Over the years, national courts in the United Kingdom have found it difficult to interfere with Parliament's role in legislation on matters relating to human rights. One of the main difficulties that courts have faced is whether or not they have the supremacy to declare national law incompatible with treaty rights. However, the courts, through the Human Rights Act[1], have the power to declare national laws incompatible. Therefore they should not feel the need to impose limits on their power because it is their constitutional role to uphold and challenge the law. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original EssayThe law is meant to work for the people and not against the people, but as seen in the assisted suicide cases, the law has worked against the people. In these cases the people were individuals who wished to end their lives because they felt that their life was undignified, full of pain, distressing and intolerable. Statistics have shown that hundreds of people with terminal or chronic conditions commit suicide every year and that approximately 44% of their loved ones would break the law and help them die, risking a fourteen-year prison sentence.[2] The law has turned its back on these vulnerable individuals and left them and their families unprotected and alienated. The current law on assisted suicide[3] has therefore been challenged before national courts and the European Court of Human Rights. Several individuals over the years have challenged the law but none have been successful even after the inclusion of the right to die was accepted. in the right to private and family life enshrined in Article 8 of the Convention, demonstrated in the Pretty case.[4] Pretty, who approached the European Court of Human Rights after believing that her Article 8 rights had been violated by the government, partially rejected her request because, as the Strasbourg Court explained, the section 2 of Article 8 was "designed to safeguard life by protecting the weak and vulnerable and especially those who are unable to make informed decisions against acts intended to end life or contribute to ending life". In addition to this, the court explained that it is up to the States to examine the risk of a relaxation of the law on assisted suicide. As seen in the Nicklinson case, the courts denied Mr. Nicklinson both forms of relief for a declaration that it would be permissible for a doctor to kill or assist him to end his intolerable life and a declaration that the existing rule of law in this regard is incompatible with his rights under Article 8 of the Convention. The majority of the Lords concluded that it was not the role of the courts to act as final arbiter on whether the current law on assisted suicide should be modified or declared incompatible with Convention rights. This case raised many questions regarding the relationship between parliament and the courts and who has primary responsibility for declaring national law incompatible with treaty rights. Some of the reasons why neither body has declared the law incompatible or changed it is because the courts believe that it is not their constitutional role to address questions of law that raise such sensitive ethical, moral and social questions. They believe this would affect the role of parliament considering it is the supreme legislator, but any statement made by the courts does not question parliamentary sovereignty. 1