Equality Bill [HL]

moved Amendment No. 85:"Page 4, line 23, at end insert ““, and" (e)   promote awareness and understanding of the fact that in appropriate instances human rights involve the person whose rights are protected in concomitant responsibilities”” The noble Lord said: The amendment would add a new   obligation on the equality commission to promote awareness and understanding of the fact that in appropriate instances human rights involve the person whose rights are protected in concomitant responsibilities. I am conscious that in the Human Rights Act 1998 it is the public authorities who owe responsibilities to individuals. However, for reasons that I will explain, I believe that this is an area where debate might be valuable. In 1997, a group of senior politicians from all   over the world produced a report on a proposed universal declaration of human responsibilities. Among those who gave their unqualified endorsement to that document were the late Lord Callaghan of Cardiff, as well as Mr Jimmy Carter. In that document, they referred to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and expressed the view that it was now time to initiate an equally important quest for the acceptance of human duties or obligations. They said that, in any society, freedom can never be exercised without limits; that the more freedom we enjoy, the greater responsibility we bear towards others as well as ourselves; and that we must move away from the freedom of indifference to the freedom of involvement. They also said that, when freedom presents us with different possibilities for action, including the choice to   do right or wrong, although a responsible moral character will ensure that the former will prevail, sadly that relationship between freedom and responsibility is not always clearly understood. What is needed is a body to take responsibility for spreading understanding that responsibilities are the absolute corollary of human rights. I acknowledge that the consensus has been for the judiciary to emphasise that the majority of rights are qualified, but a great deal of the courts’ time and taxpayers’ and defendants’ money may be wasted before that point is reached. It would be far better that people should be educated, and what better body to take responsibility for that education could there be than the equality commission? It is also instructive to see how a religion from another part of the world considers the issue. Rather hesitantly, therefore, being completely unqualified to do so, I quote from Dr Chandra Muzzaffar, an Islamic scholar who wrote:"““the Quran lays out . . . our responsibility to self, family, relatives, the community, the state””." He says that, in Western society, the intricate balance between rights and responsibilities has been eroded by an obsession with rights. The importance of maintaining the link between right and responsibility is underscored by the grim tragedies unfolding in a certain sphere of social and human relationships. The AIDS phenomenon is tangible evidence of what can happen when the insistence on the exercise of one’s sexual rights is not accompanies by a deep sense of sexual responsibility. There are many other examples: the Travellers who move in and erect structures that flout the planning regulations but insist that any attempt to enforce those regulations breach their human rights; the terrorist who sues the police force that managed to shoot at him while he was exploding his bomb; and the imprisoned murderer who uses the human rights card to sue for solitary confinement, which was awarded for confrontational and threatening behaviour towards prison staff. Those are not isolated cases; they are only some examples. I beg to move.