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LETTER TO THE FIRST MINISTER - ICCPR UPDATE

From Henry Ferguson



Dear co-signatory,

 

It’s almost six weeks since we published the open letter to the First Minister which has been updated to include the 263 signatures received so far.  Thank you for your support!

 

As most of you know, our petition to the Scottish Parliament asking it to recognise Direct Democracy (DD) by enacting the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) was rejected and we’re currently contesting the rejection with the Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee (CPPPC) (members are: Jackson Carlaw MSP (Convener) & Maurice Goldon MSP (both Conservative), Foysol Choudhury MSP (Labour) and David Torrance MSP (Deputy Convener) & Fergus Ewing MSP (both SNP)).

 

We’ve shared two things with the CPPPC: 1) the extract from the Scotland Act 1998 which clearly states that ICCPR implementation is within the power of the Scottish parliament; and 2) the Scottish Human Rights Commission’s (SHRC) report that supports our position that ICCPR can be immediately brought into Scots law.  Both documents are attached (apologies if you’ve already received this…)

 

Last week, the Executive Director of the SHRC confirmed our position and we’ll shortly be opening a dialogue with the Chairman to ensure Parliament and Government shortcomings are noted at the highest possible level.  (The SHRC is the UN-accredited independent Scottish agency which monitors conformity with Human Rights - including direct Political Rights (i.e. Art 25 of ICCPR) - on behalf of the Scottish People).

 

We remain confident that the parliamentary petitions team’s position is wrong and we’re still in discussion.  It’s not excluded that if implementation of the entire ICCPR presents practical difficulties, we might refocus our Petition to request implementation of only Art. 25 on direct Political Rights.

 

We’ll give the CPPPC a reasonable period to respond (or not), then we’ll close the FM open letter signature-collection process and begin a new campaign phase with Scotland Decides.  Until then, we’re still accepting signatures to the FM letter, so please continue to share widely with family, friends and colleagues.

 

 

(s) Henry Ferguson

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