Chapter 1: Introducing human rights

1.1 What are human rights?

Human rights are not a privilege conferred by government. They are every human being's entitlement by virtue of his humanity.

Mother Teresa

Human rights belong to everyone. They are the basic rights we all have simply because we are human, regardless of who we are, where we live or what we do. Human rights represent all the things we need to flourish and live together as human beings. They are expressed in internationally agreed laws, and cover many aspects of everyday life ranging from the rights to food, shelter, education and health to freedoms of thought, religion and expression.

The roots and origins of human rights and the struggles to bring them about lie deep in the history of many different societies, civilisations and individuals. However, the first universally agreed statement of human rights did not emerge until 1948, with the ‘Universal Declaration of Human Rights’ (UDHR). The UDHR is the most famous, most translated, and probably most important, human rights document. All other human rights laws take the UDHR as their starting point – it is the foundation of modern human rights law.

1.2 What human rights do we have?

1.3 Who has responsibilities for human rights?

Human rights are based on the principle that we all have human rights – we are all ‘rights holders’. When an individual has a right, there is a corresponding ‘duty bearer’, usually the state, who is responsible for making sure that right is respected, protected and fulfilled. By the state, in broad terms we mean the government and those acting on its behalf. Human rights prevent states from doing certain things, like not treating you in a degrading way. They also require states to take certain actions to make sure your rights are protected and fulfilled, like taking steps to protect your life and improve your quality of life.

This doesn’t mean that human rights have nothing to say about the responsibilities of individuals, or our relationships with each other. Human rights recognise that we all live alongside each other, and everyone else has rights too. If we compromise others’ human rights, we are subject to laws that may limit our own rights as a result. For example, if someone is convicted of burgling your home, it is likely that they will be sent to jail, restricting their right to liberty. We will explore the concept of balancing rights, and when they can be limited or restricted, in more detail in chapter 3.

Move onto the next chapter to find out more about human rights laws and how they work in practice.

Chapter 2: How do human rights work – the legal overview

There are three layers of human rights protection in the UK – domestic, regional and international. These are enforced and monitored in different ways.

2.1 The Human Rights Act and the European Convention on Human Rights

The Human Rights Act came into force in the UK on 2 October 2000. The Act brings most of the rights contained in the European Convention on Human Rights into UK law. The European Convention on Human Rights, which UK lawyers and civil servants helped to draft, was agreed in 1950 by the Council of Europe. The UK signed up to this Convention in 1951. The list of the rights it contains can be found here.

These points are covered in more detail in our factsheet on ‘How the Human Rights Act works’.

It’s also very important to remember that the Human Rights Act is not just about the law and taking cases to court. As the later chapters in this toolkit demonstrate, the Act is relevant to many of the decisions people make and the situations people experience on a daily basis. We hope the toolkit will encourage you to use the Human Rights Act ‘beyond the courtroom’ in your advocacy for individuals and in your wider campaigning and lobbying work.

2.2 The UN human rights treaties

The UK has signed up to a series of international human rights treaties (also called Conventions or Covenants) agreed by the United Nations. These treaties place legal obligations on the states that sign up to them, in contrast to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights which is not a legally binding document. The text of these treaties can be found on the website of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights.

Key things you need to know about the UN human rights treaties:

• There are nine core UN human rights treaties
• They cover a range of issues and groups including torture, women and racial discrimination
• They cover a broader range of rights than the Human Rights Act and European Convention
• Each treaty is monitored and enforced by an expert UN committee through a state reporting system, individual complaints mechanisms and general comments
• You cannot bring a case in the UK courts against the Government using one of these treaties as they are not part of UK law
• However, they can act as very powerful campaigning tools

You can find out more about the UN human rights treaties by downloading our factsheet on the international human rights system.

2.3. Different laws, different rights

As you’ll have seen from the above, one of the key differences between the different human rights laws is the way they are monitored and enforced. Another important difference is the rights they contain.

You will probably have noticed that the list of rights in the European Convention is much smaller than the UDHR. You may have also noticed that a number of rights that are missing are related to economic and social issues, such as the right to health and the right to a minimum standard of living. This is currently a gap in our human rights protection. However, some of the rights contained in the European Convention, such as the right to respect for private and family life, can still be used to tackle everyday economic and social issues.

Since the rights contained in the European Convention are enforceable in the UK courts through the Human Rights Act, these are the rights that voluntary and community sector organisations can currently use most directly in their work, particularly with regards to advocacy. Therefore, the next two chapters focus on some of these rights in more detail. However, it is important to remember that at an international level there is a more widely recognised set of rights that provide a wide range of exciting campaigning and lobbying opportunities.

Before moving on to the next section, test your knowledge so far with our human rights quiz.

Testing your knowledge so far: Human rights quiz

Chapter 3: Different rights – a balancing act?

3.1 Introduction

So far we have explored the ideas behind human rights, where human rights come from and the human rights legal framework that protects them. The next two chapters look at specific rights in more detail and how they operate. In order to do this, it is important to understand the difference between absolute and non-absolute rights.

Some human rights are absolute. They must never be limited or restricted in any way.

However, the majority of rights are non-absolute and can be limited or restricted in certain circumstances where there is a need to take into account the rights of other individuals or wider society.

3.2 Absolute rights

There are a small number of human rights that cannot be balanced against the rights of others, or the interests of the wider community. These are known as absolute rights. These rights can never be limited or restricted, whatever the circumstances – even in a state of war or emergency.

There are only a very few absolute rights. One example is the right not to be tortured or treated in an inhuman or degrading way. It is never ok to torture you or treat you in an inhuman or degrading way, regardless of the circumstances.

3.3 Non-absolute rights

The majority of human rights are non-absolute and can be limited or restricted in certain circumstances. There are two main types of non-absolute rights – limited rights and qualified rights.

Any interference with a qualified right must be:

• Lawful - be allowed within existing legislation;
• For a legitimate aim, e.g. to protect the rights of others or wider society;
• Necessary in a democratic society and;
• Proportionate - appropriate and not excessive in the circumstances.

If a public authority limits or restricts a qualified right contained in the Human Rights Act without adhering to the above four steps, they will be acting unlawfully.

Proportionality

A proportionate action is one that is reasonable and not excessive in the circumstances. The principle of proportionality is central to the human rights framework. It helps to ensure that any interference with a right is kept to a minimum.

Certain questions can be asked to help decide if an action is proportionate:

• What is left of the person’s rights if we take this action?
• Is there an alternative approach to the problem that would restrict the right any less?
• Is there anything that we can do to minimise the need to restrict the right?

A straightforward way of thinking about proportionality is ‘you must not use a sledgehammer to crack a nut’.

3.4 Which rights are absolute?

Only a very few rights are absolute, as show in the table below. Please use this categorisation as a guide only, as there are some slightly ‘grey areas’!

For example, in general the right to life is absolute – it is one of our most fundamental rights, and the state must not take away the life of individuals. However, it is occasionally possible for the state to justify its actions, for example to defend oneself or someone else from unlawful violence. Some of these ‘grey areas’ are looked at in more detail in the next chapter, where we explore how specific rights work in practice.

Chapter 4: Rights in practice

Introduction

This section explores some of the rights in more detail. We have focused on the rights in the Human Rights Act that have been used most widely by voluntary and community sector organisations in the UK.

However, don’t forget that there are a number of other rights contained in the Human Rights Act that may be relevant for your work, and there is also a broader range of rights contained in international human rights treaties.

More examples of how these rights have been applied in practice can be found at Our Human Rights Stories and in The Human Rights Act – Changing Lives (BIHR 2008).

Move on to the next chapter to practise applying your knowledge of these rights to real life case studies.

Chapter 5: Case studies

This chapter will help you start to put your learning into practice. Have a look at the five case studies below, and see if you can work out how you could apply human rights thinking to the issues they raise. For each case study it will be helpful to think about the following questions:

• Which human rights are relevant, and who do they belong to? (use the rights in the European Convention on Human Rights for reference)
• Who has duties under the Human Rights Act in this example?
• Which of the rights you have identified are absolute and which are not absolute?
• If the rights are not absolute, are they being restricted or limited in a lawful way? For example, for qualified rights is the ‘duty bearer’ acting in a proportionate way?
• What should be done next? How would you challenge this using a human rights approach?

You might find it helpful to use the below table when noting your answers. We have given you model answers for each case study – try not to look at the answers before you have had a go yourself!

Please note that the suggested answers we have given are a guide only and should not be interpreted as legal advice for any situation. Each individual situation is very different and whether or not it would be found to be a breach of the Human Rights Act in a legal case would depend on the individual circumstances of the case. However, the vast majority of human rights issues are resolved long before they reach the courts, and we hope that this toolkit will encourage you to use human rights beyond the courtroom to find practical solutions to everyday issues as well as in your wider campaigns and advocacy.

CASE STUDIES AND ANSWERS

Click on Reveal answers for the corresponding case study to view the answers.

Where to next?

The first five chapters of this toolkit will hopefully have given you a good general overview of what human rights are and how they might be relevant for your work. But how do you actually go about applying them in an everyday context? Where do you start? And how can you find out more?

Here are a few initial ideas of how you could start using human rights:

• Tell people about them! Include human rights as an item on your staff meeting agenda, talk to your clients/beneficiaries about what human rights mean to them, send people the link to this toolkit - spreading the word will help make human rights a reality.
• Identify which human rights you think are most relevant to your work. Make an action plan outlining how you could start using them. If you are an advocate - can you use the right to private life to support one of your clients to be able to make their own choices in their lives? If you are a campaigner - can you use the right not to be treated in an inhuman and degrading way to campaign for better treatment for your beneficiaries? If you are an adviser - how can you make sure that you can identify any human rights issues involved in your clients' cases?
• Go on a human rights training session. BIHR provides a wide range of courses on human rights. Follow this link to find out about our training.
• Find out more. The useful resources section of BIHR's website provides links to further reading around human rights.
• Need advice on a specific issue or case? Follow this link to find out about advice-giving organisations.
• Watch this space! Over the next few months we will be developing additional chapters of the toolkit that explore how human rights can be applied to specific areas of work such as campaigning, advocacy and advice provision as well as specific groups or themes such as disabled people, healthcare and poverty. If you'd like to be kept up to date with toolkit developments email Lucy on lbentley@bihr.org.uk.  

Tell us what you think: we see this toolkit as a work in progress and we are really keen to hear your views. What works and what doesn't? What should we include that we haven't included? What shouldn't we include that we have included? How could we make it more exciting, interesting or accessible?

Let us know your thoughts via our online evaluation form.