Absolute Right
A Convention right, such as Article 3's prohibition of torture, that can never be limited, restricted, or balanced against any competing public interest.
Independent editorial summary — not the official statute text. Read the official version on legislation.gov.uk.
Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights, scheduled to the Human Rights Act 1998, provides simply that no one shall be subjected to torture or to inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. Unlike qualified rights (such as Articles 8 to 11) or limited rights (such as Article 5), an absolute right admits of no derogation, exception, or justification by the state under any circumstances, however serious the public interest said to be at stake.
This means a public authority can never rely on resource constraints, national security, or the conduct of the individual concerned to justify torture or inhuman or degrading treatment. The European Court of Human Rights has held that Article 3 prohibits such treatment in absolute terms irrespective of the victim's conduct, including even where a person is suspected of involvement in terrorism — a principle applied, for example, to bar deportation of a person to a country where he faced a real risk of torture, regardless of the state's countervailing security concerns.
Example
In one case discussed by the Equality and Human Rights Commission, a man facing deportation argued that Article 3 barred his removal because he risked torture; the European Court of Human Rights held that Article 3's absolute prohibition applied irrespective of his suspected involvement in terrorism, and could not be outweighed by the state's security concerns.
Related terms
Official sources
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