UK politics: a letter to my MP

[Glaurung]

I have now put my money where my mouth is (at least in the sense of time = money), and written to my MP. In the hope that it will be helpful to someone else, the text is below. Overall it took me under an hour to write, and another 15 minutes to deliver.


Dear MP

Human Rights in the UK

I am writing as one of your constituents, to express my concerns about proposed Conservative legislation. Obviously there are the proposed welfare cuts, which will damage the dignity and well-being of many of the most vulnerable members of our society. However, I fear that there are more urgent and more far-reaching threats.

As I'm sure you are aware, the Conservatives announced three pieces of proposed human rights legislation in their first few days in office:
- repeal of the Human Rights Act
- introduction of an "anti-extremism" bill
- introduction of the "snoopers' charter"

The "snoopers' charter" is bad enough, giving the government power to read all our electronic communications, any time it wants to, and possibly making illegal the encryption that protects our on-line transactions from criminals. However, it's the other two bills that are to my mind frankly terrifying.

The Human Rights Act was one of the principal achievements of the last Labour government, directly enshrining in British law the European Convention on Human Rights (itself the embodiment of a great deal of British legal principle). Repeal of the Act will render our human rights subject to change at will by a government that has already shown it cares very little for them. Your colleague Keir Starmer has already written in The Guardian of the dangers of going down this road. You might also be aware that an online petition (at keeptheact.uk) is being run by Amnesty International, and this on its own should surely set the alarm bells ringing – the world's foremost human rights campaign organisation is running a campaign aimed at our own government!

The "anti-extremism" bill threatens to introduce into British law the Orwellian concept of "thoughtcrime". If it passes, the government will have the power to decide that the expression of any particular opinion or view, even if legal, is unacceptable, and to gag anyone expressing such an opinion. This is immediately contrary to our right of freedom of speech, and indeed the legal principle of "innocent until proven guilty". It could, of course, very easily be used against anyone objecting to any government policy, including the welfare cuts already mentioned. The "snoopers' charter" would obviously facilitate this process.

I trust that this makes my concerns clear, and I hope that you will work to prevent any of these bills from becoming law.

Yours sincerely


My MP is Labour, which probably makes the letter easier for me to write as he will naturally oppose all this legislation anyway. For a Conservative MP, I would change the tone - remove the references to the welfare cuts, make more of the Convention being Winston Churchill's baby, obviously switch the mention of Keir Starmer (Labour) to Dominic Grieve, Ken Clarke or David Davis (Conservative).

Next steps? I'm contemplating writing to any or all of Dominic Grieve, Ken Clarke, David Davis and Keir Starmer. It's unconventional to write to MPs other than one's own, but they are likely to be leading the pro-human rights group, and I want them to know that I think they're doing the right thing.