Following the transfer of Southport killer Axel Rudakubana to Broadmoor high-security psychiatric hospital, questions have resurfaced over whether Britain could ever reintroduce capital punishment for offenders like him. The legal reality is that doing so would require Parliament to dismantle decades of domestic and international human rights law, and even then, could almost certainly not be applied retrospectively to his case.
Axel Rudakubana, who is serving a 52-year custodial sentence for the Southport murders, has recently been transferred from Belmarsh prison to Broadmoor secure hospital on clinical grounds, the Ministry of Justice has confirmed. His case has reignited public debate over the harshest possible penalties for such crimes, with some, including Reform MP Rupert Lowe, calling for the death penalty to be restored for the most serious offenders. But reintroducing capital punishment in the UK would face a series of significant legal and constitutional barriers, and even if those barriers were overcome, applying it to Rudakubana himself would almost certainly remain unlawful.
Rudakubana’s current situation
Rudakubana, 19, was transferred to Broadmoor earlier this week after independent psychiatrists concluded he could not be safely managed within a standard prison environment and required treatment in a high-security psychiatric hospital. The Ministry of Justice has stressed that the move does not affect his sentence in any way: he continues serving his 52-year custodial term, with time spent at Broadmoor counting towards that sentence, and he is expected to remain in secure custody, whether hospital or prison, for the rest of his natural life. Officials have said he is unlikely ever to be released.
The death penalty is abolished under UK law
The starting point for any discussion of executing Rudakubana is that capital punishment simply does not exist within the UK’s current legal framework. The death penalty for murder was abolished in 1965, and the small number of offences that had retained it, including treason and piracy with violence, were finally abolished under the Crime and Disorder Act 1998. In practical terms, there is currently no crime for which a UK court can impose a death sentence.
International obligations bar its return
Beyond domestic law, the UK has entered into a series of binding international commitments that would need to be unwound before capital punishment could be reintroduced. Britain ratified Protocol No. 13 to the European Convention on Human Rights in 2002, which bans the death penalty in all circumstances, including in wartime. The UK is also a party to the Second Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, an international treaty aimed at abolishing the death penalty globally. Reintroducing executions would require the UK either to withdraw from these agreements or to act in direct breach of them.
The Human Rights Act 1998
Domestically, the Human Rights Act 1998 incorporates the rights set out in the European Convention on Human Rights, including the abolition of the death penalty, directly into UK law. Any legislation attempting to reintroduce capital punishment while the Act remained in force would almost certainly face legal challenges, and courts could issue declarations that the new law was incompatible with existing human rights protections.
Retrospective punishment is generally prohibited
Perhaps the most significant obstacle specific to Rudakubana’s case is the long-standing legal principle against retrospective criminal punishment. Article 7 of the European Convention on Human Rights, along with broader principles of UK law, prohibits applying a harsher penalty to someone than the one that existed at the time they committed their offence. Even if Parliament restored the death penalty tomorrow, it could not lawfully be applied to Rudakubana, who would continue serving the sentence imposed under the law as it stood when he committed his crimes.
Could Parliament change the law anyway?
In constitutional theory, Parliament is sovereign and can legislate on almost any matter it chooses. In practice, restoring capital punishment would require a government to pass new legislation reintroducing the death penalty, repeal or substantially amend the Human Rights Act, formally withdraw from Protocol 13 of the ECHR, and potentially withdraw from further international commitments including the Second Optional Protocol to the ICCPR. It would also need to determine which offences would carry the death penalty and establish an entirely new legal framework covering trials, appeals, sentencing and the mechanics of execution itself.
Rupert Lowe’s position
Rupert Lowe has publicly argued that Britain should restore the death penalty for the most serious offenders, and has proposed putting the question to the public in a referendum. These remain political proposals rather than current law, and any attempt to put them into practice would first need to overcome the full range of legal and constitutional barriers outlined above. The reintroduction of capital punishment remains a contested and long-running political debate in the UK, with supporters arguing it would serve as a deterrent and proportionate response to the most severe crimes, while opponents point to the risk of miscarriages of justice, the UK’s international human rights commitments, and ethical objections to state execution.
