Meeting Supports Co-ordinated Campaign on HRA
The HRCS held a very successful meeting on Monday 1st June and members agreed that a co-ordinated campaign to defend and promote the Human Rights Act (HRA) is needed. Also, it is important to counter the orchestrated negative publicity and generate a better understanding that human rights should be equally enjoyed. See the press release that was subsequently issued. Human Rights Mtg PR 1 June
The meeting also noted that the Scottish Parliament and Scottish Government agreed, way back in November 2014, its support for both the European Convention on Human Rights and the HRA.
“ the Parliament re-affirms and re-asserts, on behalf of all of the people of the community of Scotland, the inalienable human rights and fundamental freedoms that are the common inheritance of all members of humanity; recalls the particular importance to the Parliament, through its founding statute, its founding principles and in all aspects of its day-to-day work, of human rights in general and of the European Convention on Human Rights in particular; acknowledges the constitutional responsibility of the Parliament to uphold the principles and values expressed in the convention and to respect, protect and realise the rights and freedoms that it enumerates; further acknowledges the importance of that work not only in relation to Scotland, but also in establishing and maintaining standards of best practice, which provide a benchmark for human rights elsewhere in the world; expresses its confidence in, and support for, the Human Rights Act 1998 as a successful and effective implementation of the convention in domestic law, and believes that the principles and values that inform the convention, the rights and freedoms that it enumerates and the Acts that incorporate it into law, should be a source of unity and consensus across the whole of society and should enjoy the unequivocal backing of all who are committed to upholding human rights, democracy and the rule of law.”
The Scottish Parliament voted in favour of this Scottish Government motion on 11th November 2014 by 100 votes to 10.