Amnesty International UK criticised the House of Lords on Wednesday for their failure to strike down clauses in a vote earlier in the week, which strip away human rights protections for prisoners. They have warned of a “sinister trend” of human rights being “switched off, ” with prisoners being the latest group to be targeted.
The Victims and Prisoners Bill, first introduced in March 2023, seeks to address and improve support for victims of crime, including the appointment of specialist advocates, as well as reforms of the parole system, placing restrictions on the early release of dangerous offenders. It also introduces clauses preventing inmates with life sentences from marrying or forming civil partnerships.
Amnesty had released a briefing on the Bill before the second reading in the House of Commons, asking for amendments to Parts 1 and 2 of the Bill and the complete removal of Part 3. Part 3 proposes, among other measures, to disapply Section 3 of the Human Rights Act (HRA), which requires all public authorities to interpret and apply laws in line with the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), from certain prisoners. Amnesty, and other organisations, including Liberty and Justice, warned that these proposals raised “very serious practical concerns as well as fundamental points of principle about the UK’s respect for human rights and the proper functioning of the country’s human rights protection system.”
Amnesty criticised the House of Lords for not rejecting such clauses within the Bill during the debate on Tuesday, which remove protections under the HRA. In the statement, Sacha Deshmukh, Amnesty International UK’s Chief Executive, said:
Human rights protections are designed to be universal, not given by politicians to groups they favour and taken away from groups they don’t like…It was deeply disappointing to see the Labour leadership abstain from the vote on these dangerous clauses in the Bill yesterday. We strongly urge all parties to make a vocal commitment to repealing all human rights carve outs should they be in Government after the next election.
