The private members’ bill was introduced in the House of Lords by Lord Alton of Liverpool on 4 June 2026, some 10 years after the proposal was read in Parliament for the first time ever.  

The bill seeks to provide for the High Court in England, Wales and Northern Ireland and the Court of Session in Scotland to make preliminary determinations of genocide or the serious risk of genocide under the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide; for the referral of such determinations to relevant international courts or organisations; for response to reports on genocide; and for connected purposes. 

Commenting ahead of second reading of the bill Lord Alton of Liverpool, said: “I first introduced the Genocide Determination bill ten years ago in June 2016. Only a few months earlier, following a unanimous vote, the House of Commons had made a determination of genocide committed by Daesh/ISIS against Yazidis, Christians and other minorities in Iraq. This was the first time Parliament had made such a determination. 

“Yet, despite incredible cross-party support and heartbreaking speeches describing outrageous atrocities and calls for our duties under the Genocide Convention to be engaged and invoked, the FCDO refused to accept Parliament’s right to declare a genocide or to insist we engage with Convention duties to stop the atrocities and to protect the populations at further risk, even of utter annihilation. 

“The government repeatedly insisted that a Genocide determination may only be made by an international judicial body - despite knowing only too well that there was no international judicial body able to prosecute the crimes committed by ISIS. The government made it very clear that it was not willing to move on this position or to work with other governments who were re-evaluating their stance on how to prosecute genocidaires.  

“This government unwillingness to change its position, and to hide behind the mantra of it being a ‘long-standing policy’ and set in stone, made me consider what would need to happen to implement the government’s declared policy that “only a court can decide.” 

“If it is true that the government genuinely wants a court determination, my question was: could our domestic courts make such a determination? 

“As the law then stood, the only legislation pertaining to the prosecution of genocide was in the International Criminal Court Act 2001 (ICCA 2001) - a statute domesticating the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC). However, the ICCA 2001 has a very narrow jurisdiction - and enables prosecutions only where the alleged perpetrators were British citizens or residents. How often would this happen? The ICCA 2001 could have been used against the some 400 Daesh foreign fighters who returned to the UK after their involvement in the Yazidi genocide. However, the ICCA 2001 provides zero solution to other cases of genocidal atrocities.  

“To address this circular argument - that it is for courts to make a determination but not provide the courts with the power to do so- and following the statement of a former Supreme Court Judge, Lord Hope, that the Genocide Convention “is no longer fit for purpose”, a cross-party group of Peers has crafted a new private members’ bill. This bill is to empower British courts to make a determination of genocide, and, first and foremost, empower victims/survivors to seek justice and action where other options are non-existent.”