05 June 2024
We have today launched a briefing on the Safeguarding the Union package. This provides a civil society perspective on its contents and its implications for human rights and equality protections under the Windsor Framework. The Safeguarding the Union package consists of a Command Paper and three Statutory Instruments and is the product of negotiations between […]
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13 May 2024
Following the passage into law of the Safety of Rwanda Act the Human Rights Consortium has updated its briefing note on the implications of this legislation for human rights in Northern Ireland. The UK government recently passed the ‘Safety of Rwanda Act’ which seeks to limit the use of human rights laws to challenge their […]
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13 May 2024
The Human Rights Consortium welcomes today’s judgement from the High Court disapplying multiple provisions of the Illegal Migration Act in Northern Ireland due to their incompatibility with the Windsor Framework and declaring provisions incompatible with the European Convention on Human Rights. The challenge was brought by the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission (NIHRC) alongside an […]
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29 February 2024
The Human Rights Consortium, a coalition of 160 NGOs dedicated to a rights based society, welcomes the significant ruling yesterday in the High Court that the immunity provisions of the Legacy Act breach the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) and Article 2 of the Windsor Framework. This ruling underscores the ongoing importance of Article […]
Read More08 December 2023
The UK government this week introduced the ‘Safety of Rwanda Bill’ to limit the use of human rights laws to challenge their attempts to automatically remove asylum seekers to Rwanda. The Human Rights Consortium has criticized the introduction of the Bill as a violation of basic human rights guarantees of the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement, the […]
Read More 29 September 2023
The Windsor Framework, and the Protocol that came before it, were developed and negotiated between the EU and the UK to manage the new regulatory framework in Northern Ireland resulting from the UK’s exit from the EU, while maintaining the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement commitments to cross-border cooperation and to maintaining the Common Travel Area between […]
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27 February 2023
The Brexit and Human Rights Working Group, convened and chaired by the Human Rights Consortium, has released their ‘5 Tests’ for the Ireland/Northern Ireland Protocol Deal, focusing on the key commitments on rights and equality protections contained within the Protocol. A fair Protocol deal to protect human rights must: Make no changes to Article 2 […]
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23 November 2022
As the law-breaking NI Protocol Bill continues its steady passage through the House of Lords, their EU Affairs Sub-Committee wrapped up its scrutiny of the Bill by publishing all written evidence received and sending a letter to the Foreign Secretary, James Cleverly MP, outlining their concerns with the Bill and the engagement they had undertaken. […]
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27 October 2022
The Consortium recently shared our briefing on the Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill with MPs in advance of the second reading of the Bill in the House of Commons on the 25th of October. Unfortunately, the Bill continues in what is now a well-worn pattern of attempts to undermine existing standards of protections and […]
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08 July 2022
We in the Human Rights Consortium were extremely disappointed to see that Liz Truss’ proposed Northern Ireland Protocol Bill, which outlines dramatic alterations to the Protocol while conferring powers to UK Government Ministers to amend or disapply most Articles of the Protocol at their discretion, passed the second reading stage in the Commons on the […]
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