9/11 consequently demonstrated a vulnerability to terrorism, both national and personal. The ‘need to protect’, was evidenced by the swift enactment of the ATCSA 2001. Risk and threat rhetoric was underpinned by a sense that everything could change imminently. This ‘need to protect’ escalated the perception that a ‘balance’ between security and rights was operational. This thesis focuses on three pieces of UK anti-terror legislation throughout the period of 2001-2006. It argues that while the term ‘balance’ is often used to describe how legislation is legitimised in favour of rights or security, the process of ‘balance’ is less explicit through political debate than may be expected. This thesis uses a mixed method approach consisting of both qualitative and quantitative methods. This was informed by the parliamentary debate located in Hansard. Whereas the quantitative data collected presented a broad overview of debate from the House of Commons during 2001-2006 specific to rights and security, the qualitative assessment reduced the breadth of review and focused on one case study from each of the acts examined. This examination highlighted various influences between conceptual interpretations and the allocation of roles with the constitutional framework in the UK. Seven key observations emerged through which this research established that there are too many influences on parliamentary debate to be able to ascertain precise data of how parliament actively creates legislation. This is further complicated by the existence of a number of shortfalls in the validation process of legislation within the UK parliamentary system. These findings pave the way for a review of human rights law incorporation within the UKs constitutional framework.

This thesis is the first major study of the UK Supreme Court’s use of jurisprudence from foreign domestic courts in human rights cases. It contributes to the debate on judicial comparitivism by asking when, how and why the Supreme Court uses foreign jurisprudence, as well as whether the Court should be making greater use of it. The research findings are drawn from quantitative and qualitative analysis of judgments handed down by the Supreme Court during its first four years (2009-2013). These are supported by evidence obtained through interviews with ten Justices of the Supreme Court, one Lord Justice of Appeal and the eight Supreme Court Judicial Assistants. In the absence of legislative guidance, the use of foreign jurisprudence is neither consistent nor systematic. Different Justices use foreign jurisprudence to different degrees and for different reasons. The main use of foreign jurisprudence is as a heuristic device: it provides the Justices with a different analytical lens through which to reflect on their own reasoning about a problem. Some Justices also use foreign jurisprudence when interpreting a common legislative scheme and to support their conclusions. As a result, the Justices use foreign jurisprudence differently according to the audience to whom their reasons are addressed. Thus foreign jurisprudence can assist the Supreme Court to enter into dialogue with the Strasbourg Court. However, this thesis does not support theories of transjudicial dialogue with other domestic courts; the evidence does not indicate that the Supreme Court considers itself to be part of global conversation. Further, the use of foreign jurisprudence is limited by practical barriers including, but not restricted to, time pressures, the availability of comparative resources and the greater use of plurality style judgments. These barriers are worth addressing if the Supreme Court is to fully utilise the heuristic value of foreign jurisprudence.