Human Rights Local

This report responds to the call for evidence from the European Committee of Social Rights by addressing the cost-of-living crisis in England. It examines the impact of the crisis on socio-economic rights within the context of England's social security and public transport systems.

By highlighting the challenges faced by groups at greater risk of harm, disadvantage and discrimination due to rising costs and service cutbacks, the report contributes to the ongoing dialogue on socio-economic rights and inequalities.

The report calls for transformative change to child services. Creating a social security system that guarantees the essentials in life, regulating for-profit children’s homes, and extending peer-parent support are among a list of recommendations that can help to eradicate the toxic culture of the England’s Child Protection Services. Conceived and developed in partnership with the anti-poverty human rights NGO ATD Fourth World, the report is based on law and policy desk research, data analysis, and interviews and focus groups with a total of 33 people (28 of them female), including parents, social workers and young adults.

Human Rights Local joined forces with ATD Fourth World, a human rights-based anti-poverty organisation with 60 years of experience in the UK, to submit evidence for the 7th periodic review of the UK in front of the UN Committee on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights. The submission focused on the right to protection and assistance to the family, recognised in Article 10 of the International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights.

The submission by ATD Fourth World and Human Rights Local brings to the attention of the UN Committee that families in poverty in the UK can be subjected by children’s social care to harsh interventions that are discriminatory and driven by a concept of risk-aversion that is inconsistent and fails to fully consider the harm done by removing children into State care or contested closed adoptions. This harm includes the current insufficient regulations for the accommodation of 16 to 18-year-olds in care, which makes them potentially vulnerable to grooming and trafficking.

This report documents the state of social rights in and near Colchester, home of the University of Essex Human Rights Centre.

The research uses the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights as the normative and analytical framework, and focuses on access to housing, social security, food poverty and child poverty, and access to libraries.

The report is based on quantitative and qualitative desk research, as well as 13 in-depth interviews with representatives and local officials, local community groups, local charities and non-profit organisations and academics, as well as information provided in writing by Colchester Borough Council and Essex County Council.

A shorter version of this research will be submitted to the UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights for their forthcoming review of the UK’s compliance with the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, a review that will take place between 2022 and 2024.

This report identifies some of the common characteristics of Human Rights Cities in Europe, as well as the potential benefits of becoming one.

The report provides historical background on the development of the concept of 'human rights city’. Based on a literature review and the case studies of seven self-declared human rights cities, the report identifies certain common characteristics. It also presents the case studies of nine cities in Europe, including three in England.

The first seven cases declared themselves human rights cities (Barcelona, Graz, Lund, Nuremberg, Utrecht, Vienna and York). The case studies provide a background on the city, presenting some of the structures and initiatives employed to implement a human rights framework.

The last two cities are from England (Brighton & Hove and Newcastle); while they have not yet declared themselves human rights cities, both of them have implemented interesting local initiatives in the domain of housing and homelessness that resonate with human rights principles.