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Hands off our rights, Cameron
Paul Donovan: The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has played a vital role in safeguarding citizen's freedoms. The British Prime Minister recently took to berating the Council of Europe about the European Court of Human Rights.The Premier was looking for restrictions on the right to take cases to the ECHR in Strasbourg.
Cameron takes his brief on human rights from the rabid tabloid press which has whipped up a frenzy around the concept of human rights, as if upholding them is in some way aiding criminals.
A typical example came from the Metro newspaper which reported: "Those convicted of terrorism, rape, murder or found guilty of illegal immigration get a stay of execution in the country that found them guilty while they await the European hearing."
A focus of the most recent hysteria has been the case of Jordanian man Abu Qatada who, it was ruled, could not be deported because he would likely face a trial where evidence obtained using torture could be used.
Qatada has variously been described as being part of al-Qaida and Osama Bin Laden's "right hand man in Europe.
Where these descriptions came from can only be speculated about, but there is enough enough to suggest a less than fair trial may be available to Qatada - not only in Jordan but also in Britain.
Not that he, it would seem, is ever likely to come before a properly constituted court of law in Britain.
Qatada is one of a number of men who have been held under immigration law overseen by the Special Immigration Appeals Commission for the best part of the past 10 years.
The existence of the European Convention on Human Rights has not stopped this detention taking place, but it has resulted in modifications.
This happened most notably in 2004 when, three years after detention without trial was established, the law lords ruled it unlawful under the convention.
This then resulted in the control order regime being established.
The Human Rights Act brought in by the Labour government simply amounted to the downloading of the ECHR into domestic law, thereby avoiding so many cases as in the past having to take the long and winding road to the court in Strasbourg.
There was though still the ultimate appeal in the final instance to the ECHR.
It is difficult to see how Cameron's proposal that the most trivial cases should not go forward could work.
Who makes the judgement on triviality? A politician taking his or her brief from the British tabloid press?
Remember the cases during the Troubles, such as the ECHR ruling in 1978 against the British government on the use of the five interrogation techniques by the army. These the court ruled amounted to "inhuman and degrading treatment" and a breach of the convention.
Then there was the ECHR ruling in 1995 of unlawful killing in the case of the three IRA volunteers shot dead in Gibraltar in 1988.
The legacy of the great fight to get human rights upheld in the north resulted in the Human Rights Commission and Bill of Rights being included as part of the Good Friday Agreement.
In Britain, there have been ECHR decisions stopping the police retaining the DNA of innocent people indefinitely and restrictions on stop and search powers. How can this be bad?
Human rights have been hard won over the years. The ECHR was established after the second world war with the British ironically playing a crucial founding role in that process. The reason there is a backlog at the ECHR is mainly because of the number of new countries coming under its auspices. It is having a civilising effect.
Having fought long and hard to obtain human rights now is not the time to go throwing them away, especially not at the behest of one of the most right-wing British governments in recent times.
The vista of justice denied being whipped up around cases like that of Abu Qatada and the right of prisoners to have a vote needs to be seen off. It is just cheap populist political pointscoring.
Human rights are inalienable to each individual, not something to be given or taken away at the behest of some populist politician. This is something not universally understood by politicians or many citizens. This allows the unscrupulous politician to reconfigure the whole idea of rights as in some way amounting to privileges to be bartered in populist fashion.
There should be no change in the Human Rights Act or the European Convention on Human Rights. If anything the convention needs strengthening with the judiciary given stronger rights of enforcement, certainly not watering down to suit opportunist right-wing politicians.