United Nations Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights visit to the UK: submission of evidence

The potential for sufficiently severe poverty to undermine an individual’s human rights is recognised by the UK judiciary and legal academics. But the UK’s human rights regime privileges the (mainly civil and political) rights in the ECHR above the economic and social rights protected by other treaties, hindering human rights law from fulfilling its potential to protect against poverty. Social rights instruments are likely to remain legally marginal unless incorporated into domestic law. Nonetheless, the UK has undertaken to respect, protect and fulfil certain rights and should be held accountable for success or failure to do so. The Special Rapporteur’s visit provides a vehicle for such accountability and, potentially, for raising the profile of social rights.