Stuart Weir (Cambridge, Democratic Audit): The Joint Committee on Human Rights, a select committee made up of MPs and peers, has been an influential though largely unseen actor in the dramas of government counter terrorism laws, whilst also commenting on other human rights issues which emerge from legislative proposals and the UK's obligations under international human rights instruments. In its first ever annual report, the committee accuses the government of failing to use the Human Rights Act to improve the delivery of public services - a task that the British Institute of Human Rights has taken on - and of allowing a catalogue of myths to build up around the Act's true purpose and use. Committee members are angry that the government has shelved a campaign, launched by the former Department for Constitutional Affairs, to tackle "far-fetched stories" about the Act.
They also demand that ministers should stop misleading the public by blaming the Human Rights Act for judicial or other decisions with which they disagree or which embarrass them. The committee accuses the government of "following the media" in saying that the HRA was responsible for the tragic death of Naomi Bryant, the woman murdered by a released sex attacker, because it had required her killer to be released. The committee's research shows that there was no evidence that she was killed as a result of officials misinterpreting the Act - but despite this clear finding, both the government and the media have continued to repeat the unfounded assertion that the Human Rights Act caused her death. Other popular myths have also been allowed to flourish, such as the Human Rights Act being responsible for the provision of a takeaway meal to a prisoner making a rooftop protest, or the giving of pornography to a serial killer in prison.
The HRA is frequently derided in the tabloid press as a "charter for terrorists, criminals, and migrants" and not enough has been done to promote and enforce the human rights of, for example, adults with learning disabilities, older people in care settings, or the victims of human trafficking: areas that the committee has looked at in the last year. The committee says a good start towards using the HRA properly to ensure that universal rights are upheld and improve services would be to implement fully its recommendations on the human rights of older people in health-care.
