How a group of elderly Swiss women could take the UK out of the European Court

ER Editor: Yesterday we memed about this Swiss legal case, where a group of elderly women at the ECHR won their case claiming that Switzerland’s neglect of its climate responsibilities (whatever those might be) violates their rights, as being something from Monty Python.

We were wondering what the real purpose of this silliness was, and now feel that this below (from Politico) – the reaction of the UK’s ruling Conservatives, is one of the immediately intended effects. With somehow an implosion of the European Convention of Human Rights and its court to follow, all falling under the Council of Europe.

The Politico piece below notes that 52% of the British public agree with pulling out of the Convention.

Stopping more climate madness, that this ECHR decision now sets a precedent for, seems to depend upon pulling out of the Convention, and with some haste.

Note that the key problem ECHR has interfered in is the UK government’s plan to deport failed asylum seekers to … Rwanda of all places. Sunak is determined to push on with this as yet unrealized policy. This all sounds like circus trick piled upon circus trick to us, the improbable on top of the improbable in order to see certain key dominoes fall. In this case, the convention and political grouping that makes up the Council of Europe.

Readers may be interested in this Daily Sceptic piece from today, which contains the following —

…how on Earth we got to the position that the ECtHR could be deciding whether or not there is a right to protection from the effects of climate change. There is no such right in the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), nor anything that resembles it, and the people who drafted it couldn’t even have imagined that there ever would be. So how is it that the court has decided that, in effect, there is?

The answer will take us a long way towards understanding why, regrettably, the self-respecting democracies of Europe are going to have to either seriously reform the entire Council of Europe framework (the umbrella organisation for the ECHR) or disassemble the whole thing.

‘Disassemble the whole thing’, starting with the UK? 5D chess.

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Britain’s Conservatives are getting serious about leaving the ECHR.

LONDON — In politics, timing is everything.

And the European Court of Human Rights’ shock ruling on climate targets this week could hardly have been more explosive for a British political landscape already gripped by election fever.

In a landmark ruling Monday, Europe’s top human rights court ruled in favor of a group of elderly Swiss women who said their government’s inadequate efforts to combat climate change had violated their human rights. | Frederick Florin/AFP via Getty Images

In a landmark ruling Tuesday, Europe’s top human rights court ruled in favor of a group of elderly Swiss women who said their government’s inadequate efforts to combat climate change had violated their human rights. The court effectively concluded that humans have a right to safety from climate catastrophes — a move which immediately established a potent precedent that people living in the nearly 50 nations under the jurisdiction of the court could potentially use to sue their own governments.

The court is already controversial in the U.K., where critics point to its use of so-called “pajama injunctions,” named because they were often granted by judges hauled out of bed in the middle of the night, to frustrate government attempts to deport asylum seekers to Rwanda.

As the general election expected by the end of the year creeps inexorably closer, the ruling Conservatives have flirted with putting the ECHR front and center of their campaign by pledging to pull out of the European Convention of Human Rights, and therefore the court. Those calls are only likely to get louder following the climate judgment.

“The ECHR has been bent out of shape by activists and politicians who want to seem progressive and internationalist by junking both nations and democracy. We should leave,” tweeted Danny Kruger, co-chair of a grouping of right-wing Conservative MPs.

Kruger’s words were echoed by former Tory Immigration Minister Robert Jenrick — who described the decision as “profoundly undemocratic.”

A government minister also voiced criticism, with Energy Secretary Claire Coutinho tweeting: “I’m concerned by the Strasbourg Court decision. How we tackle climate change affects our economic, energy, and national security. Elected politicians are best placed to make those decisions.”

Kruger is far from alone on the right of the political spectrum in calling for the U.K. to quit the court. With the climate ruling in Strasbourg, some spy an opportunity to gain traction in their quest.

Many right-wing figures have long been skeptical of the court — and, particularly since Brexit, have increasingly railed against a European court which they see as disrupting the agenda of democratically elected governments. Increasing hostility towards net zero targets among some Conservatives, combined with the new ruling, could see another front open in the debate about Britain’s future in the convention.

Nigel Farage, one of Britain’s most prominent Brexiteers and a long-running advocate of leaving the court, confirmed that view, telling POLITICO: “This makes a huge difference to our campaign to leave the ECHR.”

It’s the Rwanda plan, stupid

The ECHR’s ruling came as the court was already embroiled in a domestic political row in the U.K.

Legislation designed to help the Rwanda scheme to bypass domestic and international courts is due to pass through parliament in coming weeks. | Dan Kitwood/Getty Images

The court is already controversial in the U.K., where critics point to its frustration of keynote policies designed to remove asylum seekers from the U.K. to Rwanda.

Those interim measures, granted by the court due to concern asylum seekers may not be given a fair hearing on their asylum claim in the central African country, have contributed to the U.K.’s failure to send a single asylum seeker to Rwanda since the expensive policy was announced in 2022.

In an effort to turn around his struggling premiership, Sunak has vowed finally to get his plan off the ground — literally. Legislation designed to help the Rwanda scheme to bypass domestic and international courts is due to pass through parliament in coming weeks. Once that process is complete, some Tory MPs and right-wing strategists want the party to push for Britain to leave the court altogether — or promise to do so if the ECHR blocks any more flights.

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How a group of elderly Swiss women could take the UK out of the European Court

Stopping more climate madness, that this ECHR decision now sets a precedent for, seems to depend upon pulling out of the Convention, and with some haste.

The answer will take us a long way towards understanding why, regrettably, the self-respecting democracies of Europe are going to have to either seriously reform the entire Council of Europe framework (the umbrella organisation for the ECHR) or disassemble the whole thing.

‘Disassemble the whole thing’, starting with the UK? 5D chess.