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Human Rights

I understand my hon. Friend’s logic, but as I said, I cannot take the matter further. The hon. Member for Aldridge-Brownhills (Mr. Shepherd) has huge respect for our freedoms and I have huge respect for him, not least as a former colleague on the Joint Committee on Human Rights. However, I fear that he is too convinced that because we are democratically voted into Parliament we will decide everything correctly for the public good, and that people can always be confident that because we have been voted in we shall be able to preserve everybody’s individual rights all the way through, so they need no further empowerment because they have us. I do not agree. People require empowerment and a means—whether international or not—to implement their rights themselves. I am sorry that the hon. Gentleman’s love of democracy does not make him understand that we need to deepen it in exactly that way.