The left wing argument for leaving the ECHR (with Freddie Feltham)

In a clip from today's podcast, Ava and Laura are joined by Freddie Feltham, co-host of the What’s Left podcast, to make the left wing case for leaving, or rather reforming, the ECHR. The conversation explores how an institution created in the aftermath of the Second World War to safeguard liberty and prevent fascism has, in Freddie’s view, evolved into something that may now be fuelling the very forces it was designed to resist.

Freddie argues that stories about serious offenders avoiding deportation under the ECHR have become ammunition for the right wing press and populist commentators, and that the left cannot afford to ignore the public anger these cases provoke. He suggests that by refusing to engage with legitimate frustrations about immigration and sovereignty, progressives risk alienating ordinary voters and reinforcing the perception that the left is out of touch.

The conversation also looks back to Clement Attlee’s post-war Labour government, which originally opposed supranational control over British law, and considers what that tradition of popular sovereignty might mean for the modern left. For Freddie, reclaiming the principles of democracy, accountability and fairness from the right is essential if progressive politics is to survive.

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