eurealist.co.uk

I would suggest that you read Henry Porters article in the Observer http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/mar/09/constitution

He argues thus:

this campaign against Britain’s historic rights and freedoms began at almost the precise moment the European Human Rights Convention was incorporated into British law as the Human Rights Act (HRA) in 1998. In other words, the HRA, a Bill of Rights by any other name, has allowed the executive and Civil Service to roll back individual liberty and privacy and has done almost nothing to defend the British public from the accumulation of centralised power.”

By chance this morning I also received an email that commented on Mr Porters article from Jo White;

“The granting of “universal rights” has done more to undermine national sovereignty and British Representative Democracy than almost anything else?

Individual rights were originally founded and linked to the political authority within nation states. By “equalising” universal rights across borders, and stressing the “sameness” of all peoples in applying them, we take away from nation states, the national self-determination from whence the concept of “human rights” was originally born! The granting of universal rights such as those bestowed upon us all by the HRA and the EU’s Charter of Fundamental Rights, turns the citizen against the authority of his own nation state, and instead, grants the authority to set and police those rights, to a distant and unelected authority.

It must surely follow then, that a British Bill of Rights would be useless, unless linked to the absolute sovereignty of the British Nation?”

The idea which has always worried me personally is also picked up by Mr Porter in his final chapter, it is that this idea suggests that rights are somehow in the gift of the government, in this case the EU government, but it matters not a jot any new British Bill of Rights introduced by the present administration would use the same criteria.

The present mostly ignored British Bill of Rights is based on the concept of negative rights, and form a basic protection for the citizen against the power of the state. These rights are beyond the remit of the state and certainly not changeable by a short term, elected government, the states only responsibility is to protect those rights.

Both Mr Brown and Mr Cameron are suggesting a new Bill of Rights for Britain, the problem with this is that should Mr Brown undertake to create such a bill of rights what is then to stop any later administration throwing those rights out of the window and installing something more to their liking.

But for the moment let us only look at the EU Charta of Fundamental Rights this clearly falls into the category of the state granting rights, and then also demanding a duty from the citizen in return for those rights. And far from the Charta protecting the citizen from any EU powers it actually allows the EU to limit those rights in the interest of the EU. To be clear about this the EU Charta of Fundamental Rights gives the EU the power to limit all of the rights the Charta grants, this includes the right to life, the right to marry, Prohibition of torture, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, Prohibition of slavery or forced labour

(including human trafficking) Right to liberty and security of person, Right to respect for family life, home and communications, Right to have, change and manifest freedom of thought, conscience and religion, including the right to conscientious

objection, in accordance with national laws, Right to freedom of expression (including freedom of the media) and so on.

Now I do not know about the reader but I really do not wish to be placed in the position where my basic rights are subject to the vagaries of the state to such an extent that the state reserves the power to remove my right to life itself.

Of course the “it will never happen brigade” will argue that “it will never happen” if that is the case then why allow the EU the power in the first place. If the EU requires the power to remove a fundamental right of its citizens then I would argue that it will at some point to some degree happen, and by allowing the EU that power makes a mockery of the concept of fundamental rights in any case, they are fundamental only so long as the EU allows.

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Basic Rights, British Constitution, EU Constitution, EU Fundimental Rights, EU Law, The EU
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