'Fatally flawed': The human rights commission that cost £700k and took 19 months... but didn't even discuss controversial rulings by Euro judges

A panel set up to examine human rights law in Britain was branded ‘fatally flawed’ last night – after it failed to discuss controversial rulings by Strasbourg judges.

The Commission on a Bill of Rights cost £700,000 and took 19 months, but did not look at whether Britain should pull out of the discredited European Court of Human Rights.

The commission, filled with lawyers proposed by David Cameron and Nick Clegg, could not even reach a unanimous conclusion on the central question of whether there should be a new British Bill of Rights. Two Lib Dem appointed members – Labour peer Helena Kennedy QC and Lib Dem adviser Philippe Sands QC – opposed such a bill, saying there was nothing wrong with the Human Rights Act.

In a damning paper appended to the main report, two Tory panel members, Lord Faulks QC and Jonathan Fisher QC, criticised the Commission’s narrow scope, saying it had been prevented from discussing ‘critically important matters’.

They said it had been wrong to prevent the Commission considering either withdrawing from the European Court of Human Rights or ditching the convention on which it bases its decisions.

Critics of the court say judicial activism – judges making up the law instead of interpreting it – has resulted in the court ruling on areas such as prisoner votes and equality law that should be matters for Parliament or national courts.

(2012-12-19/dailymail)