Dominic Raab has vowed to escape the “straitjacket” of European law, claiming that 70 percent of deportations from the UK are still blocked by Strasbourg.
Speaking to the Justice Select Committee, Mr Raab said: “I don’t think it’s right that we have effectively straitjacket legislation coming in through the back door via a court.”
He said that if the UK continues to “gold plate” the approach taken by the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg, Britain will be “unable to deport serious foreign national offenders”.
The Justice Secretary criticised the application of the Human Rights Act, saying: “The obvious one is the deportation of foreign national offenders.
“I think the use of Article 8, for example, the right to family, by foreign national offenders to frustrate deportation orders is wrong.
“If we gold plate the approach that Strasbourg takes we are going to be unable to deport serious foreign national offender.
“Some 70 percent of successful human rights appeals against deportation are still Article 8.”
The Justice Secretary is currently preparing a UK Bill of Rights, which he said would “curb abuses of the system and inject a bit more common sense into human rights law.”
He said the legislation would “make crystal clear that the UK Supreme Court is not subordinate to the European Court of Human Rights”.
While the Government said Britain would not abandon the European Convention on Human Rights, the bill would see the UK Supreme Court in London become the ultimate arbiter on human rights over Strasbourg.
He told MPs that the bill is intended to curb “elastic interpretations” of human rights that have developed through court rulings.
Speaking to the Justice Select Committee this afternoon, Mr Raab signalled opposition to withdrawing from the European Convention on human rights, saying he could see “immediate downsides”.
The above summary was derived from the story linked below
Source: Raab vows to escape ‘straitjacket’ of European law as 70% of deportations still blocked
