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Title: United Kingdom of Great Britain Human Rights Practices, 1995
Author: U.S. Department of State
Date: March 1996
UNITED KINGDOM OF GREAT BRITAIN AND NORTHERN IRELAND*
* A separate report on Hong Kong, a dependent territory of the United
Kingdom, follows this report.
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (UK) is a
longstanding, constitutional monarchy with a democratic, parliamentary
government elected in periodic, multiparty elections and an independent
judiciary. Human and civil rights are recognized by statute and by
strongly held traditions, but there is no written constitution. The
legal system treats human rights as assumed unless limited by statute.
Throughout the United Kingdom, police forces are responsive to, and
under the effective control of, civilian officials. In Northern
Ireland, because of terrorist violence in the recent past, army units in
some areas reinforce the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC).
The United Kingdom has a highly developed industrial economy. The
Government provides comprehensive social welfare services. The Northern
Ireland economy has improved since the 1994 cease-fires, but pockets of
high unemployment remain.
The United Nations Human Rights Committee (UNHRC), as part of a report
issued in July, called on the Government to withdraw emergency
legislation in Northern Ireland. In response to the decrease in
violence, the Government pledged in August to establish an independent
panel to review the relevant acts. By year's end, the panel had not
been created, and the Government proposed to Parliament that the
Emergency Powers Act be extended for 2 years. The Government has
already taken several measures in Northern Ireland, including
withdrawing some troops, reducing army patrols by 75 percent and ending
them entirely in some areas, and opening some border roads with Ireland
that had been closed for security reasons. In December the Defense
Secretary stated that no further troop withdrawals were planned in the
short term.
There continued to be allegations that security forces in Northern
Ireland physically and psychologically abused detainees in holding
centers, although these decreased as the let-up in terrorist violence
eased tensions. Allegations of past use of excessive force by the
security forces continued to be a matter of contention. Emergency
antiterrorist measures enacted during the past 20 years restrict freedom
of movement for 36 suspected terrorists and supporters (down from 69 in
1994). Also, primarily due to fear of terrorist violence, many
Protestant and Catholic communities in Northern Ireland are self-
segregated.
Laws and procedures governing detention that deny the right to immediate
counsel and encroach on the right to silence have been widely
criticized. Provisions of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act of
1994 that allowed inferences to be drawn from the silence of persons
accused of crimes drew censure from the UNHRC.
The cease-fires called by Republican and Loyalist terrorist
organizations (whose members are Catholic and Protestant, respectively)
resulted in a greatly diminished threat to public order in Great Britain
as well as in Northern Ireland. Paramilitaries in Northern Ireland are
believed to be responsible for seven killings in 1995--four in December
alone--in what both authorities and knowledgeable observers believe are
Provisional IRA (PIRA) murders of alleged and known drug dealers. Bomb
explosions and defusions associated with paramilitary groups totaled 7,
down from 22 in 1994. Nonetheless, both Republican and Loyalist
paramilitaries continued to engage in vigilante "punishment" attacks on
alleged "antisocial elements" and to exile "informers" by force. There
have also been instances of arson against (Protestant) Orange halls and
Catholic churches.
Societal discrimination against nonwhite minorities is a problem. The
Government is taking steps to combat violence against women.
RESPECT FOR HUMAN RIGHTS
Section 1 Respect for the Integrity of the Person, Including Freedom
from:
a. Political and Other Extrajudicial Killing
There were no reports of political killings by the Government, but
several deaths during apprehension or in custody raised questions about
whether police and prison officers had used improper restraining
techniques or excessive force against minority group members and
criminal suspects.
In May a black man, Brian Douglas, died from hemorrhages and a fractured
skull 5 days after an arrest during which a witness alleged that the
police had struck him on the head; police said he was intoxicated. By
year's end, the authorities had not decided whether to press charges.
In December a black burglary suspect, Wayne Douglas, died in a police
holding cell after resisting arrest. Two postmortems revealed a heart
attack, but Douglas' family asserted police brutality. An investigation
was under way at year's end.
Three other deaths of black men in detention remained under
investigation at year's end. All died in prison after struggles that
involved guards using extraordinary controls and restraints.
In June a court acquitted three London metropolitan police officers of
the 1993 manslaughter of Joy Gardner. The officers had gone to
Gardner's home to carry out an order to deport her to Jamaica. When she
resisted arrest, they gagged her with 13 feet of adhesive tape wound at
least seven times around her head, causing her to asphyxiate and
subsequently die of brain damage. A police department investigation of
the officers' supervisor, for neglect of duty in permitting the use of
an unauthorized restraint, continued at year's end. In July the UNHRC,
alluding to the Gardner case, expressed its "grave" concern at the use
of excessive force in the execution of deportation orders.
In November the Southwark Coroners Court returned a verdict of unlawful
killing in the April 1994 death of 37-year-old Irishman Richard O'Brien,
who suffocated after being handcuffed face down. Police shouting anti-
Irish epithets assaulted O'Brien outside a social club where they had
been called to investigate a disturbance. The coroner identified 31
separate injuries to O'Brien's body. Following the verdict, the
family's attorney petitioned the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS), which
had earlier decided there was insufficient evidence, to institute
criminal proceedings against the officers involved. At year's end, the
CPS had not taken a new decision, and police declined to suspend the
officers involved in the interim.
The European convention on human rights stipulates that lethal force
should be used only when "absolutely necessary," while British law calls
for it to be "reasonable under the circumstances." Human rights groups
have criticized the British standard as deficient, but British courts
have ruled that lethal force may be applied only if there is imminent
and unavoidable danger to life. Courts generally assume that a police
officer who aims and fires a weapon intended to cause serious bodily
harm; the issue then is whether there was justification for such intent.
If not, the only applicable charge is murder, requiring a life sentence,
and the courts have been unwilling to impose such a heavy penalty in
borderline cases. The alternative charge of manslaughter is applicable
in death cases only if there is no intent to cause bodily harm; there
have been few convictions on this basis.
In February the trial of two British soldiers for killing 18-year-old
Peter McBride in Northern Ireland in 1992 concluded. The court
concluded that the victim had been shot as he ran away after being
stopped and searched, and it sentenced the defendants, who had denied
murder, to life in prison.
Private Lee Clegg, who had been sentenced to life imprisonment in an
unlawful death case, was released in July. Clegg had been convicted for
the 1990 shooting of an 18-year-old passenger in a stolen vehicle that
had accelerated through an army checkpoint in Northern Ireland. In
making his decision to parole Clegg after only 4 years of incarceration,
the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland cited an appellate decision
that found the killing unlawful but regretted mandatory imposition of
the life sentence given the circumstances of the case. The decision
also took into account the recommendation of the Northern Ireland Life
Sentence Review Board. Although Review Board guidelines generally
require a prisoner to serve 10 years in confinement before cases are
considered, exceptions are permitted and have been made in other
instances. The decision resulted in serious rioting in some parts of
Northern Ireland and drew criticism from many within the Nationalist
Community.
According to a report by a quasi-official advisory group, security
forces in Northern Ireland have killed over 350 people, many in disputed
circumstances, since the troubles began in 1968. While there have been
criminal prosecutions in 32 cases involving the security forces, Clegg
was only the fourth soldier to be convicted for an offense while on
duty. The only other soldier sentenced to life imprisonment prior to
the Mcbride case was released after 26 months in prison.
During 1995 authorities and other knowledgeable observers attributed six
killings of alleged and known drug dealers to the PIRA, presumably
acting in a vigilante capacity. A group calling itself "Direct Action
against Drugs" (DAAD) took responsibility for four of the murders.
While the PIRA denied a connection with DAAD, its refusal to condemn the
killings contributed to public suspicion that it was involved. There
were no arrests in the cases by year's end.
William Elliot, a known Protestant paramilitary, was killed in September
in what appeared to be a Loyalist-ordered execution. Elliot was
implicated in the April 1994 murder of Margaret Wright, a Protestant
woman brutally attacked after being mistaken for a Catholic woman
outside a dance hall frequented by Loyalists.
The 1989 killing of Patrick Finucane, counsel to many IRA suspects,
remains an open case. Although it was widely alleged that Brian Nelson,
a former Loyalist paramilitary and agent for British military
intelligence, assisted in targeting Finucane, the Northern Ireland
Director of Public Prosecutions determined that the available evidence
was insufficient and decided not to bring charges against Nelson.
Human rights organizations have called for the establishment of an
independent public inquiry to investigate allegations of police threats
to defense lawyers in Northern Ireland and of alleged collusion between
the security forces and Loyalist paramilitaries. Amnesty International
in August concluded that the Government had "consistently refused to
carry out a thorough, impartial and wide-ranging inquiry into the extent
of collusion." Authorities pled security considerations in declining to
publish a report by senior police officer John Stevens on the subject.
Although newspapers reported that Stevens' 6-year inquiry had uncovered
proof of the involvement of four members of the security forces in
killings, the Northern Ireland Director of Public Prosecutions declined
to press charges, citing a lack of evidence sufficient to gain
convictions. In September the European Court of Human Rights ruled in a
10 to 9 decision that the killing of three PIRA terrorists by British
commandos in Gibraltar in 1988 was a breach of the European human rights
convention.
b. Disappearance
There were no reports of disappearances attributed to the Government.
At least 14 terrorist-perpetrated disappearances, going back to 1972,
remain outstanding, without any significant investigative progress by
the authorities. A seven-person RUC team works full-time to solve the
cases, but the victims, typically members of the security forces,
suspected informers, or petty criminals, have not been found. In spite
of the cease-fire, the paramilitaries have not cooperated in locating
any bodies.
c. Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman, or Degrading Treatment or
Punishment
The law forbids torture and other cruel, inhuman, or degrading
treatment. Confessions thus obtained are not admissible in court, and
judges can exclude even voluntary confessions. Detainees who claim
physical mistreatment have the right to an immediate medical
examination. Such a claim must be examined by a trial judge.
The Independent Commission for Police Complaints (ICPC), established by
the Government, supervises police investigations in Northern Ireland.
Authorized to review all complaints, it automatically supervises cases
involving death or serious injury. It accepts information provided by a
complainant and by any other sources, as well as that discovered by the
police. The ICPC can advise (but cannot require) the chief constable to
take disciplinary action against police officers. The ICPC reported
that in 1994 it had received 2,810 complaints of official abuse, that
its investigations had led to the substantiation of 30, the disciplining
of 107 police officers, and the lodging of criminal charges against 6
more. Local human rights groups complain that the ICPC's powers are
inadequate because it cannot act autonomously; it can only review cases
in which a state actor or citizen has filed a complaint.
In 1993 the Northern Ireland Secretary named an independent assessor of
military complaints to deal with procedures regarding complaints of
abuses by the army; he, too, has no independent investigative powers.
His second report, released in June, noted that, of 217 formal
complaints in 1994, only 15 were substantiated. No disciplinary action
was taken in five of these cases. In six cases, the soldiers in
question were chastised; in two, they were severely reprimanded (in one
case for pointing a rifle at a civilian and in another for incivility);
in one, the soldier was removed from the area (for harassing a local
resident); and in the remaining case, the soldier was fined (for making
a rude gesture at civilians).
The U.N. Committee Against Torture and many human rights groups have
raised concerns about ill-treatment of detainees in Northern Ireland,
where suspects arrested under emergency legislation are interrogated in
special holding centers. It recommended that interrogations in police
custody be videotaped. The Government resisted doing so, on the grounds
that videotaping could compromise operations and jeopardize informants.
In December 1992, the Government appointed a senior barrister as
Independent Commissioner for Holding Centers in Northern Ireland, with
authority to make irregular, unannounced visits to any holding center,
observe interrogations on television monitors, and interview detainees.
His second report in March found some substandard conditions but nothing
that would constitute torture. The Commissioner recommended the closure
of the holding center at Castlereagh, where there is no exercise
facility and no natural light in the cells and interview rooms. The
UNHRC also urged that Castlereagh be closed "as a matter of urgency,"
but the Government has not announced any plans to do so.
Following some widely publicized prison escapes in Great Britain, the
Home Office in January drafted a plan that stressed prison "security as
the overriding priority." Prison facilities and regimes vary depending
on location, with the best conditions found in prisons in northern
Ireland. Remand facilities in Britain, like holding centers in Northern
Ireland, tend to be antiquated, overcrowded, unsanitary, or deficient in
exercise areas. Most permanent facilities are good, but human rights
groups complained that overcrowding, caused by a 28 percent rise in the
prison population between December 1992 and August 1995, led to inmate
violence and alienation by reducing work and educational opportunities
and limiting time prisoners could spend out of their cells.
Women's prisons appeared to suffer the most. In December the new Chief
Inspector of Prisons halted his inspection of Holloway prison in London
in protest at conditions there. He was reported to have been shocked at
the squalor and vermin infestation and particularly concerned at the
treatment of prison inmates who were foreign nationals or ill. He
called for "immediate improvements" after finding an "over-zealous and
heavy-handed" security regime that included the use of shackles on
pregnant women having antenatal examinations in nonsecure areas. The
Government responded by assigning 16 additional staff members to the
facility and issuing new guidelines to eliminate routine use of chains.
There have long been accusations that security forces in Northern
Ireland harass citizens, particularly young people, in areas where
support for terrorists is considered strong. The Government strongly
denies that such behavior is widespread or officially tolerated. Police
continue to use plastic bullets in crowd control situations, a use which
is restricted to Northern Ireland and which has been widely criticized
by human rights monitors and by the U.N. Committee Against Torture. In
July a demonstrator in Belfast was reportedly seriously injured when a
plastic bullet struck him in the face.
Both Loyalist and Republican terrorists in Northern Ireland have
continued to carry out frequent "punishment" attacks, typically
involving beatings with iron pipes and improvised clubs. The RUC
recorded 76 Loyalist and 141 Republican assaults of this nature; young
men ages 14 years and over were the most frequent victims. While the
Loyalists appear to target members of their terrorist cells who have
broken ranks, the Republicans extend their vigilante activities to the
broader Catholic community, punishing "antisocial" activities (drug-
taking, car theft) or sometimes even such acts as dating an IRA
prisoner's girlfriend.
d. Arbitrary Arrest, Detention, or Exile
British authorities can and often do make arrests or detain suspects
without judicial warrants--especially in Northern Ireland, under laws
applicable only there--when they believe they have reasonable cause to
suspect wrongdoing.
The Criminal Justice and Public Order Act of 1994 gives a police officer
of the rank of superintendent or above the power to authorize uniformed
officers in a specified area to stop and search pedestrians and anything
they are carrying for offensive weapons or dangerous articles if the
officer reasonably believes there is a prospect of serious violence or
terrorism. No reasonable suspicion is required that the person being
stopped and searched has committed a crime.
Outside Northern Ireland, suspects arrested without warrants must be
released within 36 hours unless brought before a magistrate's court.
The magistrate may authorize extension of detention by an additional 60
hours, or, in cases of crimes of violence, for periods of up to 3 years
pending trial. Persons charged with "nonserious" offenses can request
release on bail; to be granted bail they must either have a local
address or be firmly established in the community.
Under the latest Northern Ireland (Emergency Provisions) Act (EPA),
passed in 1991, members of the armed forces on duty there can arrest
without a warrant any person they have reason to suspect of any offense-
-or intent to commit any offense--linked to terrorism. Such suspects
may be held for up to 4 hours and then must be transferred to police
custody or released. (From April on, routine military patrolling in
support of the RUC throughout Northern Ireland dropped by 75 percent
compared with levels before the cease-fire.)
The most recent Prevention of Terrorism (Temporary Provisions) Act
(PTA), passed in 1989, allows the police to arrest without a warrant
anywhere in the UK persons they have reason to suspect of being involved
in terrorism. The authorities may detain such persons (even those under
age 18) for up to 48 hours without legal representation or judicial
review. Suspects may be interrogated during this time, and confessions
obtained may be used in subsequent court proceedings. Under the 1989
PTA in England or Wales, detainees are granted the right to have lawyers
present during interrogation, but this is not the case in Northern
Ireland. Judicial review may be delayed up to a further 5 days on the
authority of the Home Secretary or, in Northern Ireland, the Secretary
of State for Northern Ireland.
In September a British High Court ruled that the Home Secretary's 6-
month delay of parole hearings in the case of five PIRA prisoners
serving longer minimum terms than they had been sentenced to was
"manifestly unjust" and flouted the principles of the common law and the
European human rights convention.
Immigration legislation gives the power of administrative detention to
immigration officers. There is no time limit for such detention and no
right to have it reviewed by a court.
In March police detained a Punjab native with permanent residency in the
UK, citing national security after the murder in London of a Punjabi
newspaper editor. Although the detained Punjabi was not charged, at
year's end he continued to be held in custody pending deportation.
The Government does not practice exile (see Section 2.d. regarding
exclusion orders), but the terrorist organizations do. A human rights
group, Families Against Intimidation and Terror (FAIT), said it knew of
287 persons currently in PIRA or Loyalist paramilitary-enforced exile
and suspected the true number was significantly higher.
e. Denial of Fair Public Trial
The judiciary is independent.
The UK has several levels of courts. The vast majority of criminal
cases are heard by magistrates' courts, which are managed by locally
based committees. Their decisions may be appealed to the Crown Court,
which also hears criminal cases requiring a jury trial, or to the High
Court. From the Crown Court, convictions may be appealed to the Court
of Appeal, which in turn may refer cases involving points of law to the
House of Lords. The Appellate Committee of the House of Lords (which
consists of senior judges and is functionally distinct from the
legislative arm of the House) is the final court of appeal. Once all of
these appeals have been exhausted, defendants in England and Wales may
appeal to the Home Secretary to refer a case back to the courts if fresh
evidence has emerged that casts doubt on the conviction. (Appeals may
be made to the Northern Ireland Office and the Scottish Office in those
jurisdictions.)
The law provides for fair trial, and the authorities respect this.
However, serious exceptions led the Government in 1991 to establish a
Royal Commission to review all aspects of the criminal justice system in
England and Wales. The Commission's report, issued in 1993, included
352 recommendations. The Government in July passed the Criminal Appeal
Act to establish a Criminal Case Review Commission. The Commission, due
to start work in 1996, will direct and supervise investigations into
possible miscarriages of justice and refer cases for further appeal on
factual, legal, and sentencing grounds.
The Belfast Crown Court acquitted the remaining three of the
"Ballymurphy Seven," a group of teen-agers arrested in 1991 in
connection with an attack on the RUC, on procedural grounds. The 3 had
been out on bail since October 1994, when 10 boxes of documents
pertinent to their trial, the existence of which had been previously
denied, were produced by the prosecution. The Court ruled that the
failure to disclose the evidence was central to the men's release, but
it described the prosecution's actions as an "inadvertent lapse" and
strongly implied that the accused were in fact guilty as charged. It
called "implausible" the defendants' allegations that police used
physical and mental coercion to elicit their confessions.
With the entry into effect of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act
of 1994, judges obtained the power to instruct juries that they may draw
an inference of guilt from a defendant's refusal to answer questions
during interrogation or trial, although no conviction can be based
solely on such an inference. Human rights groups and the UNHRC have
sharply criticized this change in the law. A similar provision is in
effect in Northern Ireland (see below).
Indigent defendants have the right to free counsel of their choice. All
criminal proceedings must be held in public except those in juvenile
court and those involving public decency or security. In a trial under
the Official Secrets Act, the judge may order the court closed, but the
sentencing must be public. Convictions can be appealed to successively
higher courts.
In Northern Ireland, special "emergency" restrictions affect due
process. Under the 1973 EPA, the Government suspended the right to
trial by jury there for certain terrorist-related offenses because
terrorists had intimidated the judiciary, jurors, and lawyers. Such
offenses are tried instead by a "Diplock Court," a judge presiding
without a jury. If the decision is to convict, the judge must justify
it in a document that becomes part of the court record, and an appellate
court may overturn it on substantive as well as legal grounds. The
Diplock Courts have been widely criticized. The EPA also permits the
use of uncorroborated confessions, but they cannot be the sole basis for
conviction anywhere in the UK. The 1988 Criminal Evidence Order allows
judges to draw an adverse inference when a suspect refuses to answer
questions.
There were no reports of political prisoners.
f. Arbitrary Interference with Privacy, Family, home, or
Correspondence
Warrants are normally required for a police search of private premises.
However, under the EPA, on-duty members of the armed forces or policemen
in Northern Ireland may enter any premises if they believe they have
"reasonable grounds of suspicion" that the entry is necessary to
preserve peace and order.
Section 2 Respect for Civil Liberties, Including:
a. Freedom of Speech and Press
Strongly held common-law tradition, an independent press, and a
democratic political system combine to secure freedom of speech and the
press, including academic freedom. Viewpoints critical of the
Government are well represented. The print media are dominated by a
handful of national daily newspapers, all privately owned and
independent (although often generally aligned with a political party).
About half the electronic media are run by the British Broadcasting
Corporation (BBC), which is funded by the Government but enjoys complete
editorial independence. The remainder are run by corporations under
renewable government license.
Human rights organizations continued to criticize the Official Secrets
Act of 1990, which prohibits disclosure of a broad range of foreign
policy and national security information. They assert that, in the
absence of freedom of information legislation or a public interest
defense for disclosing sensitive information, the act shields government
activities from public scrutiny, including possible improper or illegal
activities. Alleged offenses under the act may be tried in secret, and
the Government need not disclose its justification for holding a secret
trial. However, the act is seldom invoked and has not prevented the
disclosure of numerous internal government documents and alleged
wrongdoings. Attempts by the Government in the 1980's to prosecute
officials who leaked documents generally failed.
The doctrine of Public Interest Immunity (PII) allows government
ministers to prevent certain information from being disclosed during
litigation, on the grounds that its revelation would be contrary to the
public interest. In May the Northern Ireland Secretary imposed a PII
certificate on former Manchester Deputy Chief Constable John Stalker to
prevent him from giving evidence in court in a civil action against the
greater Manchester police. The Government maintained that any
discussion of the RUC's alleged "shoot-to-kill" policy, which Stalker
had investigated in the mid-1980's, could jeopardize the current peace
process. (Manchester's Chief Constable had taken Stalker off the
investigation, and his findings, which he hinted might be damaging to
the Government, were never published.)
b. Freedom of Peaceful Assembly and Association
The law provides for the right of peaceful assembly, and the Government
respects this right in practice.
Under the PTA, the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland may proscribe
any organization that "appears to him to be concerned in, or in
promoting or encouraging terrorism...." Membership in some 10 Loyalist
and Republican paramilitary groups is thus punishable by up to 10 years'
imprisonment, and supporting these entities is also illegal. Human
rights activists have criticized this law because it criminalizes not
only terrorist acts but also association with individuals who commit
them.
c. Freedom of Religion
Government policy and general practice ensure freedom of religion.
There are two legally recognized official churches of the State: in
England, the (Anglican) Church of England, and in Scotland, the
(Presbyterian) Church of Scotland. Blasphemy of the Christian religion-
-and only of that religion--is outlawed. The blasphemy law, however, is
rarely enforced. In Northern Ireland, the Constitution Act of 1973
prohibits public authorities from discriminating on the basis of
religious or political belief.
d. Freedom of Movement within the Country, Foreign
Travel, Emigration, and Repatriation
Citizens enjoy freedom of movement within the country and in foreign
travel, emigration, and repatriation. However, the Home Secretary may
exclude from Great Britain anyone believed linked with terrorism in
Northern Ireland, except anyone born in Great Britain or resident there
for 3 years; and the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland can
likewise exclude persons not native to or resident in that province.
Currently 36 persons (down from 69 in 1994) are subject to exclusion
orders. Several Members of Parliament, human rights groups, and the
media have objected to exclusion orders. The Secretary of State need
not reveal the grounds for exclusion, and the evidence is not tested in
any court. There is no right of appeal to the courts, but appeal may be
made informally to an independent advisor.
The Government cooperates with the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees
and other humanitarian organizations in assisting refugees. The charge
has been levied, however, that the Government regularly detains a small
percentage of asylum seekers, on average for over 4 months, as a
deterrent to others who might follow. The Government denies this, but
figures show a higher percentage of detainees ultimately gain refugee
status than do asylum seekers permitted to live in the community.
Applications for political asylum dropped from a peak of 44,840 in 1991
to 32,840 in 1994. Of those, 825 were granted--the lowest proportion
ever.
Because asylum procedures are cumbersome and cases are backlogged, the
law provides for granting of "exceptional leave to remain" (ELR) as a
step short of full refugee status. Home Office statistics show that
three to four times as many asylum seekers are granted ELR as are
granted full refugee status. While in ELR status, however, individuals
are denied the benefit of family reunion. Human rights groups maintain
that the Government does not apply safeguards, such as assurance of
access to a fair asylum-determination procedure, when removing asylum
seekers to safe third countries and that these policies undermine
Britain's commitment to provide haven for legitimate refugees.
Section 3 Respect for Political Rights: The Right of Citizens to
Change Their Government
Citizens have the right to change their government and freely exercise
it. The Government is formed on the basis of a majority of seats in the
House of Commons, which are contested in elections held at intervals not
longer than 5 years.
Participation in the political process is open to all persons and
parties. All citizens 18 years of age and older may vote. Northern
Ireland has city and district councils, as in the rest of the UK, but
with somewhat fewer powers. England and Wales also have county
councils, while Northern Ireland does not. (Scotland's structure is
different still.) Despite periodic attempts, there has been no devolved
government in Northern Ireland since 1972 because of the troubles.
In 1979 a majority of Scottish people voting (but not the required
majority of those on the Scottish electoral rolls) voted in favor of
devolution for Scotland. Parties committed to the establishment of some
form of Scottish parliament received some 75 percent of the vote during
the last general election (in 1992). The Government has chosen not to
call a further referendum on Scottish devolution.
British dependent territories, other than Hong Kong, have small
populations, under 60,000, and all are ruled by appointed governors or
administrators assisted by executive councils (usually appointed) and
legislative assemblies or councils (partly elected). In August
Bermudians voting in an independence referendum chose to maintain their
island's status as a British dependency.
Women and minorities face no legal constraints on voting or holding
office. The Head of State is a woman. The Head of Government from 1979
to 1990 was a woman. Female members constitute about a 10th of the
House of Commons (including the Speaker of the House) and a 20th of the
House of Lords. Both major parties recognize the need to increase the
number of women representatives. The Labour Party has sought to require
local constituencies to nominate only women candidates for safe seats
that fall vacant. About a fifth of Councillors on local authorities are
women. Several members of minority ethnic groups serve in Parliament,
and many work in local governments.
Section 4 Governmental Attitude Regarding International and
Nongovernmental Investigation of Alleged Violations
of Human Rights
The many nongovernmental human rights organizations operate with no
government interference, and the UNHRC praised their submissions to it
as "a tribute to the democratic nature of United Kingdom society." In
1973 the Government established a standing Advisory Commission on Human
Rights to monitor human rights in Northern Ireland but has not adopted
many of its recommendations.
A number of international, nongovernmental human rights organizations,
including Amnesty International and Article 19, are based in the United
Kingdom. The Government cooperates fully with international inquiries
into alleged violations of human rights.
Section 5 Discrimination Based on Race, Sex, Religion,
Disability, Language, or Social Status
The law prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color,
nationality, or national or ethnic origin and outlaws incitement to
racial hatred, except that racial discrimination is not specifically
outlawed in Northern Ireland. Conversely, discrimination on grounds of
religious or political opinion is unlawful in Northern Ireland but not
in Great Britain. Discrimination on the basis of religion is only
illegal in Great Britain when its effect is to discriminate against a
member of a minority ethnic group. The Government respects all extant
antidiscrimination laws.
In 1991 the Prime Minister announced that sexual orientation would no
longer be a bar to receiving a security clearance. Nevertheless, in
November an Appeal Court ruling upheld the Ministry of Defense's power
to dismiss male and female homosexual members of the armed services on
grounds of "incompatibility." The Ministry commenced a review of the
policy in order to advise a House of Commons special select committee
due to consider the quinquennial armed forces bill in early 1996.
Women
Statistical and other evidence indicates that most victims of societal
violence are women. Domestic violence constitutes one-third of all
reported crimes against women and accounts for almost 25 percent of all
reported violent crimes. A coordinator of refuge provision, the Women's
Aid Federation in England, says that it receives approximately 130,000
calls about domestic violence each year. Almost 50 percent of all
homicides of women are committed by partners or ex-partners.
The law provides for injunctive relief, personal protection orders, and
exclusion orders for women who are victims of violence. The Government
provides shelters, counseling, and other assistance for victims of
battery or rape, and it offers free legal aid to battered women who are
economically reliant upon their abusers. It actively prosecutes
perpetrators of domestic violence, and the law provides for their
imprisonment. The courts have held that nonconsensual marital sex can
constitute a criminal offense. A 1994 law abolished the warning that
judges had previously been required to give juries to the effect that a
victim's testimony alone should not be adequate for a rape conviction.
The Criminal Justice and Public Order Act of 1994 made sexual (as well
as other intentional) harassment a criminal offense.
The law provides for equal opportunity between the sexes. A government
minister cochairs the Women's National Commission, a forum for women's
organizations that presents women's views to the Government. An Equal
Opportunities Commission supports persons who bring discrimination cases
before industrial tribunals and courts, and it produces guidelines on
good practice for employers. Women in Britain earned approximately 21
percent less than their male counterparts in comparable positions. In
Northern Ireland, the figure is 25.9 percent less.
The 1975 Sex Discrimination Act as amended in 1986 prohibits indirect as
well as direct discrimination in training, education, housing, and
provision of goods and services, as well as in employment. In February
the Government promulgated regulations to ensure that employees working
part-time, almost 90 percent of whom are women, are entitled to qualify
for employment protection rights on the same basis as full-time workers.
Women have equal rights regarding property and
divorce.
Children
The Government demonstrates its strong commitment to children's rights
and welfare through its well-funded systems of public education and
medical care. In 1993 the Government initiated a 3-year grant to create
an extra 50,000 out-of-school childcare places. Nine out of 10 children
ages 3 and 4 now attend some form of nursery school or play group. In
July the Government announced that it would provide parents with
vouchers for nursery education for 4-year-olds. However, publicly
funded care is available for only 2 percent of children under age 3.
While there is no pattern of societal abuse of children, indications
are, despite the lack of reliable data, that child abuse is nevertheless
a problem. Various laws covering England and Wales stipulate that
children have the right to apply for court orders, to give or withhold
consent for medical treatment (for those capable of making an informed
decision), to make complaints to the relevant local authority, to have
their ethnic, linguistic, and religious background considered in
decisions affecting them, to have reasonable contact with their family
(usually applied in a circumstance where there has been abuse), and in
general to be consulted regarding their desires.
The U.N. Committee on the Rights of the Child concluded in January that
emergency legislation in Northern Ireland operated to the detriment of
children there: for example, the police and army power to stop,
question, and search people on the street led to complaints of youths
being mistreated. The UNHRC in July regretted that corporal punishment
is lawful in certain circumstances in independent schools.
People with Disabilities
The Companies Act of 1985 requires firms employing more than 250 people
to set out in their annual reports their policies on recruitment,
training, and career development for disabled workers.
A 1994 survey commissioned by SCOPE, a charity and lobbying group, of
1,568 disabled people in England, Wales, and Scotland found that nearly
a fifth had been refused service in a pub or restaurant because of their
disability, 45 percent found it difficult to get information about
available health and social services, and 51 percent believed that they
had been refused a job interview or a job because of their disability.
In November the Government passed the Disability Discrimination Act,
outlawing discrimination against disabled people in provision of access
to public facilities. The Act does not cover discrimination in
education, and the Government declined to create an enforcement body,
creating the National Disability Council instead as an advisory body to
carry out research and report regularly to the Secretary of State for
Social Security.
Access to buildings is improving but inadequate. Many buildings are so
old that they do not have elevators. Since 1985 government regulations
have required that all new buildings meet the access requirements of all
persons with impaired mobility. In June 1992 the Government put in
place similar regulations for sensory-impaired persons.
Government regulations mandate that by the year 2000 all taxis be
accessible to wheelchairs.
Religious Minorities
For a variety of historical and social reasons, the Protestant community
controls much of the local economy in Northern Ireland, and anti-
Catholic discrimination persists in the private sector there. Despite
government efforts, the unemployment rate for Catholic men there
remained twice that for Protestant men. Government efforts to increase
recruitment of Catholics into the police force (currently 92 percent
Protestant) and related security fields in the province have been
hampered by PIRA assassinations and death threats, as well as widespread
antipathy in the Catholic community to the security forces.
Applications by Catholics to join the RUC have nonetheless risen since
the cease-fires from 12 to 22 percent of the total, and the most recent
class of inductees included about 20 percent Catholics. With postcease-
fire downsizing likely, however, the RUC acknowledged that raising its
percentage of Catholics to approximate that of the general population
would remain problematic.
While active recruitment of Catholics by the Northern Ireland civil
service has produced rough proportionality in overall numbers, the
service has acknowledged that Catholics remained significantly
underrepresented in its senior grades, and in November 1993 it declared
its intention to overcome this imbalance. Service-wide employment
cutbacks have thus far hampered its efforts.
The Fair Employment (Northern Ireland) Act of 1989, as amended, aims to
end even unintentional or indirect discrimination in the workplace.
(There is no legislation to prohibit religious discrimination in
housing, education, or provision of goods and services.) A fair
employment tribunal adjudicates complaints. All public-sector employers
and all private firms with over 10 workers must report annually to the
Fair Employment Commission on the religious composition of their work
force and must review their employment practices at least once every 3
years. Noncompliance can bring criminal penalties and loss of
government contracts. Victims of employment discrimination may sue for
damages. While critics of the act have asserted that its targets and
timetables are too imprecise, most leaders of the Catholic community
have praised it as a positive step.
National/Racial/Ethnic Minorities
Although the law prohibits discrimination based on race (except in
Northern Ireland), persons of African or South Asian origin face
substantial unofficial discrimination. The Home Office has estimated
that there are between 130,000 and 140,000 incidents of racial attack
and harassment involving all races every year. An April study by the
Northern Ireland Anti-Poverty Network found that 90 percent of the
approximately 7,000 ethnic Chinese living in the province had
experienced some form of racial prejudice. Incitement to racial hatred
is a criminal offense punishable by a maximum of 2 years' imprisonment.
The Government strictly enforces these laws and regulations.
A government-appointed but independent Commission for Racial Equality
(CRE) provides guidelines on good practice, supports persons taking
court action under the Race Relations Act of 1976, and may initiate its
own court action. After investigating a complaint, the CRE may issue a
notice requiring that the discrimination be stopped. The CRE monitors
the response to such a notice for 5 years.
Although ethnic minorities are only 5.5 percent of the population, they
are a quarter of those stopped and searched by police. Various studies
have shown that, on average, black men face more serious charges for the
same substantive offenses than do white men, they are more likely to be
cautioned, and they are more likely to receive custodial sentences.
Statistically, blacks are 7.1 times as likely as whites to be
in prison. Ethnic minorities are seriously underrepresented in the
criminal justice professions.
Section 6 Worker Rights
a. The Right of Association
Workers have the right to form and join unions, and the Government fully
respects this right in practice. Unions participate freely in
international organizations. Unions are free of government control.
Like employers' associations, they must have their accounts certified by
the Government. Senior union officers must be elected by secret ballot.
The law mandates secret ballots before a strike call; prohibits unions
from disciplining members who reject a legal strike call; and allows
members to lodge complaints against their union with a government-
appointed commissioner.
There is no specific statutory "right to strike." Voluntary cessation
of work may be considered a breach of contract. A system of legal
immunities from prosecution for unions engaged in lawful industrial
action was narrowed by acts of Parliament in the 1980's. These acts
exclude secondary strikes and actions judged to have political motives;
unions encouraging such strikes are subject to fines and seizure of
their assets. The legislation also restricts the ability of unions to
act against subsidiaries of prime employers with which they are in
dispute when the subsidiaries are not party to the dispute and are the
employers of record.
In September 1993, the Council of Europe (COE) determined that British
labor law violated the European Social Charter by permitting an employer
to dismiss all employees who take part in a strike and then, after 3
months, to rehire them selectively. The COE requested the British
Government to notify the COE of the measures to be taken to remedy this
defect, but the Government has not done so, because it is no longer a
party to the Charter.
Legislation in 1978 and 1990 made it illegal to deny employment on the
grounds that the applicant is not a union member. The Trade Union
Reform and Employment Rights Act of 1993 set new procedural requirements
for union strikes, dues collection, and membership rules. It also made
it possible for private citizens, when deprived of goods or services due
to strike action, to seek damages and to obtain assistance in this
effort from the Government. The Trade Unions Congress (TUC) in 1993
lodged complaints with the International Labor Organization (ILO) on
various provisions of the 1993 Act (see Section 6.b.); the ILO has not
completed consideration of these complaints. In March the House of
Lords upheld a provision of the Employment Protection Act of 1978, as
amended by the Employment
Act of 1988, allowing employers to offer workers financial inducements
to give up trade union representation.
b. The Right to Organize and Bargain Collectively
Although there is no legal obligation for employers to bargain with
workers' representatives, and while labor-management contracts are not
enforceable in the courts, collective bargaining is longstanding and
widespread, covering about 40 percent of the work force.
Workers who believe themselves victims of antiunion discrimination may
seek redress through industrial tribunals. Remedies available include
payment of indemnities and reinstatement.
Contrary to ILO Convention 98 on the right to organize and bargain
collectively, it is lawful for employers or others to circulate
blacklists of union members seeking employment. In May 1993, the ILO
concluded that the British Government is obliged to protect union
members from such discrimination, but the Government has not responded
to this.
There are no export processing zones.
c. Prohibition of Forced or Compulsory Labor
Forced or compulsory labor is prohibited and is not practiced.
d. Minimum Age for Employment of Children
School attendance until age 16 is compulsory. Children under age 16 are
not permitted to work in an industrial enterprise except as part of an
educational course.
e. Acceptable Conditions of Work
There is no legislated minimum wage. The Trade Union Reform and
Employment Rights Act of 1993 abolished the wage council system, which
prior to September 1993 had established minimum hourly wages and
overtime rates for adult workers in 26 low-wage industries. No
legislation limits daily or weekly working hours.
The Health and Safety at Work Act of 1974 requires that the health and
safety of employees not be placed at risk. A Health and Safety
Commission effectively enforces regulations on these matters and may
initiate criminal proceedings. Workers' representatives actively
monitor the enforcement. Workers can remove themselves from hazardous
conditions without risking loss of employment as provided in the
European Union Framework Directive on Safety and Health.
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