Read, here, today’s fascinating and important ruling by the Scottish
Registration Appeals Court, which, on a generous reading of the law thinks it really is the Court of Session, on the compatibility of the Scottish elections with the Convention rights under the Human Rights Act 1998.

There’s nothing legally new in the http://www.gooakley.com/ judgment: it’s much bigger political news that it is legal news. The ruling follows logically from the Hirst ruling in Strasbourg, in which the ECtHR decided the UK breached the Convention right to free elections by imposing a blanket ban on voting by all prisoners. The UK Government hasn’t yet sorted out what new policy to lay down for prisoners (banning lifers from voting might be okay, for instance). Perhaps the Home Secretary wants to discuss the solution with judges (see my earlier post about Charles Clarke) so the Scottish elections will clearly be in breach. This judgment merely clarifies that.

A key point is that the elections will not be unlawful – at least, not under the Human Rights Act – and no one is under any legal obligation to correct the incompatibility. To think they are unlawful is an error that the press repeatedly fell into over the Belmarsh prisoners case. The Government need not Ray Ban outlet act on a declaration of incompatibility, and this may be the first time it refuses to do so.

I say not unlawful at least under the Human Rights Act because I’m not sure what the position of the Scottish Executive and Parliament will be – they have no power, under the Scotland Act 1998, to act incompatibly with Convention rights, so if either technically has a role in conducting the elections – I doubt they do, but I haven’t checked the legislation – there might be difficulty in going ahead with the elections.

2017-03-18T03:38:51+00:00Tags: |