The UK government has announced law reform to remove numerous DNA profiles from their DNA database. Under the Protection of Freedoms Bill, police would no longer be able to retain DNA profiles of most people arrested but not convicted. The period for which DNA data of people arrested can be retained would depend upon the offence. This follows a decision by the ECtHR, Marper, which found the "blanket and indiscriminate" data retention under English law to interfere disproportionately with Article 8 ECHR.
Please click here to view the BBC News article.
Please click here to view the Protection of Freedoms Bill.
Meanwhile the UK government has announced law reform proposals for operation of the sex offenders' register. Currently, people sentenced to over 30 months for a sex-related crime are required to register with the police for life. This means that they must notify the policy whenever they move house or travel abroad. The government is proposing that those on the register will have a right of review, which would be triggered 15 years after leaving prison, with the police making the final decision.
These proposals follow a UK Supreme Court decision in April 2010 in the case of R (on the application of F (by his litigation friend F)) and Thompson (FC) (Respondents) v Secretary of State for the Home Department (Appellant).
There the UK Supreme Court upheld a declaration of incompatibility in relation to the notification requirements under the register. They found that absence of an individual review mechanism, whereby a person might demonstrate that they no longer posed a risk of reoffending, resulted in a disproportionate interference under Article 8 of the ECHR (the right to private and family life). The Court added that it would be open to the legislature to impose a high threshold for individual review. Please click here to view a previous Bulletin on this.
Please click here to view the BBC News article.
Finally, the UK parliament has voted overwhelmingly by 234 votes to 22 to maintain the ban on prisoners' right to vote. The vote comes despite a recent ruling by the ECtHR in Greens and M.T. v. the United Kingdom, which gave the UK authorities a 6 month deadline to introduce legislative proposals compliant with the ECHR. The ECtHR had previously found the blanket ban on prisoners' right to vote in violation of the ECHR in Hirst v. UK (No.2).
The Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission has called on the UK government to introduce law reform in line with the ECHR, commenting "rehabilitating and reintegrating offenders into society is an important objective of the prison system and engagement therefore with civic responsibilities including participation in the democratic process makes sense". Please click here to view the NIHRC press release.
Please click here to view a previous Bulletin on this.
These law reform proposals have been prompted by test cases brought under the ECHR. However, UK Prime Minister David Cameron has announced that a new commission is to consider a "British Bill of Rights", which would exist independently of the rights enshrined in the ECHR. Meanwhile the President of the ECtHR, Justice Jean-Paul Costa, has advised the UK authorities that it would be a "disaster" for Britain to denounce the Court's ruling on prisoner voting rights or to withdraw from the Council of Europe.
Talk of a "British Bill of Rights" brings to mind Lord Bingham's words on the Human Rights Act: 'Which of these rights, I ask, would we wish to discard? Are any of them trivial, superfluous, unnecessary? Are any of them un-British? There may be those who would like to live in a country where these rights are not protected but I am not of their number'.
To read about UK human rights group Liberty's campaign to promote the rights and values protected by the Human Rights Act, please click here.