It already is, of course: the 1689 Bill of Rights has effectively been impliedly repealed, having been usurped by the ECHR, which is singularly concerned with the ‘Rights of Man’, most especially ‘equality’. A man cannot serve two masters: man cannot be defined by two conflicting notions of rights.His Grace was going to write on this matter at length today, but Bill Cash has done so eloquently over at ConservativeHome. Now that the Commission on reform has been announced – that is, the body which decide whether or not there is to be a distinctive British Bill of Rights which goes some way to wresting powers back from the judiciary to restore the sovereignty of the people and Parliament – it is apparent that there can be nothing but stalemate, and so maintenance of the status quo.
The Conservative Party pledged in its 2010 Manifesto:
“To protect our freedoms from state encroachment and encourage greater social responsibility, we will replace the Human Rights Act with a UK Bill of Rights.”But, as Mark Harper reminded us in Parliament on Friday, the Conservative Party did not win the election. There is no hope of withdrawing from the European Convention or of repealing the Human Rights Act as long as we are governed by a coalition. Nor, indeed, as long as Dominic Grieve is Attorney General and Ken Clarke is Justice Secretary.
Which raises the question of why millions of pounds of taxpayers’ money is now being spent on a Commission which has evidently been constituted to give the appearance of progress while simultaneously pre-ordained to deliver nothing but the status quo.
