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Lord Lilley (Con)

Speaking in the House of Lords on 7 January 2025

Debate

European Convention on Human Rights: 75th Anniversary

Contribution

My Lords, does the Minister agree that the anniversary would be a good opportunity to dispel the myths just promoted by the noble Lord, Lord Browne, that this was a purely British or Conservative invention, and to recall that the Attlee Government reluctantly agreed to sign the ECHR only on the basis that the court would not have jurisdiction in the UK as British citizens would not be allowed to take cases to it? It was a policy continued a few months later by Winston Churchill, when he came into power. Both were presciently advised of the risk to which the noble Viscount, Lord Hailsham, recently pointed: that it was inconceivable that any Government would take the risk of entrusting to an international court legislative powers that Parliament would never entrust to the courts of this country.

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