The human rights propaganda aimed at four-year-olds
WITH its intricate illustrations of people and animals, it is described as the ‘perfect stocking filler’ for children as young as four.
But the latest book from Children’s Laureate Chris Riddell has been labelled propaganda for primary school-age pupils.
My Little Book Of Big Freedoms is intended to explain to youngsters why Britain should retain Labour’s controversial Human Rights Act (HRA).
The Government has pledged to replace it with a Bill of Rights that can overrule the European Convention on Human Rights.
The 39-page book, for human rights campaigners Amnesty International, has 16 sketches depicting provisions in the 1998 Act, such as the rights to life and to a fair trial.
On Article 8’s right to family life and privacy, a sketch of two adults hugging children is opposite the wording: ‘We have the right to live with our family and live our lives the way we choose. The Government shouldn’t spy on us.’
Critics called it tantamount to propaganda, with no reference to alleged abuses in the way the HRA has been employed, such as when immigration judges ruled Somali rapist Mustafa Abdullahi could not be deported because it would breach his family rights.
Tory MP Philip Hollobone said: ‘It is completely inappropriate to politicise children’s reading in this way. Everyone supports human rights but not everyone supports the Human Rights Act.’
Amnesty said the £3.99 book aims to ‘encapsulate the freedoms and protections people enjoy every day, but never notice’.
The publication is part of a campaign to save the HRA, brought in by Tony Blair, and to stop Prime Minister David Cameron carrying out his election manifesto pledge to rip it up. The Tories instead plan to put the wording of the Convention in the Bill of Rights.
This would give UK courts supremacy over the Strasbourg court, which would then be treated as an advisory body.
The legislation would for the first time acknowledge that rights must be accompanied by responsibilities, curtailing claims by foreign criminals of a ‘human right’ to avoid deportation.
Mr Riddell – who became the illustrator behind Russell Brand’s children’s book retelling the Pied Piper of Hamelin after meeting him in a London private members’ club – was unveiled as the ninth children’s laureate in June.
The 53-year-old, who is also the political cartoonist for left-wing newspaper The Observer, will spend two years in the post, which comes with a £15,000 bursary.
He was born in South Africa, where his father was a vicar active in ant-apartheid politics. The family fled to the UK, where he grew up in Brixton, south London.
He now lives in Brighton with his wife, illustrator Jo Burroughes.
Amnesty acknowledged the collaboration marked a rare intervention by a children’s laureate in a ‘contentious’ issue.
Its UK director Kate Allen said: ‘Children have a natural instinct for determining what’s right and fair and this little book really appeals to that sense.
‘The Human Rights Act protects all of us, children and adults, which is why Chris’s drawings are so important.’
Writing in the foreword, Mr Riddell said: ‘ These freedoms were created to protect every one of us, forever.
‘They are part of something called the Human Rights Act. We need to stand up for these freedoms and look after them just as they look after us.’