The Judicial Committee of the Privy Council (JCPC) is the highest court of appeal for the Crown Dependencies, the British Overseas Territories, some Commonwealth countries and a few institutions in the United Kingdom. Established on 14 August 1833 to hear appeals formerly heard by the King-in-Council, the Privy Council formerly acted as the court of last resort for the entire British Empire, other than for the United Kingdom itself.
Whilst the House of Lords of the United Kingdom is the upper chamber of Parliament and has government ministers, for many centuries it had a judicial function. It functioned as a court of first instance for the trials of peers and for impeachments, and as a court of last resort in the United Kingdom and prior, the Kingdom of Great Britain and the Kingdom of England.
The Human Rights Act 1998 is an Act of Parliament of the United Kingdom which received royal assent on 9 November 1998, and came into force on 2 October 2000. Its aim was to incorporate into UK law the rights contained in the European Convention on Human Rights. The Act makes a remedy for breach of a Convention right available in UK courts, without the need to go to the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) in Strasbourg.
The Supreme Court of Ireland is the highest judicial authority in Ireland. It is a court of final appeal and exercises, in conjunction with the Court of Appeal and the High Court, judicial review over Acts of the Oireachtas. The Supreme Court also has appellate jurisdiction to ensure compliance with the Constitution of Ireland by governmental bodies and private citizens. It sits in the Four Courts in Dublin.
The Prevention of Terrorism Act 2005 was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom, intended to deal with the Law Lords' ruling of 16 December 2004 that the detention without trial of eight foreigners at HM Prison Belmarsh under Part 4 of the Anti-terrorism, Crime and Security Act 2001 was unlawful, being incompatible with European human rights laws.
The Supreme Court of the United Kingdom is the final court of appeal in the United Kingdom for all civil cases, and for criminal cases originating in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. As the United Kingdom’s highest appellate court for these matters, it hears cases of the greatest public or constitutional importance affecting the whole population.
Jonathan Philip Chadwick Sumption, Lord Sumption,, KC, is a British author, medieval historian and former senior judge who sat on the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom between 2012 and 2018.
The European Convention of Human Rights Act 2003 is an act of the Irish parliament, the Oireachtas, which gave further effect to the European Convention on Human Rights in Irish law. It is substantially similar to the UK's Human Rights Act 1998.
A declaration of incompatibility in UK constitutional law is a declaration issued by a United Kingdom judge that a statute is incompatible with the European Convention of Human Rights under the Human Rights Act 1998 section 4. This is a central part of UK constitutional law. Very few declarations of incompatibility have been issued, in comparison to the number of challenges.
William Martin McKechnie, SC is an Irish judge who served as a Judge of the Supreme Court from 2010 and 2021 and a Judge of the High Court from 2000 to 2010.
R v The Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis [2011] UKSC 21 was a 2011 judgment of the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom. The case concerned the extent of the police's power to indefinitely retain biometric data associated with individuals who are no longer suspected of a criminal offence. In the case, a majority of the Supreme Court, including the Court's President Lord Phillips and the Lord Chief Justice Lord Judge reversed an earlier ruling of the High Court of Justice and found that the police force's policy of retaining DNA evidence in the absence of 'exceptional circumstances' was unlawful and a violation of Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights. The court declined to offer any specific relief however, recognising that the policy is expected to be subject to legislative scrutiny as Part 1 of the Protection of Freedoms Bill 2011.
My Death, My Decision (MDMD) is an organisation that campaigns for the legalisation of assisted dying in England and Wales. The group was founded in 2009, in order to campaign for a change in the law and advocate on behalf of adults of sound mind, who are either terminally ill or incurably suffering.
Taylor v Attorney-General[2015] NZHC 1706 is a New Zealand High Court judgment which made a formal declaration that a statute that prohibited prisoners from voting is inconsistent with the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990. The action was brought by Arthur Taylor, a high-profile prison inmate. This was the first time a court had recognised that a formal declaration of inconsistency is an available remedy for statutory breaches of the Bill of Rights. Section 5 of the Bill of Rights Act states, "Subject to section 4, the rights and freedoms contained in this Bill of Rights may be subject only to such reasonable limits prescribed by law as can be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society." In his decision, Justice Heath declared that the Electoral Amendment Act 2010 which stripped all voting rights in general elections from prisoners was an unjustified limitation on the right to vote contained in s 12 of the Bill of Rights. The Court of Appeal upheld this decision after the Attorney-General appealed the jurisdiction of the courts to make declarations of inconsistency.
Seales v Attorney-General[2015] NZHC 1239 was a 2015 court case concerned with whether a doctor could assist a terminally ill patient in ending her own life. Wellington lawyer Lecretia Seales, terminally ill from a brain tumour, sought High Court declarations to the effect that her doctor would not be committing murder, manslaughter or assisting a suicide if he assisted in her euthanasia. Seales also sought, as an alternative, that the court make declarations that the Crimes Act was not consistent with the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990. The Court declined to make any of the declarations sought by Seales. Seales died of her illness the day after the judgment was delivered.
Beghal v DPP was a 2015 judgment of the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom concerning powers of the police in England and Wales.
Coventry v Lawrence was a 2015 judgment of the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom concerning the compatibility of the Access to Justice Act 1999 with the European Convention on Human Rights.
A citizen of Ireland is legally permitted to change the designation of their gender on government documents through self-determination. In 2015, Ireland was the fourth state in the world to permit such alterations to government documents. By May 2017, 230 people had been granted gender recognition certificates under the law. Section 16 of the Act entitles the holder of a gender recognition certificate to apply to have the certificate amended if there is a clerical error or an error of fact in the content of the certificate. Two such corrections have been made since commencement of the Act.
Assisted suicide is the ending of one's own life with the assistance of another. Physician-assisted suicide is medical assistance in helping another person end their own life for the purpose of relieving their suffering, and voluntary euthanasia is the act of ending the life of another, also for the purpose of relieving their suffering. The phrase "assisted dying" is often used instead of physician-assisted suicide by proponents of legalisation and the media when used in the context of a medically assisted suicide for the purpose of relieving suffering. "Assisted dying" is also the phrase used by politicians when bills are proposed in parliament. Assisted suicide is illegal under English law.
Saimo Chahal KC (hon) is a British lawyer specialising in human rights. She was formerly joint head of the public law and human rights team at Bindmans LLP, in London.
Make It 16 Incorporated v Attorney-General is a 2022 landmark decision of the Supreme Court of New Zealand in which the court held that the country's current voting age of 18 was discriminatory. The court found that the provisions in the Electoral Act 1993 and Local Electoral Act 2001 that set the voting age of 18 years was an unjustified limitation on the right to be free from age discrimination in section 19 of the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990 (BORA).
