Weekly Human Rights News: 21/06/2024

This week, the main UK political parties published their 2024 manifestos ahead of the UK general election that takes place on the 4th July 2024.

We have gone through the manifestos and written a plain language explainer on each of the manifesto pledges that mention the Human Rights Act 1998 and the European Convention of Human Rights so you know what each party is saying about our human rights.

As part of our London Communities programme in partnership with Just Fair, we hosted a free human rights workshop for community and voluntary groups across London. 

These are a chance for groups to learn about the UK's human rights laws in greater detail and how they apply to the individuals and groups they support. Attendees looked at how to use the law in advocacy with public services to create positive change and how to embed a human rights-based approach within their organisations.

We're excited to share the impact report on our recent awareness-raising workshops, offered as part of our nationwide Communities programme.

We hosted 14 workshops attended by 202 people including community group staff, volunteers and people accessing services. Before coming on the workshop, 66% of participants told us they had never relied on the Human Rights Act before or were unsure if they had.

After the workshops, people said they would rate their confidence discussing human rights with public services as 4.1 out of 5 (versus just 3.2 out of 5 before).

Participants explained how they would use their new knowledge, including by preparing complaints, passing on information to others and campaigning for change.

On Tuesday 18th June, our CEO Sanchita and Lived Experience Expert Kirsten ran a workshop for Partners in Care & Health focusing on the human rights of people with a learning disability and autistic people.

Participants explored how to take a human rights approach to decision-making and actions staff can take to make rights real, such as using human rights to frame all discharge and review meetings and having a named human rights lead to support conversations, develop confidence and respond to queries from colleagues.

Public Law Project wrote about the importance of talking accessibly about human rights

This week, Public Law Project wrote for Legal Action Group about the importance of having clear and inclusive conversations about human rights and the way human rights law works in the UK. As they explain, "There is, of course, no magic key that will unlock fair treatment from public bodies, but there are ways to help people feel confident in communicating their situation."

They also recognised the importance of ensuring those public bodies fully understand their duties under the Human Rights Act, highlighting BIHR's workshops as an example of one of the ways we can support "better decisions to be made in the first place."

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