Membership of the Eoropean Community and the effects of the Human Essay

Membership of the Eoropean Community and the effects of the Human Rights Act 1998 has had little impact on the approaches to statutory interpretation practiced - Essay Example e provisions of the European Convention of Human Rights could not be used for purposes of statutory interpretation.4Parliamentary sovereignty means that UK law can override international law7, however, the Communities Act of 1972 and the Human Rights Act have raised the question of supremacy of EU law over national law and its application within the country. In the case of FitzPatrick v Sterling8, the Courts had denied statutory rights to a same sex surviving spouse. In the case of Ghaidan v Mendoza9 Mr. Mendoza’s application for statutory tenancy on grounds of discriminatory violation of his Convention Rights under Article 14 and Article 8 on the basis of his sexual orientation, were allowed, in order to protect his freedom to choose his own sexual lifestyle. The case of Bellinger v Bellinger10 deals with the issue of the freedom of a transsexual man-to-woman to his private life and the right to marry, and the Parliament in UK is legislating on the issue of making national law compatible with that laid down by the ECHR in the case of Goodwin v UK11 in which a transsexual’s right to marry was upheld by the Court, thereby upholding the individual’s right to privacy and a normal life. In the Ghaidan case, Mr. Mendoza contended that the House of Lords should exercise its interpretative power to read and give effect to Para 2(2) on statutory rights to make it compatible with Convention rights that guarantee fundamental human rights, including succession rights, which prohibit discrimination on grounds of sexual orientation. The grounds that were offered in support were the provisions of Section 3 of the Human Rights Act, which states that Parliament legislation must be read and given effect to in a way that will be compatible with Convention rights â€Å"so far as it is possible to do so.†12 Further more the Human Rights Act of 1988 incorporated the goals of the European Convention of Human Rights13 within the framework of national law, by including a provision