Successful Judicial Review of Benefits Payment in the UK
R (Johnson and others) and Secretary of State for Work and Pensions [2019] EWHC 23 (Admin) is an English High Court case relating to the benefit payment, Universal Credit. Universal...
Lessons from Sir Henry Brooke: Making Rights Real (II)
In my last post, I argued that the judgment in Gareth Lee v Ashers Bakery is the consequence of the failure to follow a structured human rights assessment. This is...
Lessons from Sir Henry Brooke: Making Rights Real (I)
What if? What if the UK House of Lords (as the UK Supreme Court then was) had left the judgment of Lord Justice Brooke in Begum in the Court of...
The High Court of England and Wales: facilitator of the death penalty abroad?
Last week, the High Court of England and Wales held that it was lawful for the British Government to assist American authorities with the investigation and prosecution of crime in...
The UK Supreme Court and the Gay Marriage Cake: Is ‘Indissociability’ Half-baked?
Giving the judgment of the court in Lee v Ashers Baking Co (2018), Lady Hale discusses ‘indissociability’ when determining whether direct discrimination has occurred. Indissociability refers to circumstances in which...
The Employment Rights of Uber Drivers: A Battle Won, the War Goes On
The judgment of the English Court of Appeal in Uber B.V. & others v Aslam & others (Case No: A2/2017/3467; 19 December 2018) has been hailed as a victory for...
The Two Child Tax Limit Perpetuates the Myth of Poverty as a Moral Failing
Families who have a third child born after 6 April 2017 will not receive child tax credits for the third child (this has been known as a ‘two-child limit’). The...
Business and Human Rights: A Tale of Two Duties
With effect from 29 March 2017, the French Loi de la Vigilance introduced into the Commercial Code a duty on large companies to carry out a risk assessment down their...
Socio-Economic Rights and Land Reform in Scotland: Learning from South Africa
Balancing the property rights of landowners with the socio-economic rights of communities and tenants has developed into a focal point in the contemporary human rights debate in Scotland. This has...
UK Reform of Gender Recognition and the Commission for Equality and Human Rights
The UK Government’s consultation on reforming the Gender Recognition Act 2004 proposes making it easier for trans people to change legal sex or gender. Commentary supporting reform has relied upon...
Austerity Policies in the UK an Impermissible Retrogressive Measure
Under the umbrella of austerity, the UK has pursued a punishing regime of cuts to social welfare benefits and public services. This week the UN Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty...
The Consequences of the Ashers Cake Judgment
The Supreme Court has allowed the appeal by Belfast bakery Ashers Bakery and its managers Mr and Mrs McArthur in refusing to bake a cake for Gareth Lee, who had...