Former Supreme Court judge Lord Sumption has said the Government’s plans to change how human rights legislation is applied in migration court cases will be “limited” due to the European Court of Human Rights.
He told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “It will certainly have some effect, though I suspect not a very great effect.
“The idea, as I understand it, is to direct UK judges as to how they are to interpret the European Convention.
“Now, if we pass an act in the UK that tells judges to interpret the Convention in a particular way and the Strasbourg court says it should be interpreted in a different way, then the Strasbourg court will hold us to have violated the Convention, we will then have a direct conflict between our international obligations under the Convention and our domestic legislation.
“This doesn’t mean that the idea is impractical, far from it. What it means is that if the Government wants to stay in the Convention system – and it does – then it has only very limited freedom of action, it has to draft its legislation in a way that will be acceptable to the Strasbourg court.
“That’s quite difficult to do, because the Strasbourg court is an unpredictable court which tends to make up the legal principles as it goes along.”
He added: “All I’m saying is that it’s actually a difficult and delicate business to try and work out what Strasbourg court will accept and what it won’t.”
