Human Rights Legislation

Part of 2. Questions to the Counsel General and Minister for the Constitution – in the Senedd at 3:11 pm on 12 January 2022.

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Photo of Mick Antoniw Mick Antoniw Labour 3:11, 12 January 2022

Thank you for that detailed supplementary question. The Human Rights Act review, with a view to creating a new bill of rights, is something that has to be taken very, very seriously indeed. In fact, the Member will be aware that a joint statement has been issued by myself and the Minister for Social Justice specifically on this because of our concerns about the report and the way it is framed. Can I say that it really does the UK Government no credit when the Lord Chancellor, in referring to this review, says that the purpose of it is to counter 'wokery and political correctness', whatever that means?

Human rights are a fundamental part of the Government of Wales legislation, of the devolution legislation, and, of course, all the legislation we apply has to be compliant with that, and I'm fully supportive of that. I have real concerns about the review; they are expressed within the statement. I have real concerns, for example, about the reference to rights inflation. One of the purposes is to, basically, deal with the fact that we apparently have had a growth of rights and we therefore have too many rights and therefore some of our rights have to be restricted. I have real concerns about the—. Although, in the foreword to the report, it addresses the issue of devolution, but, quite frankly, it doesn't then deal with the issue of devolution at all, other than in respect of Northern Ireland. And I also have concerns about the limitation that's been placed within the review, which basically says that it will not look at expanding the issue of social and economic rights. Well, if you're going to have a review of human rights, how can you ignore the issue of the suitability of economic and social rights protection of the people?

So, I have real concern about the pejorative way in which the report has been phrased, the lack of evidence to base some of the assumptions or leading points that are made within it. But what I can assure Members of is that this is a matter of very significant concern across all Parliaments, and we will address that very seriously and put in a very wholesome and I think substantive report on all the interests that we have as a Welsh Parliament in respect of the areas under consideration by the review, but also, I think, the areas that we believe should be added to it that, clearly, the UK Government does not intend to review at the moment, which I think is a great lost opportunity.