Day 157 - 18 Jul 95 - Page 42
1 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Yes.
2
3 MR. RAMPTON: Can I just read Article 25? It will save time.
4 It says this -- this is the enabling provision for
5 individuals, that is all: "The Commission may receive
6 petitions addressed to the Secretary General of the Council
7 of Europe from any person, non-governmental organisation or
8 group of individuals claiming to be the victim of a
9 violation by one of the high contracting parties, that
10 those are the governments of the rights set forth in this
11 Convention, provided that the high contracting party
12 against who the complaint has been lodged has declared that
13 it recognises the competence of the Commission to receive
14 such petitions."
15
16 My Lord, therefore, in this case, for example, the
17 Defendants are enabled by Article 25 to make a complaint to
18 the Commission because the United Kingdom government has
19 recognised the competence of the Commission by ratifying
20 the treaty.
21
22 My Lord, Article 27, (1) does not matter for these
23 purposes. "(2) The Commission shall consider inadmissible
24 any petition submitted in Article 25 which it considers
25 incompatible with the provisions of the present Convention
26 manifestly ill-founded or an abuse of the right of
27 petition."
28
29 My Lord, I shall come back to the words as you will see in
30 a moment "manifestly ill-founded" just a little later on.
31 Your Lordship remembers that the scheme of petitions or
32 applications to the European Court of Strasbourg is that an
33 application is made by way of petition to the Commission.
34 The Commission may declare the petition admissible or
35 inadmissible. If it declares it inadmissible, then it goes
36 on to be heard by the European Court. It may be
37 inadmissible for a number of reasons but if it is held to
38 be manifestly ill-founded, then it is chucked out neck and
39 crop. In other words, it is dismissed in limine.
40
41 My Lord, the only other two Articles which I believe I need
42 to draw your Lordship's attention to are Article 6 which is
43 on page 4 and the top of page 5 -- 6.1 in fact. 6.2
44 applies, I think, only to criminal proceedings. 6.1: "In
45 the determination of a civil rights and obligations or of
46 any criminal charge against him, everyone is entitled to a
47 fair and public hearing within a reasonable time by an
48 independent and impartial tribunal established by law.
49 Judgment shall be pronounced publicly, but the press and
50 public may be excluded from all or part of the trial in the
51 interests of morals, public order or national security in a
52 democratic society", and so on and so forth. I need not
53 read the rest of that.
54
55 My Lord, the other Article which may have some relevance to
56 the circumstances of this case, or might have, is Article
57 14 at the bottom of page 8: "The enjoinment of the rights
58 and freedoms set forth in this Convention shall be secured
59 without discrimination on any grounds such as sex, race,
60 colour, language, religion, political or other opinion,
