Report Claims Ministers Are Being Influenced by Liberal Judges on Asylum and Terror Issues

Barrister Michael Arnheim says the use of human rights law has led to bogus asylum seekers clogging up courts with endless appeals at the taxpayers’ expense.

Undated photo showing Lady Justice statue on top of the Central Criminal Court of England and Wales, commonly referred to as the Old Bailey, in central London. Jonathan Brady/PA

“Politically correct” judges are influencing ministerial decisions on illegal immigrants, disruptive protesters, and terror suspects, a scathing report by a British think tank claims.

The newly released Civitas report, written by barrister Michael Arnheim, claims liberal judges are effectively making the rules that are now being ruthlessly exploited by what he called a “motley assortment” instead of in the interests of “law-abiding citizens.”

The independent report says bogus asylum seekers “clog up” the courts with “endless” appeals at the taxpayers’ expense.

It also raises concerns over the way eco-zealots and other activists are dealt with by the courts, suggesting the “main problem” is that the courts tend to view disruptive protests from the point of view of the protesters’ rights rather than from the point of view of the general public.

The impact striking workers have by denying thousands of people their rights to health care, travel, as well as harming the public finances is also raised.

Mr. Arnheim wrote, “It is important to realise that human rights law is about everybody’s human rights—the human rights of the mass of law-abiding citizens—and not just the rights of the small minority of special interest groups championed by the self-styled ‘human rights’ lobby.”

He added: “The ‘human rights’ lobby claim to be advocates of ‘the Rule of law’, but this usually amounts in practice to the rule of lawyers or judges.”

Unjust Court Decisions

His report, “Fixing Human Rights Law” (pdf), said that the government has slavishly accepted a “liberal” misinterpretation of Strasbourg rules by the UK’s domestic courts.

The well-known barrister insists the government has the power to overturn judgements, including those made by the Supreme Court.

He points to a 2017 ruling that “any judicial decision can be revoked by Parliament” through a statute and says it is the “nuclear weapon in Parliament’s arsenal.”

“It also does not depend on the judicial decision in question being ‘wrong’ in any sense,” he added.

The report advises small boats must be escorted back across the English Channel and British beaches vigorously patrolled and suggests a revived wartime Home Guard could be deployed.

The report also recommends that no applications for asylum or visas of any kind should be entertained from anyone already on British soil.

Mr. Arnheim, a fellow of St John’s College, Cambridge, said that human rights laws are failing to take account of the rights of other citizens when claims are made.

He said the “influx of huge numbers” of illegal migrants has a “negative impact” on the human rights of the mass of law-abiding citizens by putting pressure on housing, health care, schools, and public finances.

He wrote: “In a nutshell, the problem is that, in practice, human rights law does not actually protect the mass of law-abiding citizens, who should be its beneficiaries, but instead benefits a motley assortment of special interest groups, including illegal migrants, bogus asylum seekers, terrorist suspects, disruptive protesters, strikers, and the beneficiaries of ‘mission creep’ and ‘politically correct’ and simply wrong and unjust court decisions.”

Home Secretary Suella Braverman tours a building site on the outskirts of Kigali during her visit to Rwanda, to see houses that are being constructed that could eventually house deported migrants from the UK, on March 18, 2023. PA

Rwanda

The report also accuses ministers of following a liberal reading of key laws with the result that many illegal migrants can avoid being deported to their homelands or the last safe country they left before arriving in the UK.

“The UK courts quite often thwart government policy on migration, asylum, national security and human rights generally,” Mr. Arnheim wrote.

“The Government response is usually either a climbdown, or a cringing statement expressing ’regret' at the court decision, with or without the intention to appeal.

“As a result, a group of unelected, unaccountable and virtually irremovable judges have become the arbiters not only of government policy but also of legislation passed by Parliament.”

Mr, Arnheim also accuses ministers of having “allowed the domestic courts and Strasbourg to prevent anyone from being deported to Rwanda.”

In December, the High Court ruled that the Rwanda plan was lawful after a challenge brought by the PCS trade union and charities Care4Calais and Detention Action, but in June, appeal court judges overturned the judgment on the grounds that migrants might be sent from Rwanda to face persecution in their home countries.

The deportation flights remain grounded at least until the Supreme Court delivers its verdict later this year.

But Mr. Arnheim suggests, “With both a democratic mandate and human rights law on [the Government’s] side, the obvious solution is not to appeal to yet another group of unelected and unaccountable judges but simply to revoke the Court of Appeal decision.”

The report also says that the “refugee lobby” regularly accuses the government of breaching international obligations such as the U.N. Refugee Convention.

It points out that this protection applies only to people arriving “directly from a territory where their life or freedom was threatened,” and so cannot mean anyone who arrived from safe countries such as France.

The Epoch Times has contacted the Home Office for comment.