Parliament is not sovereign

Enough is enough. The British Bill of Rights is set to return: a consequence of the government’s running battle with parliament over the European Convention on Human Rights. Recent days have been filled with clues and suggestions of imminent reform: Dominic Grieve, a former advocate of the ECHR, went so far as to assert that Britain may leave the convention. Cameron let slip the news that a Bill Of Rights commission is to be convened at PMQs; at the time he was answering a question about the Supreme Court’s controversial sex offenders’ register decision.

There are no details as to what the commission will consider, but Theresa May aired the guiding philosophy during her statement on the sex offenders’ register. ‘The rights of the public’ must be represented above ‘the rights of convicted criminals.’ She added, ‘It is for parliament, not the courts, to decide the laws of this country.’