“UNWORKABLE”, “contradictory” and “incoherent”. Those were among the epithets that have greeted the Conservative Party’s plans to reform Britain’s human-rights laws. The Tories have long wanted to scrap the Human Rights Act (HRA), passed in 1998 by a Labour government. On October 3rd Chris Grayling, the justice secretary, promised to do just that as the Tories gear up for a May election in which the Eurosceptic UK Independence Party (UKIP) threatens to lure away voters. In fact, the reforms will change less than supporters hope or critics fear.

The HRA incorporated into British law the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), which Britain signed (and helped to draft) more than half a century ago. The act allowed Britons to pursue human-rights violations in British courts, rather than going to the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg. Although demonised by the Tories as European interventionism, the HRA actually made it more likely that human-rights cases would be heard in domestic courts, albeit in the light of internationally agreed principles.

Several decisions by the European court have particularly upset the Conservatives. The court ruled that Britain’s ban on any prisoners voting was unlawful; it laid down that whole-life sentences should be subject to review; and it insisted that Abu Qatada, accused of terrorist offences, should not be deported to Jordan without guarantees that neither he nor those giving evidence at his trial would be tortured. Eurosceptics and British tabloids have seized on these cases as evidence of European meddling in British affairs.

The Tories say they will replace the HRA with a new Bill of Rights. They argue that Britain has a long history of its own human-rights laws (including Magna Carta) and that the European court is overreaching. The Conservatives want to limit the rights of individuals (notably foreigners) under the convention in certain circumstances. The European court’s judgments would be merely advisory as far as British courts are concerned. If the Council of Europe, the guardian of the convention, refuses to accept these changes, Britain would withdraw from the convention.

In fact the ECHR has less legal power than first appears. International treaties are difficult to enforce, and the court cannot force Britain to change its laws even now. Prisoners do not have the vote despite the court’s objection to Britain’s ban. The main problem is political; other members of the Council of Europe may not want to put up with Britain continually ignoring the court’s rulings, as the Tories’ proposals suggest they might.

Nor has European human-rights legislation proved as restrictive as critics suggest. In 2012, of 2,146 foreign offenders ordered to be deported, just 256 successfully appealed on human-rights grounds. In the 16 years since the HRA came into force, domestic courts have made 28 “declarations of incompatibility”, holding that British laws conflict with the European convention. In 2013, of 1,652 British cases dealt with in Strasbourg, judges found violations in just eight.

Without the HRA, the liberties enshrined in the European convention would still apply to Britons, who would then have to revert to going to Strasbourg about human-rights violations, as they did before its introduction. If the promised Bill of Rights were at odds with the convention, appeals would multiply.

Even if it ditched the ECHR, Britain would still be bound by the EU’s Charter of Fundamental Rights, which draws on the convention. It would also remain bound by other international treaties. The UN Convention against Torture prohibits deporting people to places where they maybe abused. The Declaration of the Rights of the Child makes expelling foreign criminals with offspring in Britain tricky. And, since the act was passed, at least some of the convention rights–such as those not to be tortured or held indefinitely without charge–have become more firmly rooted in English common law (which is based on precedent), argues Philippe Sands, a law professor at University College London.

Devolution complicates matters further. The convention is incorporated into devolution legislation and the Good Friday agreements in Northern Ireland. Scottish police could therefore become subject to different human-rights obligations for crimes for which Westminster has responsibility (terrorism, say) and for those devolved to Scotland (most other offences). Having survived the Scottish vote on independence, the Conservatives’ proposals may shake the union again.

Yet for those who bemoan Europe’s influence, the court is a lightning rod for discontent. The Tory proposals look like a sop to them, ahead of an election. But the message that such changes would send is a bad one. Five countries, led by Russia and Turkey, were responsible for more than half the violations found by the European court last year. Getting them to comply with its rulings will be harder if Britain will not do so. For citizens of countries less committed to the rule of law than Britain, the court sometimes offers a final hope.