Civil and Political
International
Rights or
Covenant on Economic,
its
companion, the
Social and Cultural
Rights.
It is
commitment a
to respecting the two
international covenants referred to in article 39 of the
Basic Law which has become, naturally enough, the focus of
attempts to establish,
end of British rule
compliance signed.22
before the
21
on
Until that
30 June 1997, a framework for judicially enforceable human
rights applicable in Hong Kong thereafter.
date the United Kingdom is obliged to report upon its
in Hong Kong with the covenants which it has
After that date, it may be doubted that the PRC
would agree to so report. More likely is it that the PRC
would contend that conformity within Hong Kong with the
covenants to the extent that they are incorporated in the
law of Hong Kong
is a matter of the "internal affairs" of
23
This argument might have
China.
particular force by
itself a party to the
covenants and looks unlikely, for the foreseeable future, to
becoming so.
reason of the fact that China is not
These reasons explain why the draft Bill of Rights
Ordinance 1990, as amended, takes on a special significance
for Hong Kong. It provides a potential framework for a
justiciable enforcement of basic rights by an
basic rights by an independent
judiciary. This is now a well established function of the
judiciary in many countries, including countries sharing the
same legal tradition as Hong Kong presently enjoys. There is
therefore a well established jurisprudence in those countries
upon which judges of Hong Kong, before and after 1997, could
draw in discharging the function of enforcing a bill of
rights. That jurisprudence has been enhanced, in a way
- 7 -