Discovery Analytical Resourcing |
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Huda Ammori v Secretary of State
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General Measures Attached to the issue of equitable interference in Convention rights is the matter of whether the proscription of PA, as an Order of 'general measure', was proportionate and necessary - that is, whether the legislature had acted within the margin of appreciation ceded to national jurisdictions in the interpretation of Convention rights. For the Defence, consideration reverts to the primacy of Parliament to devise what powers are necessary and appropriate to protect against terrorism and for their application to reside with the discretion of the SSHD - for which, it was argued, a wide margin is available (Animal Defenders Intl v. UK 48876/08, 2013). Precedent was held to derive from the political executive's expertise, and its democratic accountability to Parliament, concerning national security matters (Begum v SSHD [2021] AC765). For the Claimant, it was simply not true that ECHR protections are automatically removed for cases heard involving violence loosely defined (judgment requires discrete, contextual, fact-sensitive review). Moreover, the fact that interference in the expression of political opinion would result in criminal conviction required detailed examination of the specific conduct to be prosecuted (Perincek v Switzerland 27510/08 2015). Citing the judgment of the ECtHR Grand Chamber (¶275): In this type of case, it is normally not sufficient that the interference was imposed because its subject-matter fell within a particular category or was caught by a legal rule formulated in general terms; what is rather required is that it was necessary in the specific circumstances. Interference The practice in common law of judicial analysis of proportionality has evolved a four-stage process to examine each instance of rights interference (cf Bank Mellat v HM Treasury 2 [2013] UKSC39 ¶74):
A) The objective must be sufficiently important to justify the interference;
The Defence entered at (A) the public interest in the control of the threat of terrorism; the maintenance of national security (B); refuted (C) that any less intrusive measures could offer comprehensive disruption to PA's activities; and asserted a fair balance was obtained by proscription (D) because PA was concerned in escalating terroristic activity as defined by statute. Several examples of failure of the SSHD's Order to hold up under condition (C) above were presented by the Claimant. Resort to proscription was excessive when such measures were available as the use of civil injunctions, behaviour orders and prosecution for criminal or terrorism offences. It was also argued (D) that a fair balance had not been attained between those rights curtailed and those protected (of the businesses implicated in atrocities; national security). With the broad impact of the Order sweeping up previously lawful actions in support of PA activities, the substance of the political expression itself, along with the Articles 10 and 11 rights of the wider public, had come under attack. Hussain also levelled a challenge at how the Order operates in practice in comparison with how it is prescribed in law: it imposes a range of legal sanctions applicable in an unforeseeable way (such as arrests of activists for sporting emblematic Palestinian clothing) while carrying no protection against arbitrary interference, thereby conveying the 'chilling effect' of potential exposure to adjunctive sections of the Terrorism Acts. The permissibility of this challenge was contested by Eadie as not having been submitted in the formal statements of claim. Political Discrimination Citing ECHR Article 14, Hussain made out a case for direct discrimination via differential assessment of Palestine Action compared with treatment of other protest groups such as Extinction Rebellion or Just Stop Oil. Intelligence agencies had noted, in a Community Impact Assessment of 6 March 2025, that proscription had never been used in respect of single-issue direct action movements. The Defence retort to this was to rely upon 'the need to control terrorist organisations' and to allege the seriousness of the damage committed by Palestine Action as a key distinguishing factor, although the Claimant argued that no evidence had been produced of a comparative assessment having been undertaken to support that position. |
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