UK citizens, help me out: Is there a way you can appeal against laws like this? In Germany, something like that would be thrown out by the Bundesverfassungsgericht, the federal constitutional court. Is there nothing similar in the UK?
Slightly more complex than that, as the ECHR isn't an EU institution, so Brexit won't result in any significant change to the relationship with the ECHR (it's a little more complex than I've made sound, as there are some relatively minor links with the EU).
However, May has stated her desire to also leave the European convention on human rights (and replace it with a UK owned Bill of Rights). This is not something that's happening as part of Brexit, and no bills have been presented before Parliament with this as a component or purpose.
I would assume that the government would take the pragmatic approach that it's better to focus on Brexit for now, and deal with the ECHR once Brexit is over with. However, I have no inside knowledge of this, and that's just my wild and unsubstantiated assumption.
There is one other relevant complexity. ECHR membership is a condition of being a member of the EU. Brexit has to happen for the UK to depart from the ECHR.
So voting for Remain was also a vote to keep the UK locked in to the ECHR. Voting for Leave was also a vote to release that lock.
The European Court of Human Rights is separate from the EU and the UK will will still be part of it after Brexit. But the political climate might be such that leaving ECHR could follow on from Brexit
It'd be great if the UK had a written constitution. But let's also be realistic here. The US also has a written constitution and the NSA has a database exactly like this one anyway, and such databases are also available to a mishmash of random law enforcement bodies. The constitution didn't help.
Also, the UK is signed up to the ECHR which theoretically guarantees a right to privacy. It's sort of like the US Bill of Rights except useless, because it was drafted by Europeans so every right has a giant get-out clause. In this case the so-called "right" to privacy exists only as long as it doesn't conflict with the "needs of a democratic society". That sort of thing crops up all the time in this document.
It's not sufficient to have a constitution. It must have teeth as well.
Germany has a proper constitution which makes it easy to judge if something is unlawful. In the UK, the constitution is just a collection of ways of doing things. That makes it harder to throw a law like this out.
