Hammond: Withdrawing from human rights not on the table
FOREIGN Secretary Philip Hammond has said withdrawing from the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) is not “on the table” following reports of a Cabinet rift over the issue.
Home Secretary Theresa May and Justice Secretary Michael Gove reportedly argued that pulling out of the convention was the “only solution” to re-establishing the supremacy of the British cour ts over the Str a s - bourg-based European Court of Human Rights.
Mr Hammond insisted that the UK would comply with its obligations under international law as he was challenged about the Government’s plans for human rights reform.
It was announced in the Queen’s Speech that plans set out in the Conservative general election manifesto to replace the Human Rights Act (HRA) with a British bill of rights had been put on hold for at least a year.
It came amid concerns the Government would face a protracted struggle to pass the legislation both in the Commons, where it faces significant opposition from rebel Tory MPs, and the Lords where it has no majority.
Any move to scrap the HRA will be resisted in Scotland, where First Minister Nicola Sturgeon has said she will invite Holyrood to refuse to give legislative consent to its abolition.
Her predecessor as first minister Alex Salmond raised the issue with Mr Hammond in the Commons.
Mr Salmond, now the SNP’s foreign affairs spokesman at Westminster, chal- lenged Mr Hammond on whether he would “support this country’s withdrawal from the European Convention on Human Rights”.
The Foreign Secretary told him: “That is not the proposal on the table – the proposal as you know is to ensure that our obligations in respect of compliance with the human rights agenda are overseen by judges in this country in the context of what is happening in this country.”
Downing Street insisted that “the whole Government” is behind the Prime Minister’s position on human rights reform.
The Prime Minister’s official spokeswoman said: “The PM’s position on what needs to happen on human rights was set out very clearly in the Conservative manifesto, a position the whole Government is behind.
“That is scrapping the Human Rights Act, breaking the link between the ECHR and here, and making the Supreme Court in the UK the ultimate arbiter of human rights in the UK.”