The number of court cases using the Human Rights Act continued to fall last year, according to new figures.

Sweet & Maxwell Online, the legal information service, said that there had been an 18 per cent fall to 394 cases in 2005-06, from 479 in 2004-05, the third consecutive year to show a decline.

Stephen Grosz, head of public law and human rights at Bindman and Partners, said: "We saw a huge surge in the number of cases implementing human rights arguments when this legislation was first introduced but there has been a gradual downturn over the past three years as the Act has been established by test cases.

"Everyone is now aware of the legislation and organisations have become more careful about complying with human rights obligations, so the Act has been successful on this account.

"On the other hand it certainly hasn't opened the floodgates to litigation as some doom-mongers warned.''

However, more human rights cases are having far-reaching implications after going to senior courts, Mr Grosz added.

"What this trend does not take into account is the higher proportion of human rights cases reaching the Court of Appeal and the House of Lords,'' he said.

"The Human Rights Act is becoming central to more and more of the really important legal decisions that are being made in the UK.

"It has managed to keep a check on some of the Government's more authoritarian instincts which in the post-9/11 world has been a considerable achievement.''

The Conservative Party has said it would abolish the Human Rights Act and replace it with a Bill of Rights.

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