Conservative conference: We must be known as 'rule of law' party

The Conservatives must be known as the party committed to the rule of law, a former justice minister who resigned over Covid ‘rule-breaking’ in Downing Street has told his party’s annual conference.

Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (David Wolfson), now shadow attorney general, was responding to a criminal defence lawyer at a fringe event yesterday. He was asked how the Conservatives can restore their reputation, which had ‘taken a battering’, as the party that stands up for the rule of law. 

Wolfson replied that he resigned from government in 2022 ‘on the rule of law point’. Wolfson was appointed as a justice minister in 2020 but resigned in April 2022 after it emerged that then prime minister Boris Johnson and chancellor Rishi Sunak received fixed penalty notices in relation to a Downing Street gathering during lockdown.

Wolfson said: ‘We have to make sure we are known as the party committed to the rule of law. How do we do it? We do it by being resolute to make sure all our policies are underpinned by the rule of law and proper legal analysis.’

Party leader Kemi Badenoch announced last year that, following a review by Wolfson, the next Conservative government would quit the European Convention on Human Rights.

Wolfson told the event: ‘The ECHR is a perfectly good political argument to be had, whether you want to be in or out. What I objected to was Labour’s attempt to reclassify it as a foregone legal conclusion. Anyone can have an argument whether that is good or bad party policy but no one can say to us we have not thought it through.

'The place where in our constitution the most contested issues are to be decided is the floor of the House of Commons. In our system, the floor of the House of Commons trumps even the Supreme Court. That’s the way the system works, that places an important responsibility, particularly MPs, to uphold those principles.’

The event, entitled Justice prevails: Britain’s strength in access to justice, the rule of law and economic growth, was hosted by the Society of Conservative Lawyers, Law Society and Bar Council.