Australia is deporting a Briton, a serial offender, back to the UK despite him having lived in Australia for more than 40 years and having a wife and three children.
We on, the other hand, can’t deport Aso Mohammed Ibrahim. an illegal immigrant, who fled the scene after killing a child when driving whilst disqualified because he has, yes a wife and two children in the UK and this would deprive him of his right to a family life under the Human Rights Act. It was reported that he is, like the UK resident of Australia, a serial offender having since racked up additional criminal convictions, including more driving offences and harassment.
It’s worth noting here that the right to a family life, as contained within Article 8 of the Act, is not an Absolute Right, it is a Qualified Right, ie one which has to be balanced against the rights of others, or the interests of society in general.
What Article 8 actually says is:
8(1). Everyone has the right to respect for his private and family life, his home and his correspondence.
8(2).There shall be no interference by a public authority with the exercise of this right except such as is in accordance with the law and is necessary in a democratic society in the interests of national security, public safety or the economic well-being of the country, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others.
I would have thought that the deportation of such an individual was ‘in the interests of public safety, for the prevention of crime and for the protection of others’ and I find it amazing that the judges thought otherwise and it would seem treated his ‘right’ to a family life as an absolute not a conditional one.
It’s rulings like this that give the whole Human Rights argument a bad name.
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