My Question about strengthening UK Courts that should not be answerable to Foreign courts

Rt Hon Sir John Redwood MP (Wokingham) (Con): This Parliament is the main guarantor of our rights and liberties; it created them in battles over many centuries for the benefit of us all. Would not this great role be strengthened if our Supreme Court were indeed supreme and not answerable to foreign courts that do not understand the mood of the British people and what they expect of their legislators?

Dominic Raab, Deputy Prime Minister, The Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice: My right hon. Friend is absolutely correct. I know that when he gets a chance to peruse the proposals, he will find those principles and that spirit reflected in the Bill of Rights, and I look forward to discussing these matters with him further.

 

 

51 Comments

  1. Bryan Harris
    June 24, 2022

    The big question following on from that is, if our host has had a chance to peruse the proposals, what is the conclusion — Are we really going to be truly independent as a nation, or not?

    Is this bill just another excuse to clamp down further on our rights, to remove freedoms we fought hard for as a nation?

    Such an analysis would be most welcome.

  2. Hope
    June 24, 2022

    JR,
    You should have all walked out with Raab’s total capitulation. Another wasted opportunity where weak legislation scam is meant to fool the public that action was taken when it is not worth the paper written on.

    No ECHR, No ECJ, no level playing fields, no regulatory orbit, no checks on goods across UK or border down Irish Sea, complete control of fishing grounds for 200 miles exclusion zone, no money to EU, all of this was expected. None delivered.

    Raab could not be bothered to return from holiday when UK military running away from Afghanistan, people asking to be saved, preferred dogs to people, same for his top civil servant, why are both not sacked? Johnson now pretending to be tough in Ukraine on US behalf. This is before the shameful Harry Dunne episode or Assange.

    1. Peter
      June 24, 2022

      Raab was hopeless on Radio 4 ‘Today’ programme. Admittedly he stepped in at short notice to replace the Conservative Party chairman who resigned earlier.

      Raab just mouthed the usual platitudes and went through pre-planned damage limitation comments to address the by-election defeats. Nick Robinson’s last remark was a reminder that Raab’s own seat could go if they carry on with ‘business as usual’.

      1. Lifelogic
        June 24, 2022

        Why was the ex-Party Chairman an EU Remainer and a Lawyer and so totally out of touch with voters.

        1. Mark B
          June 25, 2022

          You’ve answered your own question there mate.

    2. Mitchel
      June 24, 2022

      Given the news this morning,can we expect another “Chicken Kiev”-supersize-from Boris?

    3. Peter Parsons
      June 24, 2022

      The UK can’t exit the ECHR without breaking other agreements that the UK is signed up to.

      1. a-tracy
        June 24, 2022

        Peter, seriously we were told for years we couldn’t stop x y or z because of the EU and all the EU promoters on here kept telling us yes we could change it, yes we are sovereign, the problems with EU control were over-exaggerated, we could have changed this that or the other.

        Now you’re telling us we can’t stop because of the ECHR!

      2. John O'Leary
        June 24, 2022

        Yes we would probably have to exit the Council of Europe as well. Is that a problem?

        1. Peter Parsons
          June 25, 2022

          That depends on whether you want the UK to pull the plug on the Good Friday Agreement.

      3. getahead
        June 24, 2022

        It’s not your word that counts – it’s who you give it to.

      4. Lifelogic
        June 24, 2022

        Without amending these agreements as they surely should be.

      5. Mark B
        June 24, 2022

        Correct ! Sadly.

    4. Billy Elliot
      June 24, 2022

      “No ECHR, No ECJ, no level playing fields, no regulatory orbit, no checks on goods across UK or border down Irish Sea, complete control of fishing grounds for 200 miles exclusion zone, no money to EU, all of this was expected. None delivered”

      Ever considered that those promises were just unicorns? Con all together.

      1. glen cullen
        June 24, 2022

        We’ve been misled from 2016 when the political class believed that they knew better than the people

    5. DavidJ
      June 24, 2022

      Indeed Hope.

  3. Lifelogic
    June 24, 2022

    Let us hope so but far better just to leave and let UK judges make the decisions.

    It is almost always better to make decisions as close to the coal face as possible where the judges understand the languages, local feelings, culture and similar. This rather than Judges at a vast distance and without any of this knowledge. Judges are so often totally out of touch with reality anyway – as we saw with Spider Women. Bright and pleasant enough but totally deluded and out of tough so much so that she did not even consider the effect of her wearing the spider brooch – she claims! Talk about out of touch.

    Making decision close to the coal face works so much better than top down Socialism. Alas we have the Socialist, green crap Boris and Sunak government. Boris just now “we will cut taxes where we can” you have put taxes up massively and are still doing so Boris. Gove has said no tax cuts for two years (when we have the election). Furthermore Boris/Sunak after your blatant manifesto ratting we can not trust a word of you next one! Vast tax increases and endless waste everywhere you look with over regulation and the net zero expensive energy lunacy on top of this!

  4. Lifelogic
    June 24, 2022

    The Telegraph today:- PM to urge Prince to keep open mind on Rwanda policy
    Boris Johnson promises to defend asylum scheme after Charles called plan for deportations ‘appalling’

    And keep his gob shut to please on this and his grossly misguided and deluded climate hypocrisy too.

    1. Lifelogic
      June 24, 2022

      Also in the Telegraph – Drive for green fuel to be relaxed
      PM’s push to cut land used for biofuel could affect net zero petrol pledge, say experts

      Good yes Boris ignore you deluded dope of a Theatre Studies wife and listen to some proper climate realist scientist and energy engineers for a change! Cheap reliable on demand energy please get fracking, stop blowing up coal power stations and scrap net zero and renewable subsidies and market rigging now.

      1. Mark B
        June 25, 2022

        LL

        Have you learned nothing ? What they say does not translate into what they do.

    2. DavidJ
      June 24, 2022

      + many LL

  5. Shirley M
    June 24, 2022

    Thank you. We now know that two MP’s think our courts should be supreme. Such a shame that so many politicians would allow foreign courts and organisations to rule over us. Indeed, it appears the majority of politicians are eager for just that scenario with the EU, and are/were prepared to destroy democracy in their efforts to destroy Brexit.

  6. Everhopeful
    June 24, 2022

    Much as I loathe the present hostage status of this country I am very fearful of the proposed “Bill of Rights” ( I mean 
”We Don’t Believe You” on steroids).
    I have read that the Bill is very much leaning towards “the good of the community” rather than the rights of the individual.
    Thus one could easily be coerced into being jabbed.
    Especially taking into consideration the implications of our dear govt’s new “collaboration” with Novartis!

  7. ukretired123
    June 24, 2022

    Boris still thinks he can walk on water.
    Normal sensible people see his bluster while seriously experiencing making ends meet.
    Conservatives are confused and now have to suffer after indecision delivering Brexit independence and not BRINO.
    Boris has ended up confusing himself making things complex kicking the can down the road like May/Maybe-not.
    Time to bite the bullet before you forget what a Conservative used to be:-
    Taking the best of British forward whilst conserving the best of the old or words to that effect.
    No one knows what the conservatives stand for today especially when Boris can’t define it and goes AWOL abroad yet again to avoid the music and the boos.

    1. ukretired123
      June 24, 2022

      BRINO is not Brexit!

      1. Billy Elliot
        June 24, 2022

        Indeed. And BREXIT you were promised will never happen. World is just too complex.
        Many things were promised few promises will be kept.
        Talk is cheap.
        However passports are blue (could have been without BREXIT may I add) and you won.
        Just get over with it.

        1. a-tracy
          June 24, 2022

          Billy, this is why your side lost because you just don’t listen, no-one I know that wanted Brexit wanted a passport colour change.

          They wanted their jobs back in the UK, their pay to increase, to stop being landed with big bills for tax on other people’s illegal activities like prostitution and drugs, they wanted to stop the 80% VAT going to the EU from the Rest of the World imports into the UK as well as reducing our obligations to pay out so much tax credits to people not even in the UK, when Cameron tried for a small adjustment to that the answer was NO, NON until the Germans started to want some restrictions. They wanted extra investment in the NHS, but the NHS got it and just wastes it on PC employees on ÂŁ40k + who don’t do one bit of caring and nursing, and now gives us less for much more. I could go on if you want me to.

          1. Billy Elliot
            June 25, 2022

            So A-Tracy.
            Are all the promises now fullfilled? NHS getting more money? Jobs back overhere (btw there are many jobs but no one is willing to do them)?

            Things are hunky dory now?

          2. a-tracy
            June 25, 2022

            Billy, no a lot of the promises Boris made are not fulfilled, we are still paying the divorce bill and have been doing for the past six years for little gain , not even a level playing field at all and no retribution! The government not ready to apply the same rules to the EU disadvantaging our exporters – fuming about that.

            I absolutely feel that Boris and his team did a rubbish job on the withdrawal agreement and gave too much for too little, JR warned him, he was told there were sections to deal with the issues with more time (Boris failed). I concede he become totally wrapped up in covid and his own new wife, baby and her priorities it seems. Priti is pretty useless but what an awful job she has when her own party fights her every month and her department is against her from the start, if I were her I’d buy two of those cruise boats going to the knackers yard right now and offshore them and take all the asylum seekers for processing on to those. Boris needs urgently to bring in serious experienced leavers like Redwood, Lilley, Duncan-Smith.

            Sunak has all this extra money from EU VAT, the taxes and fines not going to the Eu for prostitution and drugs, all the extra money he got from inheritance tax and reductions in the cost of care for all those that sadly died sooner than expected in care homes, extra fees from all the fast-tracked passports, the membership fees to the EU are going down now and what does he do – put taxes up and kill the economy off at the roots?! Then he doubles back on many of his decisions but 3 months later after bi-elections and local elections almost as though the conservatives want to lose their advantages so we end up frozen in indecision.

        2. ukretired123
          June 24, 2022

          No problem for me but problems ahead for many others less fortunate than me especially when democracy is delayed as you would wish just like the BBC, Civil service, Church etc.

  8. Mark B
    June 24, 2022

    Good afternoon – again.

    We shall see but I very much doubt it.

  9. DavidJ
    June 24, 2022

    Prince Charles should keep his nose out of politics; he might also consider taking the side of “his” people in all other matters.

    1. a-tracy
      June 24, 2022

      David, how Prince Charles has the bare-faced nerve to go to Rwanda after his speech about that Country’s human rights being appalling still.

    2. ukretired123
      June 24, 2022

      To get a UK passport you have to swear allegiance to the Queen who gets respect by keeping out of politics.
      Different and most difficult challenge to swear allegiance to Charles or William even if they airbrush Andrew and Harry away.
      Mission impossible.

    3. Hope
      June 24, 2022

      Charles ought to take the same action as his great Uncle. He is not wanted or required. He has proven to be not up to the job, head of church- what a joke- alone should make him stand aside. What role models does he consider he and his current wife are to society? Does he and his current wife recall their behaviour towards his first wife? Engaging in politics of a left wing eco loon while his actions are in stark contrast to the little people he lectures? No. If he wants to save the monarchy, he should stand aside for his son.

  10. The Prangwizard
    June 24, 2022

    Who needs our own laws when traitorous cowardly decisions are made by government Ministers and Prime Ministers.

    Today I read that a vitally important defence company Ultra Electronics is to be sold to Americans as a result of threats. They, and other countries, own almost all of our major and medium businesses and fixed assets because Tories along with others have sold so much of our nation.

    Thus Tories have in effect willingly given up control of our country and we have no means of standing up to threats. We are also desperate for foreign money through failure to manage and balance our trade.

    Just how much more treachery will our MPs, particularly the Tories and party go along with, a few statements expressing disappointment but staying loyal to the party just adds to our destruction and humiliation.

    We must end the party and attitudes along with their elitist and City spiv friends who help to sell everything, and those with them who are destroying the country with dangerous authoritarian theories.

    1. Shirley M
      June 25, 2022

      +many PW.
      Along with the fact that patriotism has been deliberately driven out of the English population and having imported thousands (possibly millions) of ‘unknowns’, many supposedly fleeing from war I suspect the patriots are so few in number that even they would refuse to defend our country. This country is no Ukraine, and would be a walkover for any despot brave enough to invade. Why would the few patriots sacrifice themselves to save the country for those who refuse to help?

      1. Original Richard
        June 25, 2022

        Shirley M :

        Yes, I have been wondering if 200 young Russians of fighting age with no ID landed on our beaches each day our civil service led government would be putting them up in 4 star hotels, giving them ÂŁ40/week pocket money and the freedom to roam our streets.

  11. Bloke
    June 24, 2022

    RESPONSIBILITIES are probably more important. People in authority should perform theirs fully and act with probity. Citizens would then be free to do whatever is lawful. Often shady operators claim their ‘RIGHTS’ attempting leverage when trying to get away with wrongdoing.

    The House of Lords was once the supreme authority in our land. Now the so-called Supreme Court misrepresents itself with a misleading title. Where has the genius in this great world-leading nation of brainpower gone? A body which can’t decide for itself is out of control, like a headless chicken.

    Why would we need to export our choice over what is right to a bunch of inhabitants from foreign lands meeting in dark cloaks? Choosing Trial by Ordeal or Combat would be almost as daft.

  12. acorn
    June 24, 2022

    “This Parliament is the main guarantor of our rights and liberties”. Reading the majority of comments on this site, you would think that the UK is well underway to becoming a dominant party authoritarian dictatorship!

    If the current Boris executive decided that the next general election would be in ten years time; to safeguard your “rights and liberties” in this volatile Europe you understand. Who you gonna call? Ghostbusters!

    1. Peter2
      June 25, 2022

      Ridiculous fantasy from acorn.

  13. X-Tory
    June 24, 2022

    Don’t you understand that the Bill of Rights (BoR) is a complete nonsense – a FRAUD perpetrated by the government on its own supporters (and backbenchers!). The point is this: if Britain stays in the Convention – as Boris and Raab say they intend to do – then we have to stay in the Strasbourg Court. And if we stay in the Strasbourg Court then anyone who loses their court case in the UK (thanks to more stringent BoR rules) can then appeal to the Strasbourg Court. And changing the rules in the BoR will NOT change the ECHR rules – so the UK will LOSE in Strasbourg, and the government will then have to change its policies to abide by those Strasbourg decisions, just as it does now. So the BoR will make NO DIFFERENCE. Can’t you see that?

    The ONLY solution is LEAVING THE ECHR. But Boris the Traitor is too cowardly to do this, because he will then have to make some small (but controversial) consequential ‘tidying-up’ unilateral amendments to the Belfast Agreement and the UK-EU TCA, and the pathetic little coward doesn’t want the criticism that would come from the marxist scumbags if he did that.

  14. glen cullen
    June 24, 2022

    The whole of the Tory parliamentary party needs to go on an away-day to reach consensus on what ‘conservative party’ is for and its direction of travel
.as its starting to become more like ‘new-labour’ with policies everywhere and nowhere forgetting the people of the UK

  15. Pauline Baxter
    June 24, 2022

    Sir John. You worded your question very well.
    It may well go beyond the matter of ECHR interventions.
    I believe there was interference in our Supreme Court, during Blair’s Labour government. Perhaps that also needs looking into.

    As to the answer you received, well, I hope Raab has done a good job.
    Take him up on his offer to discuss it with him further!

  16. Bill brown
    June 24, 2022

    Sir JR

    The European court of Human rights has actually played an important and good role over many years across Europe and Russia, so I am not sure that the solution is as simple as you make it out to be

    1. a-tracy
      June 25, 2022

      Really Bill, when Russia wanted to take out Ukraines territory by force they just resigned from the ECHR and walked away so they could continue.

  17. lewis
    June 24, 2022

    Yes we should leave the ECHR as soon as possible.

  18. Original Richard
    June 25, 2022

    The fact that the Russian judge, Mikhail Lobov, remains a sitting judge on ECHR, despite Russia being expelled in March from the ECHR should be sufficient reason for the UK to leave this organisation.

    1. hefner
      June 25, 2022

      The actual expulsion of Russia by the Council of Ministers happened on 16/03/2023, but Russia will cease to be a High Contracting Party to the ECHR only six months later so on 16/09/2022.
      (coe.int , 23/03/2022)

  19. hefner
    June 25, 2022

    Gee 
 16/03/2022

  20. anon
    June 25, 2022

    Why not answer and just state the obvious that UK Supreme Court will be supreme , as invited?

    Perhaps, they have figured they don’t need the electorate anymore.

Comments are closed.