Human rights belong to us: Making rights accessible

To build a positive culture of human rights, everyone needs to know and be aware of their rights.

Conversations with our family and friends reveal experiences directly related to human rights all the time. A catch up about a routine visit to the GP can highlight many different rights in action, including but not limited to, the right to non-discrimination, privacy, freedom of expression and the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health.  

However, the connection to human rights isn’t always explicitly made. Sometimes, human rights may feel abstract; a far-off concept that might not belong to us. There is misconception that they are for legal professionals, academics and policy makers and don’t relate to our everyday lives. But they do.

Amnesty International has an excellent resource, ‘Right up your street’, which visually depicts rights being enjoyed, denied and demanded. Although designed for children and young people, it’s an illustration which can help spark conversations and encourage people to think about how human rights relate to their own everyday experiences in an accessible and creative way. It reminds me of a speech by Eleanor Roosevelt which highlights that human rights are for all of us and start where we are:

“Where after all, do universal human rights begin? In small places, close to home – so close and so small that they cannot be seen on any maps of the world. Yet they are the world of the individual person; the neighbourhood he lives in; the school or college he attends; the factory, farm or office where he works… unless these rights have meaning there, they have little meaning anywhere. Without concerted citizen action to uphold them close to home, we shall look in vain for progress in the larger world.”

Eleanor Roosevelt, 1958, during a speech at the United Nations called ‘Where Do Human Rights Begin?’[1]

To build a positive culture of human rights, everyone needs to know and be aware of their rights. Understanding our rights helps us to identify when they are not being met and how we can claim and defend them. Health is often overlooked when it comes to human rights. Just Fair recently launched a right to health campaign to raise awareness and advocate for people enjoying their right to health.

The ALLIANCE’s Health and Social Care Academy commissioned research to find out the extent to which the right to health is understood across Scotland with a focus on rights holders whose rights are most at risk. In 2023, the Academy published the research report ‘Investigating knowledge and understanding of the right to health’. The right to health underpins our ability to enjoy other rights: “Health is a fundamental human right indispensable for the exercise of other human rights.”[2] For example, if we are not feeling well, it can stop us from accessing education, going to work and taking part in cultural and leisure activities. It is an inclusive right and goes beyond access to health services to include the social determinants of health.

The right to health is described as one of our ‘everyday’ rights and is protected in international law under Article 12 of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (1966)[3] and features across several other treaties. Plans for a Human Rights Bill in Scotland would mean that ICESCR alongside three other UN treaties related to women (CEDAW), disabled people (CRPD) and people experiencing racism (CERD) would be incorporated into domestic law. Duty bearers would need to take positive steps to ensure that they are fulfilling these rights. It would offer people a route to challenge when they feel their rights have not been met

Our findings reflected that there is a lack of understanding amongst the public about the right to health and information relating to it. This is most significant for underrepresented groups and reflects wider structural inequalities. Some respondents highlighted a lack of understanding from NHS staff and services on their role in upholding individual’s rights. The complex nature of complaints processes reveals that people don’t know how to claim their right if they feel it has not been met.

The report makes a series of recommendations for Scottish Government, Healthcare bodies and the third sector about what is required to support people to understand their right to health. Key recommendations highlight human rights training for healthcare professionals, a streamlined complaints process, action to hold duty bearers to account, a commitment to research and engagement and the call to develop accessible information on human rights.

The report emphasises that the development of accessible and inclusive resources must be coproduced with rights holders, particularly those who are most likely to have experienced challenges in accessing their rights. Meaningfully engaging with groups and communities can result in going outside your comfort zone and doing things differently. Developing creative resources could be one way of supporting people to understand their rights. For example, Just Fair worked with community researchers to produce ‘Human Rights: Not a Game’, a game designed to raise awareness and support communities to have positive conversations about rights.

Raising awareness and providing information on human rights will have benefits for everyone. We would be better equipped to identify our rights and the rights of others, especially when they are not being met. We would know how we can challenge those responsible for upholding our rights. Feeling informed will support us to make decisions and choices that are right for us. Together we can build a human rights culture where everyone feels that human rights belong to them.    

[1] https://www.amnesty.org.uk/universal-declaration-human-rights-UDHR

[2] General comment No. 14: The right to the highest attainable

[3] https://www.ohchr.org/en/instruments-mechanisms/instruments/international-covenant-economic-social-and-cultural-rights

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