Background: Positive obligations under the Human Rights Act
The Human Rights Act means that public authorities - for example the police, local authorities, schools, and health and social care services, must take proactive action to prevent violations of people’s human rights, including taking steps to prevent serious violence or death.
This duty for public bodies to take proactive action to prevent harm is known as ‘positive obligations’. If public bodies fail to act to protect women from harm, they can face legal action.
The Government’s new Bill of Rights seeks to limit these positive obligations, putting women and girls’ lives at risk.
We are looking for past and present examples from organisations where staff have relied on ‘positive obligations’ to ensure that police, local authorities, schools and other public authorities take proactive steps to protect women and girls at risk of VAWG.
A well known example of this is the Worboys case where survivors bought action against the police for their failure to properly investigate rape.
We are also interested in examples where cases did not proceed to legal action, but where the threat of legal action, drawing on the Human Rights Act, was enough to initiate action to protect women and girls.