Read the report here        Read the Executive Summary here

The Conservative European Forum has today launched a major new report by former Attorney General, Rt Hon Dominic Grieve KC, warning that leaving the ECHR would do nothing to stop illegal migration. Successful human rights appeals account for just 3.5% of all deportations, the UK was found in breach only twice since 2023, and there have been just thirteen judgments against the UK on removals of foreign nationals since 1980.

Dominic Grieve said: “The current Conservative policy to leave the ECHR is not merely flawed and incapable of delivering its stated objectives to tackle illegal migration – it is actively preventing us from developing policies that could work.Progress lies in working with our European neighbours, who face identical and often worse challenges, whilst pursuing domestic reforms and prioritising practical co-operation on returns with third countries and the European Union. ECHR reform has presented an opportunity which the United Kingdom should now seize, not by retreating from the Convention, but by exercising the leadership that has long defined its role in shaping a rules-based European order.”

The report, ‘Patchwork Quilts and Threadbare Solutions: Why Proposals to Control Irregular Migration by Leaving the ECHR Would Not Work’, makes the positive case for our continued membership of the Convention and challenges Lord Wolfson’s advice that withdrawal is a gateway condition for reform.

Even the Wolfson Review concedes that leaving would not strip individuals of most existing protections, as the UK would remain committed to international obligations and common law protections. These could be overridden to strip back our fundamental rights, but it would serve no useful purpose.

The costs would be severe. For the stability of the Union, in particular for the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement in Northern Ireland. For our membership of the Council of Europe. And for our security co-operation with the European Union. The serious political questions raised in Lord Wolfson’s advice remain unanswered.

Following the recent migration summit in Chișinău, the report positions the UK to lead Europe’s response to illegal migration through ECHR reform and a new European sanctions regime for non-co-operative third countries. Lord Wolfson himself has said that his advice should be reconsidered if meaningful reform is achieved. The Conservative Party must now listen.

CEF President Sir David Lidington KCB CBE said: “Any political party aspiring not only to win the next General Election but to then provide an effective government needs a credible plan to tackle irregular migration. The Conservative Party is right to make this a policy priority. But as Dominic Grieve’s detailed paper shows, the argument for leaving the ECHR deserves a great deal more scrutiny and scepticism than it has so far received. There is a powerful case for urgent and significant reform, including through amendment of the Human Rights Act 1998, of the way the Convention is interpreted in immigration cases. Changes to domestic law should be reinforced by the United Kingdom working closely with our fellow European democracies to shape how the Court of Human Rights and other Council of Europe institutions interpret the Convention. Our previous experience in government, whether Ken Clarke’s negotiation of the Brighton Declaration to strengthen the “margin of appreciation” granted to national courts, or my own work to resolve successfully the vexed issue of prisoner voting, has shown how the Convention can evolve where the political will exists.”

Former Justice Secretary Sir Robert Buckland KBE KC said: “The paper correctly makes the point that membership of the ECHR is not pivotal to the question of how limits to the way in which UK’s immigration policy are determined, which is chiefly governed by other conventions and by domestic law.  It is also right to point out the threat to political stability in Northern Ireland and to the EU-UK Trade and Cooperation Agreement that withdrawal clearly poses.  At a time when many members of the Council of Europe are seeking a change of approach on immigration, this presents an opportunity for the UK to seek to achieve reform, rather than starting the lengthy process of withdrawal first.”

CEF Chair Stephen Hammond said: “Today’s report leaves no doubt that withdrawal from the ECHR would solve none of the practical problems at our borders, while doing lasting damage to the Union, to the peace settlement in Northern Ireland, and to the security co-operation on which we rely to keep this country safe. The solution lies elsewhere. The United Kingdom now has an opportunity to lead a European response to irregular migration: through meaningful reform of the Convention and the Strasbourg Court, a robust sanctions regime, and renewed access to Eurodac and SIS II.”