The United Kingdom and Human Rights - College of Social ...

118 Values and Civil and Political Liberties
embarrassment of treating the IRA as a de facto
administration capable of conducting war and of giving
them such a propaganda victory explain the determination
of governments not to declare existence of a state of
war. Applying the peacetime criteria to enforcement of
order, soldiers, including members of the SAS, may be
acting in defence of a person, or in self-defence, or
attempting to arrest or to quell a riot and using no more
force than is absolutely necessary. A difficult evaluation
would have to be made on the specific facts. As things
now stand, since there is no state of war, and since the
SAS is a military force trained to kill rather than to
arrest, there are serious questions about the lawfulness
of rendering it operational in times of peace. Certainly
any "shoot to kill policy" is unlawful and could only
become lawful in time of war. Even then it would have
to be confined in scope, covering combatants in action or
subject to guerilla attack.
Improving Domestic Institutions Giving Effect to
Human Rights
That the United Kingdom judiciary has not been
authorised to pronounce on the Convention by making it
part of domestic law is a signal vote of no-confidence in
judges by successive United Kingdom governments.
With such governmental judgments on judicial competence
no mere academic's strictures can compare.
The reasons given by the present government for
refusing to incorporate the Convention are thin. It has
argued that the Convention's broad propositions are
unsuited to the British style of interpreting the will of
Parliament by using close textual analysis; that there is a
risk of conflict between the courts and the Government