106. Balancing individual and community rights.

The principle of 'proportionality' is concerned with defining the balance, inherent in the European Convention on Human Rights¹, between the rights of individuals and the interests of the community², and although the word does not appear in the text of the Convention or its Protocols it is the guiding principle of the European Court of Human Rights' approach³. Proportionality requires there to be a reasonable relationship between the goal pursued by the authorities and the means they use to attain that goal⁴, and the Court is therefore tasked with deciding whether a measure of interference that is aimed at