is a much more symbolic issue at stake here, so let’s be very clear. The European Convention and the Act that followed in Britain are Europe’s response to and apology for the Holocaust. In the aftermath of the Second World War, leaders and lawyers from across the continent got together and agreed that something as horrific as the Holocaust could not be allowed to happen again and that there needed to be laws in place to ensure this. The Act was never about controlling the UK, it was about learning from the horrors that humans were capable of in the past, and trying to ensure that, in the future, people would be protected from such cruelty.

Campaigners commemorate Giulio Regeni on anniversary of his disappearance

In the light of recent news that President Trump signed a ‘Muslim ban’ in the US on Holocaust Memorial Day (echoing a similar restriction in the 1940s which prevented Anne Frank and her family from obtaining US visas), the presence of the HRA takes on a whole new significance. My hope is that, post-Brexit, if the Conservatives go ahead with plans and once again bring the Act into question, it will ultimately be allowed to stay as a sort of consolation prize for pro-EU Tories. But supporting the Human Rights Act has very little to do with which party you vote for and whether you like Brexit or not. This law determines our safety, well-being and, in some cases, our existence, and it must never again be used as a political tool or bargaining point by parties trying to assert their power or one-up their opponents