Approaches to the Human Rights Act

Abstract

This chapter examines how the UK’s top court has approached the procedural aspects of the Human Rights Act 1998. It looks at the extent to which the Act has been applied retrospectively, the attitude of the top UK judges to the jurisprudence emanating from Strasbourg, the definition of ‘public authority’, the way in which the section 3 interpretative duty has been applied, the extent to which declarations of incompatibility have been considered under section 4, the ‘primary legislation’ defence under section 6, the degree to which human rights have been protected ‘horizontally’, the application of limitation periods, the development of remedies for human rights violations, and the application of Convention rights outside the United Kingdom. The chapter concludes that the top UK judges have a great deal to say about these various issues but that on the whole they have been tentative and restrained in their application of the Act.