The Impact of the Human Rights Act on the House of Lords

Being 'realistic' about human rights

“…36 While the success rate of applications to the House of Lords for leave to appeal in human rights cases is high, only one in three results in a victory on the merits for the original applicant. 37 The Human Rights Act is, however, referred to in about a third of House of Lords cases although only substantially affects the results in about one-tenth. 38 Another type of misconception stems from often outrageous challenges to administrative decisions, ostensibly on human rights grounds, which ultimately fail precisely because they are outrageous.…”

Europe’s Gift to the United Kingdom’s Unwritten Constitution – Juridification

“…161 Statistical surveys reveal that leave to appeal has been more readily granted by the House of Lords on human rights challenges, although these challenges were statistically less likely to succeed than other challenges. 162 Most UK judicial review challenges do now raise human rights issues. There remains concern that the CJEU prioritises commercial interests and the free movement provisions over fundamental human rights.…”

Human rights as risk: UK prisons and the management of risk and rights

“…In Westminster-centred politics (the positions in Scotland and Northern Ireland being legally and politically very different), the Conservative Party -before it formed a coalition government with the Liberal Democrats in May 2010 -advocated repeal of the Human Rights Act (Norman and Oborne, 2009). The Law Lords, now recast as the new UK Supreme Court, have shown some ambivalence towards rights claims based on the Human Rights Act, as distinct from rights claims on other statutory and common law grounds (Hoffmann, 2009;Shah and Poole, 2009). The public sector response to the Human Rights Act has also been mixed.…”