‘Lukewarm’ commitment to rights convention

POLITICAL commitment to the European Convention on Human Rights is “lukewarm at best and hostile at worst”, a major legal conference has heard.

Colin Daly of the Northside Community Law Centre also said the European Convention on Human Rights, incorporated into law in 2003, has been shown to have “underlying weaknesses” without the support of legal arguments based on the Irish Constitution and other statutes.

The NCLC argued on behalf of Caroline McCann who owed money to her local credit union and won a landmark ruling on imprisonment for non-payment of debts after Ms McCann had brought a test case in 2009 challenging the constitutionality of debtors laws.