But this is an act still in need of friends. Ministers rarely defend it. Periodic tensions between the home secretary and the courts have been interpreted as coded attacks on the act - an impression the government does little to dispel.
Leaked letters to the Daily Mail last week revealed that Lord Irvine had received correspondence from Prince Charles on the apparent threat of the act to a "sane, civilised and ordered existence". Two years earlier, an article in the same paper by Edward Heathcoat Amory, an adviser to the Prince of Wales, warned that the new act would "strike at the very fabric of British society". Soldiers would refuse to obey orders, polygamy would be legalised, and trade unions in prisons would become mandatory.
None of these predictions materialised. Nor has the act provided a magnet for "petty-minded litigiousness", as Prince Charles suggests. The illustrations he cites can no more be laid at the door of the Human Rights Act than the pending prosecution of the Princess Royal's bull terrier.
Statistics from the lord chancellor's department reveal that the impact of the act on civil courts has been negligible. The predicted deluge of new litigation has simply not materialised. Of course there are some cases that have been taken or won solely because of the Human Rights Act. Before the act came into force, Diane Pretty could not have mounted her courageous fight in favour of assisted suicide. There were almost no grounds to challenge the laws governing eligibility for IVF treatment. The Guardian's case on the 1848 Treason Felony Act, which criminalises advocating abolition of the monarchy in print, would have been unimaginable (admittedly no comfort to Prince Charles).
Perhaps most significantly, before the Human Rights Act there could have been no challenge to the indeterminate detention without trial of foreign nationals - but not British citizens - suspected of international terrorism. This provision of the Anti-Terrorism Act 2001 has recently been declared in breach of the European convention.
Before October 2 2000, almost uniquely among modern democracies, our courts were barred from reviewing acts of parliament. Even now, judges are prohibited from overturning them. They can only declare laws incompatible and it is for parliament to decide whether to respond. Most cases involve scrutinising the decisions of public officials, not legislation, and judges have done this for centuries. However, human rights principles are now at the centre of these reviews, rendering public decisions more accountable.
This does not mean that individual liberties trump wider group interests in all circumstances. The courts refused to overturn the requirement on car owners to effectively incriminate themselves in traffic offence cases, and have not interfered with anti-social behaviour orders or changed the law on the confiscation of drug dealers' assets.
If such decisions have confounded as many lawyers as journalists, it is perhaps because they have not always appreciated the genesis of human rights law. The European convention sprung from the UN's Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which is essentially an ethical document influenced by the collectivist and communitarian values of its Islamic, Confucian and socialist drafters, as well as by western liberalism. It aimed to provide common standards for a diverse world.
Influenced by these traditions, the convention seeks to find a balance between the protection of individual rights and the concerns of the wider community. Inalienable rights are not a reward for responsible behaviour. They belong to everyone. But they can, and sometimes must, be limited to protect the fundamental rights of others.
Without clear leadership from the government, it is unlikely that this broader vision of human rights will be appreciated. Ministers need to look to the reasons why they first introduced a bill of rights. There also needs to be a national human rights body to articulate the full implications of the act.
Schoolchildren seem to understand the ethical vision behind the Human Rights Act - perhaps better than the prince. Nearly 150 schools and youth groups contributed to a national award scheme on citizenship values - showcased at the anniversary event yesterday, using videos, mime and rap. Something rather different for the lord chancellor's intray.
· Francesca Klug is senior research fellow at the LSE's Human Rights Centre. Her essay Human Rights: A Common Standard for All Peoples? is published this week in Reclaiming Britishness (Foreign Policy Centre)