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How Raab plans to fix the law

(Getty)

How do you solve a problem like Britain’s creaking criminal justice system? To the newly appointed Secretary of State, the answer involves ripping up the Human Rights Act, rolling out more electronic tags for convicts and pumping cash into preventative projects. At a Spectator event this morning, held at Tory Party Conference, Dominic Raab explained that rewriting the UK’s human rights laws was central to his reforming mission. He told editor Fraser Nelson:

The Prime Minister was very clear when he appointed me deputy PM and Justice Secretary that he wanted this done… Overhauling the Human Rights Act is not just a good way of dealing with the foreign nationals that we can’t deport but also of ironing out our constitution.

Freedom of speech, that ‘quintessentially British liberty’, has been eroded by political correctness, according to Raab. His reforms, he explained, would see its protection restored while also enforcing separation of powers and bolstering the prerogative powers of parliament. It’s not the first time Raab has looked at reforming the UK’s human rights laws. Under David Cameron, the former lawyer was tasked with setting out an alternative British Bill of Rights. Cameron bottled it. Now Boris Johnson wants to see those plans revived.

Freedom of speech, that ‘quintessentially British liberty’, has been eroded by political correctness

But what of the immediate problem, the huge backlog in criminal cases that are clogging up the courts? Raab admitted that it would take him six months to a year just to get the criminal justice system back up to pre-pandemic levels of efficiency (even before Covid there was a backlog of 39,000 cases — in June that number stood at 60,000). Raab told the event: ‘The magistrates’ courts cases are coming down, the crown court cases are flatlining… Of course it’s gummed up the system, but we are absolutely on top of it.’

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