Tim Worstall

Right, well, that’s that then, liberty is dead.

All four copies of the 1215 Magna Carta – the celebrated civil liberties document – have been granted World Heritage status by the United Nations.

When they start putting things in museums you know that the next stage is to say that it’s not relevant to the modern world.

Credited with establishing many of the freedoms on which English and international law is founded, the charter was forced on King John by his subjects, and guaranteed certain civil liberties.

One of its most durable legacies is the right of Habeas Corpus – still used in law today – and which grants the individual the right to be freed from judicial detention or harm.

See, they don’t even understand the bleedin’ concept. Which is that you should be free from arbitrary detention or harm, and only subject to that imposed by the judiciary.

And of course, Habeas Corpus has bugger all to do with international law. If it did, we wouldn’t have the appalling extradition treaty that we do with the US, nor the European Arrest Warrant.