Its role is to promote and facilitate human rights work by politicians who usually spend most of their time dealing with matters that affect their local constituency.
They have held meetings on subjects ranging from statelessness[5] to Dalit rights[6] and undertaken country visits to Pakistan to report on the situation of the Ahmadiyya community.
This came at a time in which there was a growing perception that the British government, especially after the narrow Conservative victory in the 2015 General Election, had de-prioritised human rights as part of the work of the Foreign Office.
[9] Sir Simon McDonald, Permanent Secretary at the Foreign Office admitted to a Commons committee in 2015 that human rights work "was secondary also to the need to promote British companies abroad", according to The Independent.
[10] Following the election of Jeremy Corbyn as Labour leader in 2015 and the death of Lord Avebury in 2016, new members such as SNP MP Margaret Ferrier joined the group.