Harlequin wrote:
With my limited legal knowledge it seems to me that with respect to the introduction to ID cards and more particularly the NIR, there would be sufficient prima facie evidence for bringing a claim before the ECrHR in strasbourg for violations of UK citizens' Article 5 (the right to liberty) and Article 8 (the right to respect for privacy and one's family life) rights.
Can anyone tell me if (a) I'm right and (b) if I am right, whether there are any legal organisations (e.g. Liberty) and/or barristers preparing such a case?
You're wrong, I'm afraid.
There are at least three problems with this.
1. You can't use the ECHR until you have exhausted domestic remedies.
2. You can't make a claim in abstract: you need to show how a public authority is actually violating your human rights. The evidence you need - some facts showing such violation- is entirely lacking.
3. The rights concerned are not obviously violated at all.
Art.5 is about arrest and imprisonment: the reference to "liberty" is not some general principle of liberty, but physical freedom. It is irrelevant, I suggest, to the issue.
Art.8 is often refered to as providing a right of privacy. It doesn't. Not exactly. Nor are the rights it affords unqualified. It provides a right of
respect for private and family
life, and is subject to the usual exceptions as may be "in accordance with the law and is necessary in a democratic society in the interests of national security, public safety or the economic well-being of the country, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals, or for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others." Youl'll note that some of the grounds of exception are echoed in the statutory purposes of the ID scheme.
There is one further problem. The Home Office is happy to ignore the Strasbourg Court when it suits it to do so and certainly to the extent that the opinions are not highly specific and applicable.
