Human Rights report
New report the group is launching
April 2025
Amnesty began by focusing on human rights in other countries. This was probably based on the belief that rights in the UK were secure, we had after all, the Magna Carta, a justice system and things like torture ended several centuries ago. The UK was a key player in introducing the Universal Declaration in 1948. With the arrival of the European Court, it soon became clear that not everything in the UK human rights garden was rosy. The Birmingham Six case was a classic example of a failure to treat the six defendants fairly. The police fabricated evidence, the six were badly beaten in custody, the courts and judges manifestly failed, the forensic evidence was a nonsense. Eventually they were released – not because the justice system worked to correct its mistakes – but because of the dogged work of Chris Mullins, an MP and journalist.
In the recent decade and a half, there has been a long-lasting campaign, largely led by some newspaper groups, to denigrate the Human Rights Act and to claim that it is a ‘terrorist’s charter’ and allows serious criminals to escape justice because of allegedly spurious arguments provided by their human rights. This has been echoed by the Conservative party who have variously claimed to want to abolish or reform the act. We can remember the nonsense claim by Theresa May that a Chilean man could not be deported because of his cat.
Human rights therefore are by no means secure in the UK. Legislation introduced by the last Conservative government limiting the right to protest and increasing police powers, together with the remorseless increase in the use of surveillance technology, shows no sign of being annulled by the current Labour government.
Hence we feel the need to focus on our rights here in the UK and the slow but steady attempts to limit or curtail them.
Funding for victims of trafficking
The High Court has declared that denial of Exceptional Case Funding to four victims of trafficking to access legal advice to prepare an application for criminal injuries compensation breached their rights under Article 6 ECHR.
Military Misogyny
A coroner has concluded that the UK government may have breached a young soldier’s right to life by failing to protect Jaysley Beck from a sexual assault by a more senior colleague and from sustained unwelcome sexual attention from her line manager.
Deaths in custody
More than 100 relatives of people who have died after contact with the police in the UK since 1971 have joined plans for a class action lawsuit in pursuit of compensation and justice. At the People’s Tribunal on Police Killings, bereaved families presented evidence to a panel of international experts on how their relatives died and the long-term impact this has had on them. The findings and conclusions of the event will form the basis of a first-of-its-kind legal action directed at police officers, police chiefs and government departments involved in the deaths.
Economic, Social, Cultural Rights
Claims by Amnesty and Human Rights Watch state that the UK faces a cost-of-living crisis which has yet to be addressed by policies that safeguard the economic, social and cultural rights of people from low-income households, particularly their rights to food, housing and social security.
Freedom of Expression
Following last year’s criticism of the UK by the UN special rapporteur on environmental defenders, the High Court concluded that anti-protest measures introduced in 2023 – allowing authorities to clamp down on any protests deemed ‘more than minor’ disruptions – unlawfully restricted protest. The Labour Government has yet to repeal these repressive laws and is choosing to continue the legal challenge against the High Court ruling brought by the previous government.
Environmental Protest Sentencing
Gaie Delap (pictured), retired teacher, Quaker and climate protester has finally finished her sentence.
Her detention was notoriously extended when prison authorities could not equip her with a curfew tag bracelet. She said: “I think around 80% of the women I met should not have been in prison. Help with problems such as mental health, addiction and housing would have been more useful.”
This week the Court announced its ruling to uphold most of the harsh sentences of the ‘Walney 16’, jailing the group for a combined total of 35 years (originally 41) for peaceful protest. Global Witness say that the UK is at risk of becoming one of the world’s most repressive governments when it comes to policing climate protest, arresting campaigners at three times the global average. Lawyers for the protesters, backed by campaign groups Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth, argued that the sentences were disproportionate and violate the UK’s obligations under human rights law, including articles 10 and 11 of the European Convention on Human Rights and article 3(8) of the Aarhus Convention.
On 25 March prescriptive policing led to the arrest of six Youth Demand members as they met in a London Quaker House. The civil disobedience group has protested new oil expansion and UK arms to Israel. Quakers (not allied with the group) have protested at the police raid on their premises.
Open Justice
Apple is taking the unprecedented step of removing its highest level data security tool from customers in the UK, after the government demanded access to user data, citing powers given to it under the Investigatory Powers Act. After reluctantly pulling ADP from the UK, Apple has now launched legal proceedings against the government who argued it would damage national security if the nature of the legal action and the parties to it were made public. However a judge has sided with a coalition of civil liberties groups and news organisations – including the BBC – and ruled a legal row between the UK government and Apple over data privacy cannot be held in secret.
Sources: BBC News; The Guardian; Global Witness News; Doughty Street Chambers; Human Rights Watch; Amnesty.
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