Suella Braverman reveals blueprint for leaving ECHR

Telegraph

a day ago

Suella Braverman has unveiled her legal blueprint for how the UK could quit the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) and accused Strasbourg of 'judicial imperialism.'
In a 56-page document, the former home secretary and attorney general says the UK should rewrite the 1998 Belfast Good Friday Agreement, stripping out ECHR references and replacing them with domestic UK and common law human rights principles.
Setting out the detailed legislative changes, she rejects 'apocalyptic' claims by the left of the Tory party and centrist politicians that this would threaten peace in Northern Ireland.
Writing in The Telegraph, Mrs Braverman says there is barely a 'single sphere of national life' left untouched by the 'creeping remit' of Strasbourg, from blocking the deportation of foreign criminals because of their family life to enabling the 'relentless persecution' of veterans and 'shackling our soldiers abroad.'
She adds: 'This is not simply judicial activism; it is a form of judicial imperialism. The time for debating whether we should leave is over. The question now is how we leave.'
Mrs Braverman, who was the first Cabinet minister to publicly call for the UK to quit the ECHR in 2022, is understood to have secured cross-party backing for the proposals from key figures on the right of the Tory party, senior DUP and Reform politicians and some within blue Labour.
It goes further than the Tories under Kemi Badenoch, who has said it is 'likely' she will seek to leave but has commissioned a review by shadow attorney general Lord Wolfson into the impact of any potential withdrawal.
It aligns Mrs Braverman with Reform UK, which has promised to quit the ECHR. She has pledged to remain in the Tory party but has backed an electoral pact with Nigel Farage's party. Her husband, Rael, quit Reform last week after attacks by its former chair Zia Yusuf on her and Robert Jenrick, who also supports quitting the ECHR.
Tory peer Lord Frost said: 'We all understand that leaving the ECHR is now essential. As Suella rightly argues, the real question is not 'whether' but 'how': how it can be done without disrupting our international relations or compromising the integrity of the United Kingdom.
'This bold, clear plan shows exactly how we can shake off the control of the ECHR's court and jurisprudence, and finally reclaim the sovereignty that Brexit promised.'
Richard Tice, the Reform deputy leader, said: 'This is a valuable and welcome policy paper on the vital objective of leaving the ECHR. Until we leave the ECHR, we are unable to save the UK from inexorable decline in so many important areas'
Former Northern Ireland first minister Baroness Foster said Mrs Braverman's proposals were a 'starting point for discussion and a pathway to restoring the primacy of our common law and the sovereignty of our Parliament whilst also securing the integrity of the UK.'
In her legal document, Mrs Braverman admits the ECHR is more entwined with law in Northern Ireland than elsewhere. However, to leave it as part of the Good Friday Agreement would mean 'unacceptable further divergence' between Northern Ireland and the UK.
She proposes amendments to the Northern Ireland Act to remove references to ECHR rights and replace them with new provisions ensuring continuity of rights in common law.
She argues that the Agreement has already been modified five times since 2006 through supplementary deals. 'There is no obligation within the Belfast Agreement to remain a party to the ECHR, only to protect rights in Northern Ireland. This can be achieved through domestic mechanisms, including the common law,' she said.
Mrs Braverman says the changes should be underpinned by four principles: legal uniformity between Northern Ireland and Britain; democratic accountability where Parliament and UK courts, not Strasbourg, determined human rights; consultation with Northern Irish communities; and honouring the spirit of the 1998 Agreement.
To quit, the UK would invoke article 58 of the ECHR, setting in train a six month transition process during which the UK should engage 'respectfully but firmly' with the Irish Government and Northern Irish parties to update and renegotiate the Good Friday agreement.
If some parties resist, it would be entirely within the UK Parliament's sovereign powers – as with the Windsor Framework – to proceed with domestic legislation amending the Northern Ireland Act 1998 to enact the changes,' she says.
At the same time, the UK would repeal the Human Rights Act, which embedded the ECHR in UK law, and enshrine in UK law the principle that Strasbourg judgments no longer bind UK courts or public authorities.
Mrs Braverman says: 'The ECHR's remit has become expansive, ideological, and hostile to the very idea of national democracy. It is time to acknowledge this. And act.'
The debate is no longer whether, but how, we leave
By Suella Braverman
For some years now, the case for leaving the European Convention on Human Rights has ceased to be controversial – at least among those willing to see things as they are.
That case has been rehearsed exhaustively, not least in these very pages. It is a case grounded not merely in law or policy, but in something deeper: the democratic instinct of a free people to govern themselves without supervision by unelected, unaccountable judges in Strasbourg.
During my time as attorney general, I saw first-hand the way in which the European Court of Human Rights has contorted itself in pursuit of an ideology foreign to our constitutional tradition. The moment that court blocked our ability to remove illegal migrants to Rwanda – a sovereign policy decision by a sovereign nation – was, for me, the final straw. Enough.
Let us be clear about what we are dealing with. A court that rules foreign criminals cannot be deported because of their family life. That shields terrorists from justice. That permits violent protestors to vandalise with impunity. Enables the relentless persecution of British veterans – men who risked life and limb to uphold the peace in Northern Ireland – while real threats go unchallenged.
A court that shackles our soldiers abroad and unpicks our policies at home. From planning law to immigration control, from welfare reform to environmental regulation, there is barely a single sphere of national life left untouched by the creeping remit of Strasbourg.
This is not simply judicial activism; it is a form of judicial imperialism. The time for debating whether we should leave is over. The question now is how we leave.
My new paper with Guy Dampier at the Prosperity Institute offers a comprehensive roadmap to reclaiming our sovereignty and restoring constitutional self-respect.
The main argument used to block any discussion of withdrawal is the supposed impossibility of doing so under the terms of the Belfast Good Friday Agreement. We are told, in increasingly apocalyptic tones, that departure from the ECHR would unravel the peace. This is legally wrong and politically hollow.
The Agreement makes reference to the ECHR, but it does not require the UK to remain a party in perpetuity. Indeed, the Belfast Agreement – hailed at the time as the final word on peace – has already been torn up, amended, and repurposed more times than its authors might have imagined.
The Northern Ireland Protocol, imposed in direct contradiction to the spirit of that Agreement, did not provoke collapse. As the late Lord Trimble warned, it amounted to a breach – and yet life carried on. There is room, therefore, for adaptation once again.
We set out four principles to manage this transition. First, legal uniformity: there must not be a two tier human rights regime within the United Kingdom; Northern Ireland must not be left behind.
Second, democratic accountability: our Parliament and courts, not Strasbourg, should determine the content and enforcement of those rights.
Third, genuine consultation with all communities in Northern Ireland. And fourth, peace through fairness – honouring the spirit, if not always the letter of the 1998 Agreement.
Once Article 58 of the Convention is invoked – a straightforward legal mechanism – the UK will enter a transition phase. During this period, the government should engage, respectfully but firmly, with the Irish government and Northern Irish parties to update and, where necessary, renegotiate the relevant portions of the Belfast Agreement.
If some parties resist, it would be entirely within the UK Parliament's sovereign powers – as with the Windsor Framework – to proceed with domestic legislation amending the Northern Ireland Act 1998 to enact the changes.
But this is not just about Northern Ireland. The restoration of sovereignty requires action across the UK's legal architecture. That means: repealing the Human Rights Act 1998; enshrining in law the principle that Strasbourg judgments no longer bind UK courts or public authorities; reforming judicial review to limit the reach of activist jurisprudence; amending the devolution statutes for Scotland and Wales to reflect the new constitutional settlement and renegotiating the references to the ECHR in the Trade and Cooperation Agreement with the EU.
The essence of our liberty
Would this mean the end of human rights in Britain? Only to those who have forgotten – or never understood – that this country did not discover liberty in 1950.
Long before the ECHR was drafted, our freedoms were protected by a rich body of statute and common law. As Lord Hoffmann once put it, the Convention did not create rights; it reflected the common law. Our system was already protecting people from torture, arbitrary detention, and state overreach – not through foreign fiat, but through Parliament and centuries of common law evolution.
Unlike the codified, bureaucratic, top-down systems of continental Europe, the British legal tradition begins with the individual. What is not prohibited is permitted. That is the essence of our liberty – and the foundation of our legal and political culture.
To depart the ECHR is not to dismantle rights, but to place their guardianship back where it belongs: with our elected representatives and our own courts. If those representatives err, the people can remove them. If judges overstep, Parliament can correct them. That is not chaos. That is democracy.
This will not be easy. We should not pretend otherwise. There will be resistance from vested interests: political, legal, and diplomatic. But sovereignty is not the path of least resistance. It is the path of self-respect.
The ECHR, like so many post-war institutions, was born out of noble intentions. But intentions alone do not justify perpetuity. Its remit has become expansive, ideological, and hostile to the very idea of national democracy. It is time to acknowledge this. And act.
We have laid out the roadmap to freedom. The path is there for those with the courage to walk it. The only question that remains is this: Who among us still believes that the British people are fit to govern themselves – and will act accordingly?