‘The Prime Minister’s recent announcement that Parliament would be prorogued, thereby severely curtailing the opportunity for parliamentary debate, raises important issues of constitutional principle and law, and also issues concerning fact and causation. They are examined in turn.’
Oxford Human Rights Hub, 31st August 2019
Source: ohrh.law.ox.ac.uk
‘Other dictatorial moves may follow if Boris Johnson’s ruse is allowed to pass. The high court must listen to our case against it.’
The Guardian, 29th August 2019
Source: www.theguardian.com
‘A Scottish judge has refused to order a temporary halt to Boris Johnson’s plan to shut down the UK Parliament.’
BBC News, 30th August 2019
Source: www.bbc.co.uk
‘It is most unlikely we will ever get any authoritative insight into what the Queen thought about the prime minister’s request for her to suspend Parliament.’
BBC News, 29th August 2019
Source: www.bbc.co.uk
‘The next prime minister will have the power to prevent MPs blocking a no-deal Brexit, though would he or she dare close the Commons for three months?’
The Guardian, 13th June 2019
Source: www.theguardian.com
‘In the light of widespread dissatisfaction with the Fixed-term Parliaments Act 2011 (‘FTPA’), the Conservative party manifesto states, at page 43, “We will repeal the Fixed-term Parliaments Act”. This post explores the constitutional implications if, as seems likely, the Conservative Government continues to command a majority in the House of Commons after the election and seeks to convince Parliament to repeal the Act.’
UK Constitutional Law Association, 24th May 2017
Source: www.ukconstitutionallaw.org
‘When the government decided to appeal to the Supreme Court against the High Court’s ruling that ministers could not lawfully use the royal prerogative to leave the EU, many lawyers, myself included, thought it a hopeless enterprise. A court of three judges – the Chief Justice, the Master of the Rolls and Lord Justice Sales (who had been standing counsel to the government when at the bar) – had held on cogently reasoned grounds that the prior authority of an Act of Parliament was required. Nevertheless the Supreme Court sat in full, all 11 members, to hear what even the sober Constitution Unit was calling the case of the century. Well, the appeal failed, and by a decisive margin of eight votes to three. But the margin conceals what was jurisprudentially a closer-run thing than the numbers suggest.’
London Review of Books, 2nd March 2017
Source: www.lrb.co.uk
‘One of the most striking aspects of the arguments of counsel in Miller, as Rachel Jones has pointed out, was how much the disagreement between the parties focussed on the meaning of silence. The government’s case boiled down to an assertion that silence on the issue of whether legislation was needed to invoke Article 50 of the Treaty of European Union in a succession of statutes – the European Communities Act 1972, the Referendum Act 1975, the European Union (Amendment) Act 2008, the European Union Act 2011 and the European Union Referendum Act 2015 – should be interpreted as parliament intending that the government was permitted to use the prerogative to invoke Article 50. For example, counsel for the government repeatedly argued that because some of these statutes, especially the 2008 and 2011 Acts, put restrictions on the exercise of the government’s foreign affairs prerogative power, it must follow that those statutes mean that other aspects of the prerogative must have been intended to have been left unfettered. Expressio unius exclusio alterius. On the other side, the applicants argued that parliament’s silence, especially in the 1972 Act, meant that it intended a specific pre-existing rule to apply, namely the rule that ministers could not use the prerogative, and in particular the foreign affairs prerogative, to change the law. They also argued that parliament’s subsequent silence in the other statutes confirmed that original choice.’
UK Constitutional Law Association, 13th December 2016
Source: www.ukconstitutionallaw.org
‘From the royal prerogative and Henry VIII clause to what makes lawyers laugh – and how to interpret a judge’s choice of tie.’
The Guardian, 8th December 2016
Source: www.guardian.co.uk
‘This is a brief (1200 words brief) summary of the ‘statutory basis’ argument. This post responds directly to the fact that, in the Supreme Court case being heard today, Lord Mance directly asked Mr Eadie QC whether Article 50 had been incorporated. Mr Eadie said that it was not because it did not have ‘direct effect’. It is suggested that the failure to claim Article 50 is in fact part of domestic law was mistaken. A strong argument can be made that triggering Article 50 could be done under an existing statutory power.’
UK Constitutional Law Association, 5th December 2016
Source: www.ukconstitutionallaw.org
‘Theresa May’s plan to implement Brexit without the authorisation of a vote in parliament would be “a contemporary necessity” rather than a misuse of outdated ancient royal powers, the attorney general said at the start of the most keenly awaited constitutional law case in recent memory.’
The Guardian, 5th December 2016
Source: www.guardian.co.uk
‘Miller v Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union has stimulated quite a bit of debate. Some criticism of the decision has been well-informed and thoughtful, whilst some of it has been, to put it charitably, less worthy of engagement. In this post we respond to what we view as the strongest arguments against Miller, taking account of the Government’s written case for appeal. We discussed the reasoning used in the case in an earlier post written with Tom Hickman, and will not repeat that explanation here. This post assumes knowledge of that earlier piece, which was written with the lay reader in mind. The present piece, more legally detailed, is necessitated by the quite subtle replies to the argument in that original post and to the judgment in Miller.’
UK Constitutional Law Association, 22nd November 2016
Source: www.ukconstitutionallaw.org
‘The High Court has ruled that the UK Government cannot legally begin the process of leaving the EU without first consulting Parliament. What does the decision mean for our rights and what happens next?’
RightsInfo, 11th November 2016
Source: www.rightsinfo.org
‘Shortly after the referendum on 23 June, demands were made that continuing EU membership should now be considered by Parliament, with a view it seems to stop BREXIT happening, and to frustrate the will of the 17 million who voted to leave. Indeed, the Guardian carried an article only five days later on ‘How we can stop Brexit – lobby our MPs’ (29 June 2016), no doubt as inflammatory and unacceptable to the BREXITEERS as subsequent developments have been to the REMAINERS. Fearing that Parliament was being enlisted with an agenda to defeat the referendum result, it is not surprising that the BREXITEERS should wish to exclude Parliament from the process altogether.’
UK Constitutional Law Association, 10th November 2016
Source: www.ukconstitutionallaw.org
‘In R. (Miller) v. Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union [2016] EWHC 2768 (Admin) judges had to decide, as a matter of law, on the constitutionally correct procedure for deciding whether and when to notify the President of the European Council that the UK intends to leave the EU, pursuant to Article 50 of the Treaty on European Union. This legal question is fraught with difficulty. The situation is unprecedented, so judges have to answer the question from constitutional first principles. Inevitably in such cases there is room for disagreement as to what the first principles are, and (more intractably) what weight each has as against the others in the particular circumstances of the case.’
UK Constitutional Law Association, 8th November 2016
Source: www.ukconstitutionallaw.org
‘On the legal front, the current debate focuses on the question of who has the legal authority to trigger Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty and begin the Brexit process. Some argue (quite convincingly) that only Parliament has this authority (and see Barber, Hickman, and King’s post). Others argue that Government, and in fact the Prime Minister, acting under the Royal Prerogative, can act without the approval of Parliament. The latter is, apparently, the view of Government’s lawyers.’
UK Constitutional Law Association, July 2016
Source: www.ukconstitutionallaw.org
‘The first legal attempt to prevent the prime minister initiating Britain’s withdrawal from the European Union is to be heard later this month.’
The Guardian, 8th July 2016
Source: www.guardian.co.uk
‘This piece seeks to address only one question: does Parliament or the Government have the power to decide to withdraw from the European Union in accordance with Article 50 TEU and through the notifying of the European Council of such a decision trigger the two year time limited formal withdrawal negotiations? Nick Barber, Tom Hickman, and Jeff King have argued valiantly that it will be Parliament who has to “pull the Article 50 trigger”. This piece will analyse their arguments and suggest that, contrary to their conclusions, it is the Government, under the Royal Prerogative, that has legal authority to start the Article 50 process.’
UK Constitutional Law Association, 8th July 2016
Source: www.ukconstitutionallaw.org
‘A group of businesses has launched a legal challenge to prevent the Government from launching Brexit without a formal Act of Parliament.’
The Independent, 4th July 2016
Source: www.independent.co.uk
© Inner Temple Library 2024