Earlier this year, the case of Jason Smith, a young private in the Territorial Army, was widely reported. He had died within two months of arriving in Basra when he literally overheated. His death was preventable and the court of appeal upheld a ruling that the government had an obligation to act to prevent similar incidents as much in Iraq as they do at home.

A story about the government's failure to put the lives of British troops first would ordinarily be a tabloid newspaper's dream. But Smith's story was also a landmark extension of the Human Rights Act and so it attracted deeply hostile coverage instead. "Human rights rule will cripple troops" ran a headline in the Sun, reporting the Ministry of Defence claim that the decision "will force officers to hesitate in making life-and-death decisions in battle".

There is an increasingly full history of tabloid papers attacking the HRA at every opportunity – an approach described in the commission's report as a "savaging of human rights by the media".

Only last month, a Daily Mail story headlined "The war criminals we cannot deport because of their human rights" suggested the Human Rights Act, and not – as is actually the case – a loophole in the UK's implementation of international law, was to blame for genocide suspects living with impunity in the UK.

Other similar instances include the case of Learco Chindamo, who became a hate figure when he was jailed for life in 1995 for killing headteacher Phillip Lawrence, when he was just 15. The decision not to deport him to his native Italy in 2007 was reported at the time as "the Human Rights Act gone wrong", when in fact the decision was taken under the terms of an EU directive and was not Human Rights Act-based at all.

In 2001 the case of Denis Nilsen attracted similarly damning coverage for the Human Rights Act, as the press reported the convicted killer had been allowed access to pornography in his prison cell because of his "human rights". In fact, it emerged that Nilsen's inability to establish a breach of his rights had denied him access to the material he wanted. The story is yet another example of the appetite for anti-Human Rights Act stories with a tenuous foundation in fact.

There are plenty of examples of flawed reporting in the British press and, on one level, these simply add to the list. But there is a darker side to this bias, which organisations at the forefront of human rights work reveal clearly in the report.

"The Human Rights Act is used as a vehicle to demonise certain communities – for example, asylum seekers [as] illegal immigrants," said one respondent. "It is only used in sensationalist journalism."

Another said: "One negative story about 'mad axemen in the community' can undermine 12 months of work."

There is an argument that the behaviour of journalists, editors and media proprietors is simply symptomatic of a widespread problem identified in the report – a general lack of understanding and education about rights.

As the former senior law lord Lord Bingham said in June, "The Human Rights Act … has been the subject of much hostility from those who find it less trouble to attack than to try and understand what [it] means."

And perhaps if tabloid journalists were genuinely aware that the old person in a care home, or the exhausted teacher, were benefiting from human rights, they would revise their stance. In this regard, critics say, the government is clearly at fault. "When stereotypical, misinformed or straightforwardly malicious attacks are made [it is up to the government to] say: "No, that is wrong, it is incorrect," says David Howarth MP, Liberal Democrat spokesman on justice. "It is a matter of political will. It is a matter of believing that certain values are more important than the political risks involved in supporting those values publicly".

Comments in the Daily Mail by a "frustrated" justice secretary Jack Straw that he could understand why the act was seen as a "villain's charter" did little to provide such support.

But not long before this, Straw had told a pro-human rights audience of his deeply felt commitment to human rights. "The foundation in people's souls for human rights is not as deep or strong as I would wish," he said.

Such ambivalence, from the very minister charged with overseeing human rights law, raises questions as to what can really be expected of the press.

Or, as some suggest, it's the other way round. Unless the press recognise the benefits human rights are already providing to their own readers, politicians will continue running scared.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/humanrightsandwrongs/bad-press