British interior minister Theresa May said today her ruling Conservative party would take Britain out of the European Convention on Human Rights if re-elected in 2015, saying she would include such a promise in the party's election manifesto.

"It's ridiculous that the British government should have to go to such lengths to get rid of dangerous foreigners," she told an annual conference of her party. "That's why the next Conservative manifesto will promise to scrap the human rights act."

The act has made the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) enforceable in Britain's courts since 2000. "If leaving the European Convention is what it takes to fix our human rights laws that is what we should do," said May.

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