8 January 2007

The Human Rights Act: Crucifying Logic Again

JUST when you think things can't possibly get any sillier, you open a newspaper and read this. The Human Rights Act is still doing what it does best: shielding criminals from the fumbling, arthritic hand of British justice.
Update: Due to widespread anger over this charade, the Lord Chancellor, Baron Falconer of Thoroton, ever sensitive to public disparagement of the Act, vocally derided the decision of Derbyshire Constabulary not to publish pictures of the fugitives. Although Derbyshire force's Chief Constable David Coleman stubbornly refused to relent over his decision, the pictures were subsequently published by Greater Manchester police.
The Lord Chancellor's vociferous intervention is particularly interesting. Back in July 2006 he vigorously leapt to the defence of 1998's Human Rights Act against its numerous critics, claiming it had made 'no significant impact on criminal law, or on the Government's ability to fight crime.' He also asserted that the Act had been 'widely misrepresented and misunderstood' by the British public, although it looks like this misinterpretation has spread to the constabulary as well. If the Sudbury incident had not come to the public's attention it is questionable whether Baron Falconer would even have bothered to intervene in this manner. But whether or not the Lord Chancellor is sincere in his disapproval, the fact that the Act can be interpreted in this way proves it to be a damaging piece of legislation that needs a thorough overhaul or, better still, scrapping altogether.
PostScript: This shambles has lead to the exposure of this shambles. May the Saints preserve us.

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