Conservative plans to scrap Human Rights Act could break up the UK says Carmichael

FORMER Scottish Secretary Alistair Carmichael has warned that Conservative plans to replace the Human Rights Act could split up the UK and bring down the Good Friday Agreement in Northern Ireland.

The Liberal Democrat MP for Orkney and Shetland made his comments during a Westminster Hall debate he called on the future of Human Rights in the UK.

The Conservative government has made it clear that it wants to replace the Human Rights Act with a British bill of rights, after the legislation has been used to prevent the deportation of suspected terrorists and socalled hate preachers, as well as Alistair Carmichael spoke at a Westminster Hall debate testing the rights of prisoners to vote.

Justice Secretary Michael Gove has suggested that Scotland could be exempt from the change because of the Scottish legal system being devolved to Holyrood.

But during the debate Mr Carmichael said: “The Human Rights Act is hard-wired into the devolution settlements of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.”

He said that those who had campaigned to keep Scotland as part of the UK in the referendum last year “had not envisaged separate human rights laws” for different parts of the UK. He said this would undermine the UK, adding: “Human rights need to be universal across the whole country.”

He also said the Human Rights Act was “at the heart of the Good Friday Agreement” which brought peace in Northern Ireland. He said the parties involved “took a leap of faith” because of the protection of their human rights.