In this blog, AYPH’s Youth Engagement & Partnership Project Manager, Nick Morgan shares reflections from our Young Ambassadors on a human rights and health workshop, run for the AYPH Youth Advisory Panel by The British Institute of Human Rights.
Human rights. Something often construed as so abstract that they do not impact us. But they do – every single day. Human rights have influenced our legal frameworks and can help us fight against individuals and institutions who break them. Although some rights can be limited, they cannot be taken away.
Earlier this year, our Young Ambassadors and Young Advisors were lucky enough to receive a free workshop from The British Institute of Human Rights (BIHR). BIHR invited community groups from across the UK to apply to receive a bespoke workshop on human rights in the UK and we were chosen to receive the training.
The group of young people enthusiastically came together online and got straight into the content, which included three key topics:
- how human rights work in the UK,
- how you can use human rights in your life and;
- a focus on relevant rights that could impact young people’s access to appropriate and relevant health services.
Our facilitator, the brilliant Phoebe Craig from BIHR, set the scene, informing us that human rights are Universal – they belong to everyone. They were born out of the creation of the Universal Declaration on Human Rights in 1948, which in turn led to the Council of Europe* creating the European Convention on Human Rights in 1950. This eventually led to the UK creating its own ‘Human Rights Act’ in 1998, which came into force in 2000 and has been part of our law making process ever since.
The session focused on two articles of the Human Rights Act that specifically link to young people’s access to health.
- Article 8: The right to respect for private and family life, home and correspondence, and;
- Article 14: The right to be free from discrimination
For each article, we discussed case studies and had to decide whether we believed the response to be lawful, for a ‘good reason’ and/or proportionate.
For the Article 8 case study, the group felt that something was not right about the GP’s treatment of Lila, being dismissed so bluntly and that there was generally a lack of listening and empathy. By ignoring Lila’s wishes, this takes away her right to a private life. As a 17-year-old, she is entitled to make a final decision about her medication (as is the case for 16+), not her GP or her parents.
One attendee focused on how important human rights are to remember in circumstances such as this. “I learnt that even though human rights look like a daunting phrase, we all have them and have the right to express them!” Young Person
For the Article 14 case study, the whole group agreed that there was clear discrimination going on. The fact that Omar was getting ‘good grades’ isn’t reason enough for the school to refuse Omar an assessment on a health condition and so is discriminating against him because of his educational attainment. Omar was also having their access to a private life (participation in community and relationships with others) affected, and so human rights were being breached.
We finished our session by giving Phoebe and BIHR a HUGE thank you for the amazing session.
*(Not the EU)
Find out more about the BIHR’s work here.
September 2024