The Justice Secretary, Dominic Raab, recently announced that the government would re-introduce its legislation to repeal the Human Rights Act “in the coming weeks”.
This reverses Liz Truss’s decision to shelve plans to replace the Human Rights Act with a British Bill of Rights, now widely called the #RightsRemovalBill.(For an account of that dramatic development read Government scraps human rights reform hours after Jewish charity’s warning in Jewish News (7 September 2022)
*** TAKE ACTION TO SAVE OUR HUMAN RIGHTS ACT! ***
The Human Rights Act is under threat. The government wants to replace it with a weaker Bill of Rights.
We are asking for your support for our campaign to save the Human Rights Act.
The Bill of Rights will reduce our basic rights including to freedom of religion.
So we are asking MPs to vote against the Bill of Rights. René Cassin’s briefing provides more details.
Please send this letter to your MP as soon as possible, before the Bill of Rights Bill has its second reading in the House of Commons.(find your MP here).
Please let us know when you have taken this action, and of any response from your MP
Today, 10th December, is International Human Rights Day – the 76th anniversary of the signing the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948.
The Declaration was a reaction to the horrors of the Holocaust. So, for Jews, today has a particuar significance.
Although rooted in response to atrocity, the Declaration was forward-looking and optimistic. It spoke for the majority of people who knew a better world was possible. The fact that it’s co-author , the French-Jewish lawyer Monsieur Rene Cassin, could draft such a hopeful document so soon after 26 members of his family were murdered by the Nazis is a testament to his humanity and the power of human rights in general.
Today, as the organisation that works in Cassin’s name, we are determined to ensure his Declaration’s vision of human rights for all is fully realised. Central to that work is a focus on so called ‘socio-economic rights’ – rights to everyday essentials like food, housing and health. This vision was best articulated in Article 25 of the Declaration:
‘Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond his control’.
Bolstering these rights would ensure everybody has access to the foundations on which to build a dignified, prosperous and meaningful life. They have been neglected for too long.
We are constantly developing our campaigns, planning events, and cultivating discussions on Human Rights issues, sign up for our email updates and we’ll keep you informed on all we are working on and how YOU can get involved.
