scholarly journals Fail to Prepare and you Prepare to Fail: the Human Rights Consequences of the UK Government’s Inaction during the COVID-19 Pandemic

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (4) ◽  
pp. 459-480 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rhiannon Frowde ◽  
Edward S. Dove ◽  
Graeme T. Laurie
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Civil Liberties ◽  
First Year ◽  
Inadequate Response ◽  
The Novel ◽  
The Public ◽  
Health And Wellbeing ◽  
Analytical Perspective ◽  
Uk Government ◽  
The Uk

AbstractAs the sustained and devastating extent of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic becomes apparent, a key focus of public scrutiny in the UK has centred on the novel legal and regulatory measures introduced in response to the virus. When those measures were first implemented in March 2020 by the UK Government, it was thought that human rights obligations would limit excesses of governmental action and that the public had more to fear from unwarranted intrusion into civil liberties. However, within the first year of the pandemic’s devastation in the UK, a different picture has emerged: rather than through action, it is governmental inaction that has given rise to greater human rights concerns. The UK Government has been roundly criticized for its inadequate response, including missteps in decision-making, delayed implementation and poor enforcement of lockdown measures, abandonment of testing, shortages of critical resources and inadequate test and trace methods. In this article, we analyse the UK Government’s missteps and compare them with published international guidance; we also contrast the UK’s decisions with those taken by several other countries (including the devolved administrations within the UK) to understand how its actions and inactions have contributed to unfavourable outcomes. Using an analytical perspective that demonstrates how human rights are both a protection from the power of the state and a requirement that governmental powers are used to protect the lives, health and wellbeing of citizens, we argue that the UK Government’s failure to exercise their powers competently allowed the virus to spread without ensuring the country had the means to manage a high case load. This abject failure has led to one of the highest rates of deaths per capita worldwide. We offer several lessons that can be learnt from this unfortunate, but preventable, situation.

scholarly journals Introduction: Equality and Human Rights in Britain

2011 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 191-192
Author(s):  
Sheila Riddell ◽  
Nick Watson
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Sexual Orientation ◽  
Public Sector ◽  
Radical Change ◽  
Legal Framework ◽  
First Century ◽  
British Government ◽  
The Public ◽  
Uk Government ◽  
The Uk

The first ten years of the twenty-first century has seen the British Government introduce radical change to its equality policy. These changes have included the creation of a single equalities body, the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC); the expansion of the equality terrain to include age, sexuality and sexual orientation and faith and belief in addition to gender, race and disability as protected grounds; the decision to coalesce human rights and equality legislation under the direction the EHRC; the development of an Equalities Framework; the promulgation of a new Equality Act (2009) with the aim of creating a single legal framework to cover all equality legislation together with the development of specific Equality Duties for the public sector around the areas of gender, race and disability with the aim of ‘mainstreaming’ equality. Barbara Roche, the then Minister responsible for equality co-ordination across the UK Government described these changes as ‘the most significant review of equality in over a quarter of a century’.

ICT and Human Rights in Brazil

2014 ◽  
pp. 86-99
Author(s):  
José Rodrigues Filho
Keyword(s):  
Information Technology ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Public Sector ◽  
Public Administration ◽  
Civil Liberties ◽  
Biometric Identification ◽  
Electronic Surveillance ◽  
The Public ◽  
Voting System ◽  
National Constitution

Since the end of military government in Brazil, civilian governments have sought the accumulation and exercise of power to the detriment of the citizenry. They have done this with a kind of totalitarianism that takes the form of digital or bureaucratic dictatorship. Since the 1990s, they have started to implement information technology in the public sector to regulate and run the country in a command-and-control way through technological or bureaucratic dictatorship rather democratic process. While it is evident that there is a high level of investment in information technology in the public sector (e-government) in Brazil, there are also clear signs of the violation of human rights in terms of privacy. These occur, for instance, when the public administration exercises the power to engage in a process of electronic surveillance without the supervision of the judiciary. It is alleged that thousands of individual files have been accessed in the public administration in Brazil, despite the privacy protection offered by the national constitution. In addition, there is a proliferation of biometric identification using faces, eyes, fingerprints, and other body parts, especially in the e-voting system. This chapter shows how information technology (e-government) in Brazil could lead to violations of human rights because of the proliferation of biometric identification in the e-voting system as well as other sorts of invisible electronic surveillance that are affecting civil liberties and individual rights, including privacy.

10. Terrorism and Human Rights

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ruth Costigan ◽  
Richard Stone
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Police Powers ◽  
Uk Government ◽  
The Law ◽  
Control Orders ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Terrorism Prevention

Course-focused and comprehensive, the Textbook on series provide an accessible overview of the key areas on the law curriculum. This chapter first considers the definition of ‘terrorism’. It then turns to laws which the UK government has put in place to attempt to deal with this area, including proscription of organizations, modification of police powers, and various forms of restrictions on movement, including ‘control orders’ and their successors — terrorism prevention and investigation measures.

15. The European Convention on Human Rights and the Human Rights Act 1998

Public Law ◽  
2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Stanton ◽  
Craig Prescott
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Common Law ◽  
Civil Liberties ◽  
European Convention ◽  
Bill Of Rights ◽  
Rights Protection ◽  
Positive Rights ◽  
Human Rights Act ◽  
Human Rights Act 1998 ◽  
The Uk

One of the most fundamental aspects of any constitution are the provisions and measures that protect the rights and freedoms of individuals. In the UK, rights protection is markedly different to that in America, in chief because there is no entrenched Bill of Rights. Rights protection is dominated by the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), incorporated by the Human Rights Act 1998, which sets out a number of positive rights that are actionable in the UK courts This chapter discusses the ways in which these rights are protected in the UK Constitution. It discusses the courts' historic civil liberties approach and common law protection of rights, before then examining the development, incorporation, and application of the ECHR. The chapter also explores the way in which the various sections of the Human Rights Act 1998 work to ensure appropriate enforcement and protection of rights in UK law.

A human rights perspective on the use of social media by the ambulance services

2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (12) ◽  
pp. 532-537
Author(s):  
Chris Jones
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Media Use ◽  
Legal Framework ◽  
Ambulance Service ◽  
Social Media Use ◽  
The Public ◽  
Legal Duty ◽  
Use Of Social Media ◽  
The Uk

Social media use on behalf of ambulance services by paramedics, student paramedics and ancillary staff—‘corporate tweeting’, as it has become known—has in recent times been the subject of much debate in the paramedic profession. It has been argued that social media use is an unstoppable tide and a necessary means of imparting information to members of the public about the work the ambulance service performs. Conversely, others have argued that by tweeting about their patients, the ambulance service is breaching a fundamental code of professional ethics due to the use of confidential patient data. This article explores the UK legal framework of privacy and confidence in the healthcare context, from a human rights perspective, and seeks to demonstrate that some corporate tweeting has breached not only ethical standards, but may also have crossed the line into unlawfulness owing to the public nature of the organisations involved, and their legal duty to protect the human rights of their service users.

scholarly journals The United Kingdom’s Coronavirus Act, deprivations of liberty, and the right to liberty and security of the person

2020 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Jonathan Pugh
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
European Convention ◽  
Human Rights Law ◽  
Legal Certainty ◽  
The Public ◽  
European Court ◽  
The Uk ◽  
The Right ◽  
Article 5

Abstract In response to the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus pandemic the UK government has passed the Coronavirus Act 2020 (CA). Among other things, this act extends existing statutory powers to impose restrictions of liberty for public health purposes. The extension of such powers naturally raises concerns about whether their use will be compatible with human rights law. In particular, it is unclear whether their use will fall within the public heath exception to the Article 5 right to liberty and security of the person in the European Convention of Human Rights. In this paper, I outline key features of the CA, and briefly consider how the European Court of Human Rights has interpreted the public health exception to Article 5 rights. This analysis suggests two grounds on which restrictions of liberty enforced some under the CA might be vulnerable to claims of Article 5 rights violations. First, the absence of specified time limits on certain restrictions of liberty means that they may fail the requirement of legal certainty championed by the European Court in its interpretation of the public health exception. Second, the Coronavirus Act’s extension of powers to individuals lacking public health expertise may undermine the extent to which the act will ensure that deprivations of liberty are necessary and proportionate.

scholarly journals Time-use and mental health during the COVID-19 pandemic: a panel analysis of 55,204 adults followed across 11 weeks of lockdown in the UK

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Feifei Bu ◽  
Andrew Steptoe ◽  
Hei Wan Mak ◽  
Daisy Fancourt
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Time Use ◽  
Fixed Effects ◽  
Panel Study ◽  
Social Study ◽  
Panel Analysis ◽  
The Public ◽  
Health And Wellbeing ◽  
The Uk ◽  
The Impact

There is currently major concern about the impact of the global COVID 19 outbreak on mental health. But it remains unclear how individual behaviors could exacerbate or protect against adverse changes in mental health. This study aimed to examine the associations between specific activities (or time use) and mental health and wellbeing amongst people during the COVID 19 pandemic. Data were from the UCL COVID 19 Social Study; a panel study collecting data weekly during the COVID 19 pandemic. The analytical sample consisted of 55,204 adults living in the UK who were followed up for the strict 11 week lockdown period from 21st March to 31st May 2020. Data were analyzed using fixed effects and Arellano Bond models. We found that changes in time spent on a range of activities were associated with changes in mental health and wellbeing. After controlling for bidirectionality, behaviors involving outdoor activities including gardening and exercising predicted subsequent improvements in mental health and wellbeing, while increased time spent on following news about COVID 19 predicted declines in mental health and wellbeing. These results are relevant to the formulation of guidance for people obliged to spend extended periods in isolation during health emergencies, and may help the public to maintain wellbeing during future pandemics.

A Secure Hybrid Network Solution to Enhance the Resilience of the UK Government National Critical Infrastructure TETRA Deployment

2011 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-13
Author(s):  
Devon Bennett ◽  
Hamid Jahankhani ◽  
Mohammad Dastbaz ◽  
Hossein Jahankhani
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
Critical Infrastructure ◽  
Public Information ◽  
Cellular Systems ◽  
Hybrid Network ◽  
The Public ◽  
Technological Advances ◽  
Uk Government ◽  
Communication Traffic ◽  
The Uk

In developed economies, electronic communication infrastructures are crucial for daily public, private, and business interactions. Cellular systems are extensively used for business communications, private interaction, and in some cases, public information services, via such uses as mass SMS messaging. The Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN) is at the core of all communications platforms. It was used primarily for voice communication purposes, but with current technological advances, this platform has been transformed from a voice to voice interface to a web enabled multimedia platform that provides commercial, business, and e-commerce services to the public. In response to the September 11, 2001, terrorist acts in New York City, the UK government introduced a policy of separating and transferring all emergency communication traffic from the PSTN to a digital public safety network based on the TETRA architecture. This paper extends the utilisation of the TETRA deployment by discussing a secure MANET hybrid solution for use in extreme situations as a short/mid-term EMS organisational communication platform for emergency and rescue operations.

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