Category Archives: Devolution

by | March 29, 2013 · 7:48 am

Christopher McCrudden: Equality and the Good Friday Agreement: Fifteen Years On

 mccrudden2-high-res-1_1The Northern Ireland peace agreement was born on the 10th April 1998, Good Friday, in Belfast and will thus celebrate its 15th birthday next week. One of the central elements of the Agreement was to achieve equality between the two main communities in Northern Ireland. It was an ambitious attempt to achieve this aim through a significant restructuring of the Northern Ireland constitution. This aspect of the Agreement has implications, therefore, for the role of constitutions in achieving equality more broadly. The fifteenth anniversary provides a suitable occasion to assess the outcomes achieved, and to look to the future.

The Northern Ireland constitutional model incorporated in the Belfast-Good Friday Agreement is neither unique, nor particularly unusual in a global context.  It is a classic democratic consociation, as political scientists term it. Four key elements of democratic consociation are commonly identified.

These are, first, the sharing of executive and, often, legislative and security powers among representatives of all the major communities, especially those with histories of prior antagonism. Examples of specific arrangements include collective presidencies and co-premierships; examples also include concurrent or qualified majority rules. Plainly such power-sharing aims to achieve greater inclusivity and jointness in decision-making than ‘winner-takes-all democracy’.

The second key feature is community autonomy. Each constituent group has significant internal self-government in at least one public function (for example, in establishing and controlling its own schools). Equality across the communities applies in these respects. Self-government accompanies shared government.

The third feature is the widespread use of the proportionality principle, understood to encompass proportional representation in shared institutions, and the allocation of important resources and public offices. For example, posts in the civil service, security forces, and judiciary, are shared out by reference to the proportions the groups have in the population as a whole, or in the labour market. Proportionality may also apply to the allocation of public expenditures, e.g., each group may receive the same per capita funding for its primary schools.

Lastly, because power-sharing, proportionality, and autonomy may not provide sufficient assurance to particular groups that their interests will not be over-ridden, explicit veto rights may be granted to each of the communities on vital issues, with variations in how these veto rights are allocated and legally entrenched.

How does all this relate to the equality agenda? Apart from the attempt to achieve equality at the level of the legislature and the executive, there are three additional legislative features of the equality agenda in Northern Ireland that relate to the Agreement: first, the fair employment legislation which began in 1976, was fundamentally restructured in 1989, and more minimally reformed as a result of the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement; second, section 75 of the Northern Ireland Act 1998 which established a public sector equality duty on public bodies resulted directly from the Agreement itself; and third, the (now repealed) quota provisions regarding the recruitment to the Northern Ireland Police Service is derived from the Patten Commission established as a result of the Agreement. There are five points I want to make.

First, the equality agenda comprising these elements can best be understood in the context of the Northern Ireland consociational model. It is, of course, separable from it – much of the equality agenda borrows its techniques from other countries (such as the United States) where consociations are not in operation. But placing it within the consociational model emphasizes the extent to which equality in Northern Ireland is primarily about securing the third of the three elements I described earlier – the proportionality principle. It is this that marks the equality agenda in Northern Ireland out from that in the rest of the United Kingdom or, indeed, in the Republic of Ireland.

Second, it is also useful to see the equality agenda in the context of the consociational model for another critical reason: the effective enforcement of fair employment after 1990, and the debate over the public sector equality duty in the early 1990s was a critical element in the “confidence building” measures that resulted in nationalist (and particularly republican) politicians agreeing to the other elements of the consociational package, in particular the first of these, the sharing of legislative, executive and security powers with the other parties. The orthodox histories of the run up to the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement largely, I think, underestimate the extent to which there was a parallel “peace process” that supported the main process, but which concentrated less on security and power-sharing issues and more on economic, social and human rights issues.  In practice, the two went hand in hand.

The relative success in getting these equality measures accepted and implemented provided a degree of reassurance that the Northern Ireland state was capable of reform and transformation, and laid some of the political ground work for the Agreement. The Americans, and largely because of them the Irish Government, understood this; I was never convinced that the British Government did (or, perhaps, does) fully comprehend the importance of this.

The third reason for emphasizing the consociational context of the equality agenda is that the other elements of the consociational model act as a limit on a liberal individualistic equality agenda. This can be seen in two respects.  First, the consociational model depends on the recognition and (to a degree) the institutionalization, of the two major communities as the key political actors. For some, though not for me, this is anathema because it appears to emphasize existing divisions rather than transcending them; and this came to a head in particular in the debate over the Patten police quota arrangements.

A second limit on the equality agenda arising from consociation relates to schools. I said that one of the features of a consociation is a degree of autonomy in certain spheres.  In Northern Ireland, the best example of an autonomy arrangement relates to primary and secondary education, which is a closely guarded sphere of Catholic influence.  Fair employment legislation has carved out teaching in schools as an exception.  This can really only be understood when seen in the consociational context.

I will end by making two further points.  The first is that, to a considerable extent, the strategy worked, not just in the sense that it helped build confidence (which it did), but in its own terms. In particular, research supported by the Nuffield Foundation demonstrates pretty definitively that the effective enforcement of the fair employment legislation in the 1990s led to a significant shift in the labour market with significantly reduced inequality between Catholics and Protestants, at the same time as achieving significant desegregation. There is a more complex story to tell, but suffice to say it is a very good news story, and one that Northern Ireland should be proud of. It is the success of this legislation that has significantly taken the poison out of the discrimination issue (a poison that those of us who worked in the area remember only too well). The same applies to the Patten quota, which has succeeded in restructuring the composition of the police service from one that was overwhelmingly Protestant to one that is now proportional, and has contributed to the increased acceptance of the police in the nationalist community.

Finally, what of the future? Although by no means unique globally, consociational arrangements are unusual in the British and Commonwealth world, and are therefore continually under pressure; there is a sense among some opinion formers in Britain that the Westminster model is in some way the “norm” and that, in time, the aim should be to return Northern Ireland to “normality”.  In the equality context, this means constant indirect pressure to reduce the specifically Northern Ireland features of the approaches taken to equality, such as compulsory monitoring in fair employment, a significant regulatory presence in the labour market in the shape of the Equality Commission, and the process requirements of the public sector equality duty concerning civil society participation in decision-making, and impact assessment. Both the European Union and the domestic courts have recognized the importance of preserving the Northern Ireland equality model, and have resisted attempts to force change.[1]

The greater danger comes, I think from, a sense among some opinion formers in London (and even some in Belfast) that the equality job has been done, equality has been achieved, and we can therefore simply dismantle the panoply of equality requirements, particularly in a time of financial cutbacks. That view, I suggest, should be strongly resisted. The importance of the equality agenda in enabling the Belfast-Good Friday Agreement to be concluded in the first place, and ensuring that a stable government could eventually be established and maintained, should be recognized and lessons learned. It would be a mistake, I think, of incredible stupidity with incalculable costs if inequality between the two communities were to become a significant problem again in Northern Ireland.

Christopher McCrudden FBA is Professor of Equality and Human Rights Law, Queen’s University Belfast, and Leverhulme Major Research Fellow (2011-2014). It is an edited version of a talk presented on the 27th March 2013 at the British Academy seminar “The Good Friday Agreement: 15 Years On”.

Suggested citation: C. McCrudden, ‘Equality and the Good Friday Agreement: Fifteen Years On’ UK Const. L. Blog (29th March 2013) (available at http://ukconstitutionallaw.org)
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[1] Unlike in Bosnia Herzegovina, where there have been systematic external attempts to dismantle the consociational arrangements, explored further in Christopher McCrudden and Brendan O’Leary, Courts and Consociations: Human Rights versus Power-Sharing (OUP, 2013).

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by | March 26, 2013 · 4:57 pm

Mark Elliott: Devolution, the West Lothian Question, and the nature of constitutional reform in the United Kingdom

mark1Earlier this week, the McKay Commission published its Report on the Consequences of Devolution for the House of Commons. The Commission’s terms of reference required it to determine “how the House of Commons might deal with legislation which affects only part of the United Kingdom, following the devolution of certain legislative powers to the Scottish Parliament, the Northern Ireland Assembly and the National Assembly for Wales”. In other words, the Commission was established to do that which Lord Irvine of Lairg (in)famously counselled against: viz to tackle the West Lothian Question. (Irvine reportedly said that the best thing to do about that question was to “stop asking it”.) There are various ways in which the question can be framed. The Commission, for its part, took the central issue to be the possibility that “MPs from outside England could help determine laws that apply in England, while MPs from England would have no reciprocal influence on laws outside England in policy fields for which the devolved institutions would now be responsible”.

The notion of reciprocity—or, more accurately, the lack of reciprocity that is a function of the UK’s asymmetric model of devolution—has always been at the heart of the West Lothian Question. Viewed more broadly, the fact that the West Lothian Question has arisen and remained unanswered for so long is reflective of a typically British approach to constitutional reform—one that treats the constitution as a work-in-progress, and which accepts disjointedness and inelegance as the price of pragmatism and speed. Within that tradition of constitutional reform, loose ends are an inevitable result of an underlying reluctance to confront big-picture questions. The McKay Commission’s approach to the West Lothian Question is of a piece with this dominant approach to constitutionalism in the UK, in that it proposes a practical solution that leaves the some fundamental questions unanswered.

The Commission’s guiding principle—and where that principle did not lead it

The Commission is clear that doing nothing should not be regarded as a viable option. In doing so, they rightly reject the view (advanced by Vernon Bogdanor in evidence to the Commission) that because England has a de facto predominance in the UK, it has “no need to beat the drum or blow the bugle”. Bogdanor argues that if England seeks to exploit its inherent dominance, it may strain the Union to “breaking point”. But this overlooks the potentially fissiparous effect of leaving the West Lothian Question hanging and thereby stoking a sense of disempowerment. This is a sphere in which perception matters: and the risk is that England may perceive itself to be (as Richard Rawlings, “Concordats of the Constitution” (2000) 116 LQR 257, put it) “the spectre at the feast”.

Instead, the Commission concludes that: “Decisions at the United Kingdom level having a separate and distinct effect for a component part of the United Kingdom should normally be taken only with the consent of a majority of the elected representatives for that part of the United Kingdom.” The Commission recommends that this principle be adopted by means of a resolution of the House of Commons. The question then became how this guiding principle should be given practical effect.

One obvious issue is that the “separate and distinct effect” formulation is undeniably vague. As Brigid Hadfield, “Devolution, Westminster and the English Question” [2005] PL 286, put it, “What … is an English law? If it cannot be defined with sufficient precision, then non-English MPs cannot fairly be precluded from voting on it.” By advocating the vaguer “separate and distinct effect” formulation, the Commission implicitly acknowledges that the matter is a complex one in relation to which judgement would have to exercised, rather than something that can be reduced to a clear-cut formula. But acknowledging complexity is not the same thing as resolving it, and the application of the “separate and distinct” criterion would doubtless excite controversy. Such definitional difficulties are not good reasons for shelving attempts to resolve the West Lothian Question (on the ground that it is all too difficult), but there is clearly further work to be done here.

Leaving to one side the inevitable questions of categorisation, how does the Commission propose that its guiding principle should be implemented? It rejects the creation of a separate English legislature, arguing that it might have a destabilising effect and would likely require wholesale constitutional reform. What, though, of the more modest proposal that only MPs representing English constituencies (or MPs representing English and Welsh constituencies) should be allowed to vote on laws likely to have a “separate and distinct effect” upon England (or upon England and Wales)?

The Commission rejects this option too. Its reasons for doing so are largely pragmatic. In particular, it fears that different “classes” of MPs would be created, and that the possibility of “deadlock” would arise: a Government might enjoy a majority in Parliament as a whole whilst lacking an outright majority of English MPs. Such a scenario is alien to the standard modus operandi of the UK system, in which (typically) a single party has an overall majority such that the Executive is able to drive its business through Parliament with (at least a degree of) impunity. In any event, the flip-side of the “deadlock” problem is arguably more profound. It concerns the dual functions ascribed to the post-devolution UK Parliament, whereby it is required to sustain not only the UK Government but also the de facto English Government. This is the sort of big-picture issue that the McKay Commission fails squarely to confront—a point that I develop below.

The Commission’s key proposals

Having rejected an English Parliament and “English votes for English laws” (along with various other options), the Commission concludes that its guiding principle should be implemented (first) by giving a voice to English (or English and Welsh) MPs in relation to relevant Bills, and (second) by making it politically difficult—but not impossible, either as a matter of law or parliamentary procedure—to enact relevant Bills in the absence of majority support on the part of relevant MPs.

As to the first point, the Report says that “views from England
(or England-and-Wales) should be known before a final decision is made about something with a separate and distinct effect”. The Commission identifies a range of ways in which this might be achieved. One possibility is modelled on “legislative consent motions” whereby, under the Sewel convention, the consent of a devolved legislature may be sought to the enactment of UK legislation encroaching upon devolved competence. The McKay Commission envisages that an analogous procedure might be used in relation to UK legislation liable to have a “separate and distinct” effect upon England (or England and Wales), the suggestion being that a Grand Committee consisting of all MPs representing relevant constituencies would render an opinion (by means of a resolution) as to whether the (relevant parts of the) Bill should be proceeded with. Other options identified by the Commission include debating a motion “expressing
 an opinion on that part of a bill relating separately and distinctly to England (or England-and-Wales)”, and the committal of relevant Bills to specially-constituted Public Bill Committees in which the party balance would reflect that which obtained in England (or England and Wales) rather than in the whole House. The Report does not express a firm conclusion as to which of these options should be taken forward; it identifies further questions that would need to be resolved, and suggests that the Government should put its preferred options to the House of Commons, and that a Select Committee should subsequently advise the House on points of detail.

So much for a distinctive English (or English and Welsh) “voice”. What if that voice (by a majority) opposes a Bill or relevant parts of it? Here, the Commission is very clear that MPs representing English (or English and Welsh) constituencies should not have a power of veto. It therefore rejects a “double-lock” procedure, under which it would be necessary, where relevant, to secure the approval not only of a majority of all MPs but also the approval of a majority of English (or English and Welsh) MPs. This reflects the Commission’s view that once the views of MPs representing particularly affected parts of the country have been heard and considered, “the UK majority should prevail, not least in order to retain the UK Government’s accountability at election time for decision-making during its time in office”.

However, at the same time as rejecting a “double-lock”, the Commission proposes a “double-count” procedure. This would involve making public not just the names of MPs who voted for and against the Bill, but also the constituencies they represent—with a view to determining whether relevant Bills (or provisions) attracted the support of a majority of MPs representing relevant constituencies. Although no legal or procedural consequences would ensue if a majority of the latter type were not secured, the Commission envisages that “if a government was seen to have failed to attract the support of a majority of MPs from England (or England-and-Wales) for business affecting those interests, it would be likely to sustain severe political damage”. The intention, therefore, is to disincentivise the use of MPs from unaffected (or less affected) parts of the country to push through legislation against the wishes of the majority of MPs representing particularly affected parts of the UK, whilst stopping short of preventing such a practice.

In preferring double-count over double-lock, the Commission cites its own guiding principle—that decisions “should normally be taken only with the consent of a majority of the elected representatives for that part of the United Kingdom” (emphasis added). The Commission’s defence of this position rests upon the principle of reciprocity. Devolved legislatures’ wishes with respect to incursions by Westminster into areas of devolved competence are normally respected (via the use of legislative consent motions under the Sewel convention), but are not necessarily respected (because Westminster could, at least in theory, override their wishes by asserting its legislative supremacy, which is undiminished by devolution).

By the same token, while English (or English and Welsh) MPs should be able to object to UK legislation likely to have “separate and distinct” effects upon England (or England and Wales), they should not thereby be able to veto such Bills. Instead, the consequences of oibjecting—like the consequences of a devolved legislature refusing to endorse a legislative consent motion—should play out on the political stage. The essence of the proposal, therefore, is to place (for these purposes) the group of MPs representing English (or English and Welsh) constituencies in a position vis-à-vis the (full) Westminster Parliament that is analogous to the position that devolved legislatures occupy in relation to Westminster. And, as the Commission notes, the analogy would likely be extended by the emergence of a constitutional convention corresponding to the Sewel convention. (It is worth noting in passing that the likely prescriptiveness of such a convention would mean that a double-lock requirement might well obtain in effect if not in form, just as the UK Parliament’s capacity unilaterally to interfere in devolved affairs is rendered essentially notional by the Sewel convention.)  

The bigger picture

The analogy outlined above is persuasive as far as it goes—but, arguably, it does not go far enough because it takes insufficient account of two sets of distinctions and the relationship between them. First, there is the distinction between the twin roles performed by all Westminster-style legislatures: viz legislating, on the one hand, and determining the composition of and sustaining the Executive, on the other. Second, there is the distinction between the way in which the Westminster Parliament, on the one hand, and the devolved legislatures, on the other, discharge those roles. The McKay Commission’s focus is upon the way in which the Westminster Parliament discharges its first—i.e. legislative—function. But there is insufficient consideration of the second function—i.e. determining the composition of and sustaining the Executive.

The analogy between devolved legislatures and Westminster breaks down because, unlike the former, the latter has to determine the composition of and sustain a Janus-like Executive: one that functions both as the Government of the United Kingdom and as the Government of England. Within this distinction is concealed the West Lothian Question writ large. As conventionally framed, the West Lothian Question is concerned with micro-level (albeit important) questions concerning Parliament’s legislative function and its exercise in relation to individual Bills. But a macro-level question also arises. Because the Westminster Parliament must sustain not only the UK Executive but also the de facto English Executive, no amount of finessing of the procedure whereby legislation is enacted can get around the possibility that elections to the UK Parliament may yield an Executive that does not accurately reflect the wishes of voters in England (as refracted through Parliament as an electoral college). Indeed, the 2010 election is a case in point, in that the Conservative Party won an overall majority of English but not UK constituencies.

It is in this sense that the McKay Commission might be said to have failed fully to grasp the nettle. The underlying issue that is never fully grappled with is that the post-devolution Westminster Parliament is required to perform a set of functions that may be in tension with one another. And this raises questions about our constitutional architecture more profound than those addressed by the Commission. It does not, of course, follow that that particular nettle should be grasped. As noted at the outset of this post, a certain degree of messiness is an unavoidable byproduct of the approach that characterises constitutional reform in the UK—and history teaches that the results of that approach do not necessarily yield a constitution lacking workability or public acceptance.

Viewed thus, the McKay Commission’s proposed solution to the West Lothian Question is of a piece with the type of constitutionalism that generated the question in the first place. It provides a partial, practical workaround to a problem created by a disjointed set of constitutional changes. Whether all of this showcases the merits of the UK’s highly pragmatic approach to constitutional reform or reflects a failure to confront difficult and fundamental questions is a matter of perspective. In any event, the McKay Commission’s Report shows that Lord Irvine was wrong; the West Lothian Question needed to be asked, and we could do a lot worse than answer it by implementing the Commission’s proposals. It is likely, however, that the concern underpinning Irvine’s reluctance to engage with the question derived from his recognition that once one begins to pick away at the loose edges of the constitution, it may quickly begin to unravel. It follows, then, that while asking the West Lothian Question is not unwise, thinking about it too hard might well be discomforting.

Mark Elliott is Reader in Public Law at the Faculty of Law, University of Cambridge. 

Suggested citation: M. Elliott, ‘Devolution, the West Lothian Question, and the nature of constitutional reform in the United Kingdom’  UK Const. L. Blog (26th March 2013) (available at http://ukconstitutionallaw.org)

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by | March 21, 2013 · 8:01 am

Aileen McHarg: The Leveson Report, the Royal Charter and the Scottish Parliament: A Reply to Jamieson

aileenIain Jamieson’s earlier post argues that the ability of the Scottish Parliament to implement its own model of press regulation in response to the Leveson Report has effectively been ousted by the UK government’s proposal to establish a UK-wide system of press regulation by Royal Charter.  I would take issue with two aspects of his analysis.

First, Jamieson claims that, since the provisions of the proposed Royal Charter will be entrenched by clause 92 of the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Bill, which applies to Scotland, the Scottish Parliament cannot legislate to amend the Royal Charter or provide that it should not apply to Scotland.  Clause 92 provides that the Charter cannot be amended except in accordance with the procedure laid out in the Charter itself (two thirds majority of each House).  As Jacob Rowbottom has argued on this blog, the degree of entrenchment actually provided by this device is limited because clause 92 can itself be repealed or amended by subsequent UK legislation with no special majority.

To argue that the Scottish Parliament will nevertheless bound be by clause 92 therefore requires the further claim that, because clause 92 (however indirectly) ‘occupies the field’ in relation to press regulation, the Scotland Act 1998 will be impliedly repealed insofar as it devolves power to legislate on that issue to the Scottish Parliament.  There are at least three ways of responding to this implied repeal argument, all of which lead to the conclusion that the Scottish Parliament will not in fact be bound by clause 92.

The first, and most speculative, response would be to rely on Laws LJ’s obiter dictum in Thoburn to the effect that, since the Scotland Act is a constitutional statute, it cannot be impliedly repealed.  This would mean that the only way in which the Scottish Parliament’s legislative competence can be reduced would be through express amendment via primary legislation or a section 30 order, either of which would require (by convention, in the former case, and by statute, in the latter) the consent of the Scottish Parliament.

It is, however, unnecessary to adopt such a heterodox approach.  A second, more conventional, approach would be to accept that the Scotland Act may be impliedly repealed, but to argue, as Barber and Young have done (‘The Rise of Prospective Henry VIII Clauses and Their Implications for Sovereignty’ [2003] PL 112, pp 112-6), that a statute can only be impliedly repealed by a subsequent statute on the same subject matter, not merely by a later conflicting statutory norm.  Since the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Bill does not deal with the same subject matter as the Scotland Act (the division between reserved and devolved legislative competences), it cannot impliedly repeal the transfer of power to the Scottish Parliament effected by the Scotland Act even if a norm contained within it or flowing from it for the time being ‘occupies the field’ of a particular devolved competence.  It would, on this analysis, still be open to the Scottish Parliament to assert its legislative competence in relation to press regulation and repeal (expressly or impliedly) the provisions contained in clause 92.

A third, even more conventional approach, would lead to the same conclusion.  This would be to accept that a statutory provision can be impliedly repealed by a later inconsistent statutory norm, even if the subject matter of the two statutes is not identical.  This view, however, requires a more nuanced approach to when such a conflict arises.  In relation to the Scotland Act 1998, for instance, it may be argued that the transfer of legislative competence in devolved areas to the Scottish Parliament is not inconsistent with (and therefore not impliedly repealed by) later UK legislation on a devolved matter because the Scotland Act itself, in s.28(7) expressly envisages that such a situation may occur.  This approach suggests that the Scotland Act, properly understood, involves a sharing of legislative power between the UK and Scottish Parliaments, and that the latest norm on a particular devolved matter will prevail irrespective of the Parliament from which it emanates.  This analysis would appear to be the one which best fits the post-devolution legislative practice, where the Scottish Parliament has regularly consented to allow the UK Parliament to legislate on its behalf, but has on some occasions subsequently amended such legislation.

The second point which arises out of Jamieson’s blog concerns whether the UK government is legally or constitutionally entitled to impose a system of press regulation on Scotland via the royal prerogative.  The constitutional position, as set out in written answer by Tony Blair on 30 June 1999,  is that where the exercise of prerogative powers relates to a matter within devolved competence, it is for the First Minister rather than Ministers of the Crown to advise the Queen.  The situation is slightly different in relation to business of the Privy Council, such as grant or amendment of a Royal Charter, because it is the Privy Council as a whole rather than a particular minister which advises the Queen.  Nevertheless, the written answer states that:

‘the advice in relation to a particular matter which the Privy Council offers to Her Majesty is in many instances based, either by virtue of statutory provision but more often by convention, on advice or information provided to the Privy Council by one or more particular Ministers of the Crown as the Privy Counsellor with the principal interest in that matter.’

It goes on to state that, in areas of devolved competence, the Privy Counsellor with the principal interest would be the First Minister (who is a member of the Privy Council).

It is not clear from these provisions whether the Privy Council as a whole is entitled to depart from the advice of the principal minister.  Where there is a conflict of views between members of the same administration it may perhaps be argued that the majority view should prevail.  However, in the case of a conflict between the view of the First Minister and other Privy Counsellors representing the UK government, there is a strong case (for the reasons that Jamieson outlines) for saying that it should not.

Given that the question of who should advise the monarch on the exercise of the royal prerogative is a matter of convention rather than law, it may be difficult to argue that the UK government would be acting illegally if the Privy Council were to recommend the adoption of a system of press regulation applying throughout the UK in the face of Scottish opposition.  As a matter of constitutional morality, though, it is hard to avoid the conclusion that to treat the design of a new UK-wide system of press regulation as a matter for negotiation purely between the main parties in the UK Parliament is constitutionally improper.

Contrary to Jamieson, therefore, I would argue that just because the UK government has chosen a regulatory vehicle which manages to avoid the application of the Sewel Convention, it does not thereby follow that the Scottish Parliament is compelled to accept it or deprived of its competence to legislate for a different system of press regulation in Scotland.

(I am grateful to Chris Himsworth for his very helpful comments on this note and particularly for alerting me to the Blair written answer.)

Aileen McHarg is Professor of Public Law at the  University of Strathclyde.

 Suggested citation: A. McHarg, ‘The Leveson Report, the Royal Charter and the Scottish Parliament: A Reply to Jamieson’ UK Const. L. Blog (21st March 2013) (available at http://ukconstitutionallaw.org)

 

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by | March 12, 2013 · 7:22 am

Stephen Tierney: After the referendum – the Scottish Government’s proposal for a written Constitution

stierneyThe debate over Scottish independence has turned recently to discussion of the post-referendum landscape. On 5 February the Scottish Government published Scotland’s Future: from the Referendum to Independence and a Written Constitution  which suggests that a two stage process would follow upon a majority Yes vote. From the date of the referendum until March 2016 a period of constitutional negotiations with the UK Government is proposed, culminating in the formal grant of independence by Westminster. Following the Scottish parliamentary elections in May 2016 a constitution-framing process, internal to Scotland only, would then take place. Although the prospect of a Yes vote is, to say the least, far from certain with support failing to rise above 35% in most polls, each of these proposed stages is interesting, not least for the questions left unanswered in the Scotland’s Future paper.

The first issue is timing. Scotland’s Future (1.6) states: ‘The right time for a written constitution to be drafted is… after independence, not before. At that point the people of Scotland, whatever their views in the referendum, will be able to engage fully in the process of planning for our country’s future.’ It is, therefore, not the intention of the Scottish Government to engage in setting out a draft constitution in advance of the referendum. But it still seems inevitable that speculation about the content of a future constitution of an independent Scotland will inevitably be a focal-point, albeit possibly not a major one, of the referendum campaign, particularly after the Scottish Government publishes its promised White Paper towards the end of this year on the content of independence which will inevitably contain commitments which would in due course require constitutional protection.

Not surprisingly, therefore, Scotland’s Future is somewhat light on the possible content of a new constitution, but there are some hints about the Government’s preferences. It is notable in itself that the Government proposes a written constitution (Scotland’s Future 1.5). It also suggests that the Sovereign will continue as head of state (2.14); that there will be a Supreme Court of Scotland, and that this court will have the power to strike down unconstitutional legislation (the constitution will contain ‘citizens rights that cannot be taken away by a decision of Parliament’ – 1.5). This raises a number of questions about court structure under the new regime. How would a new Supreme Court be established and how would it be populated? Would it be a free-standing court with personnel separate from the existing superior courts in Scotland, and if so could this be justified given the limited number of constitutional issues that come from Scotland to the UK Supreme Court at the moment? Or would judges from the Court of Session sit on this on an ad hoc basis? 

There is also a reference to Scotland’s membership of the European Union (and of course there is a separate debate about how that membership will be secured) being subject to constitutional provision (2.3). Little is said about institutional arrangements. One question that will inevitably arise in the referendum campaign is whether there would be any proposals to make the Scottish Parliament bicameral or at least to institute some model of review body to assess and scrutinise draft legislation.

Scotland’s Future spends longer setting out a commitment to collectivist values in the form of social rights which it suggests will also enjoy constitutional protection. There is a proposal to enshrine within the constitution an entitlement to public services and ‘to a standard of living that, as a minimum, secures dignity and self-respect’ (1.10) and possibly also ‘constitutional rights in relation to issues such as welfare, pensions, health care and education’ (1.10). There is also a radical suggestion that principles on climate change, the environment and the sustainable use of Scotland’s natural resources should be constitutionally protected and that there might be a constitutional ban on nuclear weapons being based in Scotland. Each of these proposals of course raises questions about what type of enforcement would accompany such provisions; in particular would the courts be vested with the duty to enforce social and environmental rights etc., the constitutional appropriateness of such a duty the competence of judges to execute it. The final substantive proposal in Scotland’s Future is for an examination of the war power and a constitutional guarantee that this power would be shared by the Scottish Government and the Scottish Parliament. Separately, the Government has also suggested constitutional provisions on Scotland’s system of local government.

The paper also turns to process and it is here that the two stage approach emerges. The first stage after the referendum would be the interim period within which Scotland would become independent. The intention is that during this period of some 15-16 months up to March 2016, agreements will be reached between the Scottish and UK Governments on this transition, establishing the timetable towards ‘independence day’ in March 2016. All of this would pave the way for the scheduled elections to the Scottish Parliament in May that year, which would on this proposal become elections to the Parliament of an independent country.

Scotland’s Future acknowledges that the following issues would need to be the subject of  negotiation and agreement: ‘the division of financial and other assets and liabilities (including oil revenues and assignation of other tax revenues, military bases and overseas assets), the transfer to the Scottish Parliament and Government of political authority over institutions previously controlled at Westminster… and the timetable for the speediest safe removal of weapons of mass destruction from Scotland.’ Interestingly, there is also reference to the ‘on-going co-operative arrangements that the peoples of Scotland, England, Wales and Northern Ireland would share’. It is not clear what is meant by this, although notably the Scottish Government during its period in office between 2007 and 2011 produced a White Paper ‘Scotland’s Future: Draft Referendum (Scotland) Bill Consultation Paper’  which famously stated that under independence ‘the social union with the remainder of the UK would be maintained, with the nations continuing to co-operate on a range of matters’. It is not clear if this is what is meant by ‘on-going co-operative arrangements’ in Scotland’s Future. It is also acknowledged in Scotland’s Future that some matters will remain unresolved until after independence as happened in the split between the Czech Republic and Slovakia; in other words even after 2016 there would still be an on-going period of gradual separation.

Turning to process, it is also suggested that the Scottish Government will seek to make the post-referendum negotiations inclusive (2.7) by inviting ‘representatives from the other parties in the Scottish Parliament, together with representatives of Scottish civic society’ to join in these negotiations and in helping to ensure ‘the continuity of those public services which are in reserved areas.’ The basis for the interim arrangements would be a ‘constitutional platform’ to facilitate the new Parliament and Government elected in 2016. There would potentially be something of a constitutional vacuum after ‘independence day’ when the writ of the Scotland Act would no longer run but in which no new constitution would have yet been promulgated. And so (2.10) ‘until that constitution is drafted and comes into force, arrangements will be in place from independence day to consolidate the existing rights of citizens and give the Scottish Parliament and Government the legal, financial and other powers necessary to govern Scotland effectively across the full range of national issues. These arrangements will form Scotland’s constitutional platform.’ A number of questions arise: where would sovereignty rest in this period – would the Scottish Parliament take on a new sovereign power through the constitutional platform, or would there be some notional reversion to the sovereignty of the pre-1707 Scottish Parliament? And what of the Crown, the Privy Council etc.? Finally, Scotland’s Future proposes a constitutional path to terminate Westminster’s authority. The UK Parliament would legislate ‘to acknowledge the end of its power to legislate for Scotland’ (2.13) in a way similar to the Malta Independence Act 1964 and the 1931 Statute of Westminster.

There is also some discussion of the process towards a written constitution. Scotland’s Future suggests the possibility of a constitutional convention to be convened by the newly elected independent Scottish Parliament to draft this (1.7). It is not clear what shape this would take but it ‘should engage all the people of Scotland in the process of nation-building and allow them a say in defining how our country will work. (1.6)’ Reference is made to the citizen-led assemblies and constitutional conventions convened in British Columbia (2004), the Netherlands (2006), Ontario (2007) and Iceland (2010) as well as the citizen-led constitutional convention convened in Ireland in 2012. Given that such an open process is proposed we must assume that the substantive proposals for the written constitution set out in Scotland’s Future would themselves be open to revision. For example, such a constitutional convention may well decide not to include social rights and could also opt for a republican rather than monarchical system of government etc. Finally, another question is, would there be referendum to ratify this constitution and would the referendum find its way into the constitution as a standard mechanism of constitutional amendment? What we know of referendum use is that it tends to be contagious; once used to change a system of government it often finds its way into a new constitution as part of the process of future change.

It is likely that these issues will be discussed in detail over the next 18 months. Regardless of the outcome of the referendum they may well also prompt wider UK debates about constitutional change and could also help frame the landscape for further constitutional re-thinking in Scotland, even in the event of a majority No vote.

 Stephen Tierney is Director, Edinburgh Centre for Constitutional Law. This blog is based upon a paper given to the Law Society of Scotland on 7 March 2013. I am grateful to those present for a most fruitful discussion of the paper.

Suggested citation: Stephen Tierney, ‘After the referendum – the Scottish Government’s proposal for a written Constitution’ ,  UK Const. L. Blog (12 March 2013) (available at http://ukconstitutionallaw.org).

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by | March 4, 2013 · 3:11 pm

Colm O’Cinneide: Human Rights, Devolution and the Constrained Authority of the Westminster Parliament

a_ocinneideThe debate over the place of human rights in UK constitutional law continues to run and run. The Home Secretary, Theresa May MP, has recently criticised the manner in which UK judges are interpreting the right to family life protected by Article 8 of the ECHR. A private members bill tabled by Tory MP Charlie Elphicke, the Human Rights Act 1998 (Repeal and Substitution) Bill, which would de-incorporate Convention rights and replace them with diluted ‘British’ replacements, received its Second Reading on the 1st March 2013. Furthermore, at the time of writing, the Mail on Sunday is quoting Theresa May again to the effect that the next Tory election manifesto will include a commitment to withdrawing from the jurisdiction of the European Court of Human Rights, de-incorporating Convention rights, or some such equivalent measure.

As a consequence, it may be a good time to highlight the fact that changing existing UK human rights law is not an easy task. Even if one leaves to one side the external diplomatic factors that may limit the UK’s freedom of action in this field, there are internal legal and political factors in play which make tampering with the HRA a more problematic project than the media headlines suggest. In particular, complex issues arise with respect to devolution and the various ways in which Convention rights have become embedded in the constitutional framework of the UK.

The HRA itself is a piece of primary legislation which applies to all public authorities throughout the UK and can be amended or repealed by the Westminster Parliament. The UK’s international relationship with the Council of Europe and the European Court of Human Rights also comes squarely within the sphere of reserved powers. However, human rights are not per se a reserved function, and there exists a separate and distinct ‘devolution dimension’ to the UK system of rights protection. The devolved legislatures and executives in Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales are required to comply with ‘Convention rights’ by virtue of specific provisions set out in the devolution statues (S. 6(2)(c) and s. 24(1)(a) of the Northern Ireland Act 1998; s. 29(2)(d) and s. 57(2) of the Scotland Act 1998; s. 81(1) and s. 94(6)(c) of the Government of Wales Act 2006). They can also take measures to give further effect to the UK’s international human rights obligations when acting within the scope of their powers, including but not confined to those that arise under the ECHR (para. 3(c) of Sch. 2 of the Northern Ireland Act 1998; para. 7(2) of Schedule 5 of the Scotland Act 1998; and in general Schedule 5 of the Government of Wales Act 2006).

The existence of this ‘devolution dimension’ imposes some constraints on the freedom of the Westminster Parliament to reconstruct UK human rights law as it sees fit. For example, any change to the current requirement that the Northern Irish, Scottish and Welsh legislatures must comply with Convention rights would affect the scope of their devolved powers: as a result, under existing constitutional arrangements, it would appear to trigger the Sewel Convention, meaning that Westminster would ‘normally’ have to seek the consent of the devolved legislatures before it could legislate in respect of human rights law as it applies in respect of devolved matters. Furthermore, because the devolved legislatures are able to take steps to extend human rights protection, they have the power to minimise the impact of any reduction of rights protection brought about by Westminster legislation within the sphere of devolved functions.

Thus, for example, if the Westminster Parliament wished to root out the ECHR rights from UK law and replace them with home-grown ‘British’ variants through a new Bill of Rights, it would either have to leave intact the provisions of the devolution legislation that require the Northern Irish, Scottish and Welsh legislatures to comply with Convention rights, or else seek the consent of the three legislatures to the removal from Convention rights from the devolution framework. Furthermore, even if such consent was forthcoming, or the Westminster Parliament chose simply to disregard the Sewel Convention, the devolved legislatures might subsequently be able to restore much of the status quo within the sphere of devolved functions. For example, if Westminster were to repeal the HRA, the Scottish Parliament would appear to have the power to introduce a ‘Scottish HRA’ or an equivalent measure in respect of devolved matters, which could provide an equivalent or even greater level of rights protection within its sphere of application than currently available under the HRA.[1]

Furthermore, the political context is very different in the devolved regions when it comes to human rights. The recent report of the Commission on a Bill of Rights noted that ‘there was little, if any, criticism of the Strasbourg Court, of the European label of the Convention, or of human rights generally in Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland’ (p. 163), while Philippe Sands and Helena Kennedy in their minority report suggest that ‘existing arrangements under the Human Rights Act and the European Convention on Human Rights are not merely tolerated but strongly supported’ in the devolved regions (p. 266). In addition, as Christine Bell has discussed on this blog, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales are in the course of developing their own unique approaches to human rights. This makes it unlikely that the devolved legislatures will be willing to consent to any Westminster legislation which sought to make significant changes to how human rights are protected within the sphere of devolved functions. Indeed, in giving evidence to the Commission on a Bill of Rights, the Scottish Government made it clear that it considered that the Westminster Parliament lacked the legitimacy to determine the scope of human rights protection in Scotland (see p. 166 of the Commission’s report).

Additional issues arise in respect of Northern Ireland. The Belfast Agreement specifically required that the ‘UK government will complete incorporation into Northern Ireland law of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), with direct access to the courts, and remedies for breach of the Convention’ (Rights, Safeguards and Equality of Opportunity, para. 2.). In addition, as Brice Dickson and Colin Harvey have recently discussed on this blog, a separate Bill of Rights process is underway in Northern Ireland, whose roots also lie in the provisions of the Belfast Agreement. As a result, any attempt by Westminster to alter or amend existing human rights law which applies to Northern Ireland (whether relating to devolved functions or to reserved functions such as national security) is likely to be viewed as an unwanted interference with the fragile constitutional settlement that has been constructed there on the foundations laid down by the Belfast Agreement.

Of course, the Westminster Parliament is free to alter or amend existing UK human rights law as it applies to the sphere of reserved functions, as recognised by Anthony Speaight QC in a thoughtful paper on devolution attached to the final report of the Commission on a Bill of Rights. However, even if Westminster were only to legislate in this field in respect of reserved functions (and exempted Northern Ireland from the scope of application of the proposed new law), devolution would still have the potential to create troubling inconsistencies in UK human rights law.

For example, if Westminster were to de-incorporate Convention rights and replace the HRA with a new ‘British’ Bill of Rights containing home-grown rights standards that applied in the sphere of reserved functions, Convention rights would still be applicable within the sphere of devolved functions. This could generate some complex legal issues where devolved functions in areas such as criminal justice and social welfare overlap with reserved powers such as immigration control. (These complexities would obviously be exacerbated if the entirety of Northern Irish law, including law relating to reserved functions, was exempted from the scope of the new ‘Bill of Rights’.) It would also mean that Convention rights would continue to be applied by UK courts in the context of the devolved regions, ensuring that the Strasbourg jurisprudence would continue to exert some direct influence on the development of UK law.

Alternatively, Westminster could simply choose to ignore the devolved legislatures and push through a new human rights law. However, this could generate a constitutional crisis if one or more of the devolved legislatures and/or governments were to cry foul, and it would in all probability breach the terms of the Sewel Convention. In any case, as already mentioned, the devolved legislatures might be able to limit the effects of such a measure by enacting their own devolved version of the HRA.

In general, the ‘devolution dimension’ cannot be readily ignored or sidelined in the ongoing human rights debate, as the Commission on a Bill of Rights recognised in its final report. The current parameters of the devolution settlement impose substantial legal and political constraints upon the power of the Westminster Parliament to alter existing UK human rights law. This will not come as a surprise to legal experts who are well aware of the limits to parliamentary sovereignty, as analysed by Mark Elliott, Nick Barber and others. However, discussion of these constraints have been largely absent from parliamentary or media debates on the HRA and ECHR. In particular, there has been little recognition that Convention rights have become woven into the fabric of the unwritten UK constitution in multiple different ways, which may prove very difficult to unravel.

Philippe Sands and Helena Kennedy have suggested that certain of their colleagues on the Bill of Rights Commission viewed the constraints imposed by devolution on the freedom of action of the Westminster Parliament as a case of the ‘tail wagging the dog’. There is a danger that a similar attitude may blind politicians in Westminster to the reality that the UK constitutional system is now complex, variegated and pluralist in nature. Tampering with the status of Convention rights in UK law may appease some Europhobic voters, but it risks open up some serious constitutional fractures.

Colm O’Cinneide is a Reader in Law at University College London. 

Suggested citation: C. O’Cinneide ‘Human Rights, Devolution and the Constrained Authority of the Westminster Parliament’ UK Const. L. Blog (4th March 2013) (available at http://ukconstitutionallaw.org)

 

[1] See the research paper written by Anthony Speaight QC and attached to the report of the Commission on a Bill of Rights, ‘Devolution Options’, pp. 243-256, especially at p. 250.

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by | October 15, 2012 · 4:30 pm

Event: invitation to the 2012 ‘Public Law’ lecture, Thursday 6 December 2012 at 6.30 pm

Professor Neil Walker on Our Constitutional Unsettlement

6.30pm, Thursday 6 December 2012

Arts Two Building,  Queen Mary, University of London,  Mile End Road, London E1 4NS

Please book online here. This is a CPD accredited event. This event will be followed by a drinks reception to which all attendees are invited. #QMpubliclaw

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by | September 17, 2012 · 12:53 pm

Alan Trench: Welsh byelaws and the UK Supreme Court

At the end of July, we learned that the UK Attorney-General has referred the first Act of the National Assembly passed since the March 2011 referendum to the UK Supreme Court. There’s news coverage of this from the BBC here, and a good analysis from Toby Mason of BBC Wales here.  This is the first time that any devolved legislation has been referred to the Supreme Court before receiving royal assent; it is the first time the UK Government’s law officers have challenged the legal competence of devolved legislation; and it is the first time that legal challenges involving Welsh legislation have been brought.  Any one of those would make it a noteworthy event indeed.  To find all three of them in one place – coupled with a significant point of law – makes it a case of rare interest.  The latest information is that there will be a hearing in early October.

This post will discuss what the case is about, how it comes before the court and what the constitutional political issues at stake are, as well as the black-letter legal ones.  It is a case of interest that goes far beyond Wales, because although there are significant differences between the Welsh arrangements and those for Scotland or Northern Ireland, the case also raises some rather broader questions about the legal working of devolution.

This is not the first time Wales has broken new ground in challenging how devolution works, of course.  Most notably, Wales was the first jurisdiction to refuse consent to Westminster legislation affecting a devolved function under the Sewel convention – aspects of the Police Reform and Social Responsibility Act 2011.  Perhaps the more provisional, evolutionary nature of the Welsh arrangements mean that it is more prone to test the legal aspects of its devolution arrangements than Scotland or Northern Ireland, where they are more clearly established.

The legal background 

The bill that the Attorney General is challenging is the Local Government Byelaws (Wales) bill, which was passed by the National Assembly on 3 July 2012.  The Byelaws bill is a pretty dull piece of legislation.  Its main effect is to enable Welsh local authorities to make byelaws under a number of specified powers for places like public conveniences, sea-side promenades or private swimming pools, without requiring that these be ‘confirmed’ by an approving authority.  Up to now, and still in England, byelaws have to be made under specific statutory powers, with procedural requirements including local advertising.  They must then be approved by a confirming authority, historically the Home Secretary, before they can come into effect.  To secure that approval, it is usually necessary to use established model byelaws, or else to make a strong argument why something different is needed and why it is appropriate in a particular case.  Welsh byelaws would still need to be limited to specified purposes, be consulted on, and advertised in the local area; but many of them would not need approval by another level of government.

In the case of the Byelaw bill, the power to make byelaws under the various statutes involved – the Public Health Amendment Act 1907, the Public Health Act 1936, the Highways Act 1980 and more – was passed to the National Assembly by the ‘jumbo’ transfer of functions order in 1999.  These powers were passed unconditionally, and by virtue of paragraph 30 of Schedule 11 to the 2006 Act have now passed to the Welsh Government.  However, the power for local authorities to make byelaws, which is set out in section 236 of the Local Government Act 1972, provides that confirmation of byelaws is a matter for concurrent action by both to be the Assembly (meaning now the Welsh Ministers) and the Secretary of State.  Thus, to the extent that the Byelaws bill alters the way section 236 LGA 1972 works, it affects a function of the Secretary of State.

Schedule 7 to the Government of Wales Act 2006 provides that devolved legislation can only affect pre-commencement functions of UK ministers like the section 236 bye-law confirming power if it does so only incidentally or consequentially to its main purpose, or if the Secretary of State gives her consent.  Consent has not been given in this case.  In the Attorney General’s view, clauses 6 and 9 of the Byelaws bill therefore transgress on UK ministers’ powers, so are beyond the powers of the National Assembly.

Referring a bill to the Supreme Court

The Attorney General has never before used his power to refer a devolved bill to the UK Supreme Court, though he has a similar one under each of the devolution settlements (under section 33 of the Scotland Act 1998 and section 11 of the Northern Ireland Act 1998, as amended by sections 27-8 of and Schedule 7 to the Justice (Northern Ireland) Act 2002) .  This is therefore an unprecedented step, and takes us into unknown territory.  When issues have arisen with devolved legislation in the past, they have been resolved quietly behind the scenes – perhaps by amending the legislation, perhaps by adjusting the devolution settlement to ensure the bill is within competence.  As all devolved legislation needs a declaration whether it is within the legislative powers of the parliament involved from both the minister or other member responsible for the bill, and the presiding officer, it is highly unusual for a bill to reach this stage with any major question about its legal competence.

In this case, both the presiding officer and the Minister for Local Government and Communities stated that they considered the bill to be within the Assembly’s legislative competence.  The explanatory memorandum makes no reference to the issue about confirming powers at all, and indeed implies that confirmation was simply a matter for Welsh Ministers, with no obligation for them to act in conjunction with UK ones at all.

A reference means that the case goes straight to the Supreme Court, without any earlier hearing in the High Court or Court of Appeal.  In the Welsh case, the procedure is set out in Schedule 9 of the 2006 Act.  The procedure bears some resemblances to the procedure for an advisory opinion of the European Court of Justice, which is quite a novelty for lawyers from the UK, and has never been used before.  But the lawyers will need to work out what to do quite quickly, as a hearing is apparently due to start on 9 October.

Functions of Ministers of the Crown

It has been increasingly clear for some time that the protection of the position of Ministers of the Crown was likely to be a serious brake on the exercise of the National Assembly’s legislative powers under Part 4 of the 2006 Act.  Many executive functions were transferred to the National Assembly in 1999 (by what is known as the ‘jumbo’ transfer of functions order), and a few others have been since.  Those functions were then transferred to the Welsh Ministers when the 2006 Act came into effect (by paragraph 30 of Schedule 11 to the 2006 Act).  But there remain a good many residual UK functions, reflecting the history of administrative entanglement between England and Wales – and the defensiveness of some Whitehall departments about devolution.  Those arguments were re-fought when the 2006 Act was being framed, and one key safeguard was the block on legislation affecting functions of ‘ministers of the Crown’.

One of many problems with that safeguard is that no-one knows quite how far it reaches.   There is no list of functions of ministers of the Crown, and producing one would be a huge task that would inevitably produce mistakes.  But that history of administrative entanglement goes back a long way (remember: the Welsh Office was only created in 1964), and has a powerful effect.  And UK Departments have been keen to maintain control over important functions like planning for big energy projects or defence installations, as well as safeguarding water supplies, business regulation and the common law of England and Wales.  That has usually been done by express provision, rather than by relying on a general saving clause as here.

It is worth noting that the position for Wales is rather different from that for Scotland.  There, following an opinion of the Attorney General, the UK Government has accepted that it is within the power of the Scottish Parliament to legislate for matters that affect UK ministers, provided the legislation is within Holyrood’s legislative competence – i.e., that the legislation does not ‘relate to’ a reserved matter.  There is no general saving for UK ministerial functions, though there are rather fewer of them relating to devolved functions in Scotland.  This is documented in Devolution Guidance Note 15, which also emphasises the need for consultation before Holyrood legislates in ways that affect UK ministers.

It is also worth noting that a ‘reserved powers’ model of conferring legislative powers on the National Assembly would not solve this problem.  Nor would creating a separate Welsh legal jurisdiction (though that might have an effect on it).  The problem arises because of the relationship between UK executive functions and devolved legislative powers, not the scope of those powers.

The politics of this case

In some circumstances, constitutional litigation can happen more or less by accident.  Even years after legislation is passed, a private litigant can raise the question of whether the Act was in fact legally competent.  That does not appear to be the case here.  I understand that the Wales Office tried repeatedly to draw the Welsh Government’s attention to the problem, and to suggest what changes they needed for the Secretary of State to be able to give her consent (which she was willing in principle to do).  The Welsh Government failed to respond, in circumstances that suggest this cannot have been accident or oversight.  But legally speaking the Welsh Government’s position here is weak, if not hopeless; the legislation affects a function of a minister of the Crown, consent has not been given, therefore the legislation is beyond the Assembly’s powers.  The Welsh Government seems to be walking into a judgment that what would have been the Assembly’s first Act is void.   The only hope for its argument might be if it could show that the formal protection of the UK Minister’s confirming power had in fact fallen into disuse, but even if this can be proven it is hard to see how it helps given the clear position under statute.

Equally, this analysis means that the UK Attorney General had little choice but to refer the bill to the Supreme Court.  The legal position is quite clear.  If he failed to do so, he would have been in dereliction of his duty; he would, effectively, be conniving at the National Assembly passing legislation it had no power to pass.  His legal role means that not only does he have the power to make such a reference, but in these circumstances he has to do so.  Even if he did not, it would not solve the problem – the legal flaw in the legislation would remain, and (for example) any person aggrieved at his or her conviction under a bye-law made under the new system would be able to challenge their conviction.  In that sense, the power the Attorney General has (and his exercise of it) are ways of bringing matters to a head sooner rather than later, and his use of it is an appropriate response to pretty aggressive tactics from the Welsh Government.  The only surprise here is that the Attorney General waited until the last day he had to bring this challenge (there is a 28-day limit), rather than doing so promptly after the bill was passed.

Why might the Welsh Government have drafted and promoted legislation that was beyond the Assembly’s law-making power, and handled matters so as to invite such a legal challenge?  That is a question best directed at the First Minister or Counsel General, of course.  Two reasons suggest themselves why they might do so, though.

The first is that they think there is just a chance that the Supreme Court will find in their favour, and want to see how much leeway or support they can get from the court.  In the Axa case, Lord Hope – inaccurately, in my view – said obiter that the ‘essential nature of the legislatures created’ for Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland were the same in each case (at paragraph 43).  That may have given them an (unjustified) degree of optimism in what the Court might say, given that these constraints do not apply under the Scotland or Northern Ireland settlements.  It would certainly look like an avenue worth exploring, even if the chance of success is limited.

The second is that they know they are going to lose, and want to use the Court’s judgment to underline to the wider public just how limited the new legislative powers of the National Assembly are.  There could be no more powerful sign of that than that the first, innocuous Act of the Assembly is in fact blocked.  After all, there are more contentious bills in the pipeline – notably the Human Tissue bill.  That in turn may serve a wider political purpose, of making it hard politically for the Secretary of State to refuse consent to legislation in future.  It may even secure some guidelines from the Court about how the Secretary of State should approach the giving or withholding of consent, rather than simply leave it to the Secretary of State’s untrammelled discretion.

In that context, it is worth looking at the forebears of the provision that legislation affecting ministers of the Crown needs consent.  Two spring readily to mind.  The Northern Ireland Act 1998 creates three sorts of legislative powers: ‘excepted’ and ‘reserved’ matters, which are beyond the Northern Ireland Assembly’s competence, and ‘transferred’ ones, which are the rest.  Reserved matters can be devolved by a relatively simple order, so they are candidates for future devolution (though that has not happened in practice), and they may also be the subject of devolved legislation with the Secretary of State’s consent.  In the early years of the Assembly, this power was used relatively often, mainly when criminal offences were being created in connection with devolved functions (something not needed under Part 4 of the 2006 Act; see section 108(5)).  With the devolution of justice and policing, the need for that seems to have diminished considerably.

The other model is the more general inspiration for the 2006 Act – the Scotland Act 1978.  That never came into effect, of course, but it provided for a ‘defined powers’ model of legislative devolution.  It also gave extensive powers to the Secretary of State for Scotland (part of the UK Government, not the devolved administration) to approve legislation passed by the Scottish Assembly before that legislation came into effect.  That would have turned the Secretary of State into a Viceroy in all but name.  Such powers would have been very problematic – had the 1978 Act ever come into effect, it would either have stopped devolution working, if used, or otherwise fallen into disuse.  The danger in Wales is that the power of the Secretary of State to consent to legislation affecting ministers of the Crown is sufficiently broad that, although in form it safeguards the legal functions of UK minsters, in practice it operates as a discretionary veto on what the National Assembly may do.

Conclusion: a bad place to be

The fundamental issue here is that the March 2011 referendum creates a strong public expectation that the National Assembly will have power to legislate for the twenty devolved ‘subject areas’ set out in Schedule 7.  Formal niceties about protecting UK ministers’ functions were no part of that.  Undermining the effective working of that model of devolution will risk de-legitimising that model of devolution, and raise questions about what should happen instead.  Given the strength of public support for devolution, that is a dangerous course for all involved.  Even if the Supreme Court’s decision about the Byelaws will does no more than confirm that the Act is beyond the Assembly’s powers for want of the Secretary of State’s consent, it will both increase political tensions between Cardiff and London, and make a significant step forward in relying on the judicial resolution of difficult points in the devolution arrangements.  There are serious reasons to doubt whether the constitutional framework of devolution as it presently operates can withstand that.

Alan Trench is honorary fellow at the University of Edinburgh, honorary senior research fellow at the Constitution Unit, University College London, and author of the blog Devolution Matters.

Suggested citation: A. Trench, ‘Welsh byelaws and the UK Supreme Court’ UK Const. L. Blog (17 September 2012)(available at available at http://ukconstitutionallaw.org).

 

Update (4th October 2012): 

Since I wrote the post above, the Welsh Government has released a collection of papers and correspondence regarding the Byelaws bill and the court challenge.  They go back to September 2011 and show that the Welsh Government considers that the National Assembly has power to remove functions of ministers of the crown through its power to alter such functions when that is incidental to and or consequential on other, intra vires, provisions in Acts of the Assembly.  We will see what the Supreme Court makes of that line of reasoning.  As the removal was central rather than incidental to the statutory scheme in the bill, it is hard to see how the argument is likely to succeed.

The papers released also show that, although the Welsh Government was well aware of the UK Government’s view that the Assembly had no powers to legislate without the Secretary of State’s consent, it did not seek to make the Assembly aware of that problem.  Nor did it ask for consent from the Secretary of State, even when that was offered subject to limited amendments to the bill.

The documents released can be found on the Welsh Government’s website here, and I’ve written a more detailed post about it on Devolution Matters, here.

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by | June 26, 2012 · 12:21 pm

Aileen McHarg: The Dog That Finally Barked: Constitutional Review under the Scotland Act

The reviewability of Acts of the Scottish Parliament (ASPs) at common law has, understandably, attracted considerable interest of late, on this blog and elsewhere.  However, the Supreme Court’s decision in AXA General Insurance Ltd v the Scottish Ministers [2011] UKSC 46 confirmed that the primary means of challenging ASPs is upon the grounds laid down in section 29 of the Scotland Act 1998, and there have in fact been several recent cases brought on statutory grounds which merit similar attention.

In comparative terms, the model of constitutional review – if it is appropriately so described – contained in the Scotland Act is a particularly strong one, permitting both pre- and post-enactment challenges; direct and collateral challenges; and inter-institutional and individual challenges.  Yet, as has frequently been observed, the courts have so far played a relatively limited role in policing the boundaries of the Scottish Parliament’s legislative competence.  Indeed, for the first decade after devolution, although there were a few cases, no legislation was found to be ultra vires, there were no inter-institutional challenges, and it was not until 2008 that any statutory ground other than breach of Convention rights was invoked (Logan v Harrower 2010 JC 1).

In the last few years, however, all this has started to change.  To begin with, the initial trickle of cases appears to be growing into a steady stream.  Whereas between 1999 and 2009 there were only nine reported cases in which legislative competence was in issue, since 2010, there have already been eleven such cases.

Secondly, in February and March of this year, the Scottish courts issued their first rulings that provisions were ‘not law’ in terms of section 29 of the Scotland Act.  Cameron v Cottam 2012 SLT 173 concerned section 58 of the Criminal Justice and Licensing (Scotland) Act 2010, which imposed a standard bail condition requiring the accused to participate in identification procedures and to allow prints, impressions or other bodily samples to be taken.  Because the condition was mandatory and therefore not necessarily justified in particular cases, the Court of Criminal Appeal held that it breached Article 5 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR).  In Salvesen v Riddell [2012] CSIH 26, the Inner House of the Court of Session held that section 72 of the Agricultural Holdings (Scotland) Act 2003 was an unjustifiable interference with Article 1 Protocol 1 ECHR.  The 2003 Act abolished a form of agricultural tenancy – the limited partnership tenancy – which was used to prevent tenants gaining security of tenure, and replaced it with a statutory form of limited duration tenancy which gives tenants enhanced rights.  Following a wave of termination notices issued by landlords in anticipation of the legislation being passed, an anti-avoidance measure was inserted into the Bill which retrospectively cancelled the effect of such notices.  Giving judgment for the court, Lord Gill held that the provision went further than was justifiable for anti-avoidance purposes and was in fact punitive, motivated by the sponsoring minister’s view that the landlords’ action was immoral.  On the contrary, according to Lord Gill, there was nothing immoral in landlords exercising contractual rights to which tenants had agreed.

The third notable change is in the character of recent cases.  Although Convention rights remain the most popular ground of challenge, cases are at last emerging on other section 29 grounds.  The first to involve the devolved/reserved competence boundary was Logan v Harrower, which challenged the validity of section 45 of the Criminal Proceedings Reform etc (Scotland) Act 2007, which raised the maximum sentence available upon summary conviction in the Sheriff Court, insofar as it applied to road traffic offences, which are reserved under Schedule 5, Head E1 of the Scotland Act.  Although the challenge failed in the appeal court, it was essentially revived before the Supreme Court in Martin v HM Advocate 2010 SC (UKSC) 40.  The point at issue in both cases was a rather esoteric one, namely whether a general change to the criminal law, carried out for a devolved purpose, but which for reasons of consistency made changes to the law on reserved matters, and would therefore have been intra vires in terms of section 29(4), was nevertheless ultra vires because it altered a rule which was ‘special to a reserved matter’ in terms of Schedule 4 paragraph 2(3).  By a three/two majority, the Supreme Court in Martin held that the rule was not ‘special to a reserved matter’ because it merely altered the procedural route by which a particular sentence could be imposed, rather than the maximum sentence available for road traffic offences.  However, six months later, in Henderson v HM Advocate 2011 JC 96, the Crown had little option but to concede that a similar general sentencing provision – a power to impose an order for lifelong restriction created by section 1 of the Criminal Justice (Scotland) Act 2003 – should be read down so as not to apply to offences under the Firearms Act 1968.  Firearms is also a reserved matter (see Schedule 5 Head B4), and the effect of the impugned legislation clearly was to increase the maximum sentence available in such cases.

Another ASP which has had multiple challenges is the Tobacco and Primary Medical Services (Scotland) Act 2010, which, inter alia, bans displays of tobacco and smoking-related products (section 1) and cigarette vending machines (section 9).  In Sinclair Collis v Lord Advocate 2011 SLT 620, it was claimed that the section 9 ban breached both Article 1 Protocol 1 ECHR and Article 34 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU) (free movement of goods).  The Lord Ordinary rejected both challenges, holding that although it was not clear whether the vending machine ban fell within Article 34, it was in any case clearly a justified and proportionate restriction given its aim to protect public health, and that the same applied to the property rights challenge.  The attack was renewed in Imperial Tobacco v the Lord Advocate [2012] CSIH 9, this time on both provisions and on the grounds that they related to consumer protection, which is a reserved matter under Schedule 5, Heads C7 and C8, and modified section 6 of the Union with Scotland Act 1706, so far as it relates to freedom of trade, reserved by Schedule 4 paragraph 1(2)(a).  Imperial Tobacco is undoubtedly the most significant of the recent cases, since it is the first to involve a straightforward claim that an ASP has encroached upon reserved matters, and the Inner House’s decision contains important guidance on how such disputes are to be resolved.  In particular, the judges rejected the Lord Advocate’s argument, based on Robinson v Secretary of State for Northern Ireland [2002] UKHL 32, that, as a constitutional measure, the Scotland Act ought to be given a ‘generous and purposive interpretation’.  Although of constitutional significance, they insisted that the Scotland Act was not a constitution, but rather an Act of Parliament, and should therefore be interpreted in the same way as other statutes.  While statutes have to be interpreted in the light of their purpose, this requires specific evidence as to the background purpose, and in this case, since the purpose of Schedule 5 was simply to effect a division of powers between the Scottish and UK Parliaments, a purposive interpretation did not assist in determining where the dividing line was to be drawn.  Nevertheless, the court concluded that the tobacco bans were within competence: they were not consumer protection measures, and did not affect freedom of trade within the meaning of the Act of Union.

As to future challenges, litigation is widely anticipated in relation to the Alcohol (Minimum Pricing) (Scotland) Bill, again based on the claim that it is a disproportionate restriction on free movement of goods under Article 34 TFEU.  And the prospect remains of a challenge to the competence of the promised independence referendum, unless agreement is reached on an Order under section 30 of the Scotland Act to confer express power on the Scottish Parliament to legislate on this matter.  The independence referendum issue is, of course, also significant as the first instance of an open dispute between the Scottish and UK governments about the vires of proposed legislation.

Much more could be said about the decisions in these recent cases.  One might speculate, for example, as to the factors which led the courts to strike down the provisions in Cameron v Cottam and Salvesen v Riddell, without much show of deference in either case.  One could also explore the apparent differences in approaches to the interpretation of devolution statutes as between the majority and minority in Martin, or between the House of Lords in Robinson and the Inner House in Imperial Tobacco.  However, since both Salvesen v Riddell and Imperial Tobacco have been appealed to the Supreme Court, which is also due to give judgment in another case (ANS v ML) involving the compatibility of section 31(3)(d) of the Adoption and Children (Scotland) Act 2007  with Article 8 ECHR, further discussion might reasonably be postponed until these cases have been finally resolved.

There is, though, another question on which it is equally interesting to speculate: why is it that so many more, and more varied, challenges to the validity of ASPs have been raised in the last few years?  It has been suggested that the main reason for the previous relative lack of resort to the courts is because of robust internal policing of the boundaries of the Scottish Parliament’s legislative competence, both within the devolved institutions, and through inter-governmental negotiation, the latter assisted by political consensus between the Scottish and UK governments for most of the period since devolution.  There is undoubtedly some truth in this view, since there are strong supports within the Scotland Act for political resolution of vires concerns.  These include provisions for pre-legislative declarations by sponsoring ministers and the Presiding Officer that Bills are within competence (section 31), for pre-enactment references by UK and Scottish law officers to the Supreme Court (section 33), and, in some circumstances, for pre-enactment veto by UK ministers (section 35).  Provisions such as sections 30 and 104 which, respectively, enable UK ministers to confer additional powers on the Scottish Parliament and (inter alia) to make changes to reserved matters consequent upon ASPs, as well as the greater than anticipated use of Legislative Consent Motions to allow the UK Parliament to legislate on Scotland’s behalf, also point to a co-operative approach to the achievement of legally effective legislation.  Moreover, such inter-governmental co-operation does not appear to be particularly dependent upon political compatibility: the independence referendum apart, there is no evidence, as far as I am aware, of greater disagreement over competence issues between the SNP at Holyrood and the Conservative/Liberal Democrat coalition in London than there was under previous administrations.

Nevertheless, internal policing of the boundaries of legislative competence cannot be the sole reason why so few judicial challenges emerged in the early post-devolution period, nor can it explain why the rate of challenge has increased so dramatically.  There are at least three reasons why political mechanisms cannot be expected to eliminate all potential challenges: first, the government(s) may identify possible legal problems, but for political reasons decide to legislate anyway; secondly, they may identify potential grounds of challenge, but conclude that they are unlikely to succeed; thirdly, they may simply fail to identify relevant competence issues.  Given the complexity of the reserved/devolved boundary, the reach and intricacy of potential EU constraints, and the open-textured nature of Convention rights, it would seem, on the face of it, that there must remain substantial scope for individual challenges.

So what factors might explain the changing incidence of judicial challenges?  These might include:

    • Greater awareness of the possibilities for challenge on the part of potential litigants and/or their legal advisers;
    • Greater perceived receptiveness of the courts towards vires challenges;
    • Reduced financial or other barriers to litigation;
    • Increased financial or other incentives for potential litigants to challenge legislation;
    • Bolder use of its powers by the Scottish Parliament, particularly in ways that impinge upon powerful interests.

More detailed examination would obviously be needed to establish the relevance of these suggested factors, and to identify other significant considerations.  The likelihood is that different combinations of factors are at work in different cases, and there are of course inherent difficulties in trying to prove a negative – i.e., why challenges have not been brought.  Nevertheless, there is important empirical work to be done in gaining a fuller understanding of the incidence of vires challenges and their motivating causes.  In turn, this would provide a more nuanced appreciation of the practical significance of the Scottish Parliament’s bounded competence, and of the role of judicial enforcement of the devolution settlement as just one policing mechanism amongst others.

Aileen McHarg is Professor of Public Law at the  University of Strathclyde.

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by | May 24, 2012 · 9:07 am

Stephen Tierney: Canadian Constitutional Change 30 Years On: Notes from a Small Island

A number of events have been held recently in Canada to mark the 30th anniversary of the ‘patriation’ of the constitution through the (Westminster enacted) Canada Act 1982, schedule B of which contained the Constitution Act, 1982. The main developments encapsulated by the 1982 process were the return to Canada of the constitutional amendment formula, allowing the constitution to be changed internally without recourse to the (albeit symbolic) ratification by Westminster; and secondly, the entrenchment of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms within the Constitution Act, 1982. Two anniversary events, held last month in Montreal and Ottawa respectively, are particularly notable for the ways in which they each reflected very differently on these events, and in doing so encapsulated the very different perspectives which are still brought to bear on these processes in Quebec and the rest of Canada. These events and the anniversary they commemorate, if not offering direct lessons for current constitutional debates in the UK, are certainly worth reflecting upon in light of ongoing debates in this country concerning both devolution and bills of rights.

The conference in Montreal was held at Université du Québec à Montréal by the International Association of Québec Studies and was titled ‘The patriation of the Constitution, 30 years later. What we can do? Where do we stand?’. This title itself suggests a degree of dissatisfaction with the 1982 changes. And indeed the conference was in many ways a retrospective on the 1981 process whereby Prime Minister Trudeau, with the agreement of most provincial premiers, but minus crucially the consent of Quebec Premier René Lévesque, asked Westminster to complete the patriation process. The sense of injustice, fuelled by the outcome of two legal challenges to this process in the Patriation Reference and Veto Reference cases before the Supreme Court of Canada, which served to deny the necessity of securing Quebec’s consent to the process, still lingers. The SCC broke new ground in recognising a convention of substantial provincial consent to constitutional amendment but did not extend this to include the need for Quebec’s consent specifically. It also fell back on a category distinction between law and convention, meaning that, in any case, provincial consent would not be legally enforced to prevent patriation going ahead at the behest of the federal government.

In many ways the frustrating story of the 1980-82 process is that, despite the basis for so much agreement on substantive issues, a procedural failing has served to undermine the legitimacy of the Constitution Act, at least in the eyes of many Quebecers. There was broad consensus across Canada that the UK should play no further role in amending the constitution, there was scope for agreement on what a new amending formula would look like, giving effective vetoes to a number of Canadian regions or powerful provinces, and there was even the opportunity to arrive at an agreed bill of rights across the country. But the sense Quebec felt of being rail-roaded into the new arrangements has meant that this level of substantive consensus has been seriously undermined for decades by a flawed process. In the UK of course constitutional changes have worked much more consensually in recent times, as we have seen with the Government of Wales Act 2006 and the Scotland Act 2012. But as we turn to the potentially more fraught engagement with constitutional change through a referendum in Scotland the Canadian experience of flawed constitutional process should be carefully considered.

The story of the Charter is interesting since, after 30 years, and despite the failings of the 1980-82 process, the Charter enjoys very high levels of support in Quebec as in the rest of Canada. Whereas the conference in Montreal focused upon patriation as failure, the event at the University of Ottawa – ‘Checking Our Constitution@30: The Influence of the Canadian Constitution and the Charter of Rights and Freedoms on Legislation, Identities and Federalism’, was much more a celebration, with a number of affirmations of the Charter emphasising its impact not only on the legal system and different areas of social policy, but upon the very identity of Canadians themselves. The Charter was held up as a totem of collective identity particularly for younger Canadians whose civic sense of belonging to the state has for thirty years been strongly shaped by an education process that has promoted the Charter and in doing so has helped embed this instrument within the popular imagination as an essential component of ‘being Canadian’. Again, as the UK reflects upon the much more attenuated sense of affiliation people have with the Human Rights Act, which after all incorporates a generic international instrument, and as debates proceed about a domestic bill of rights, it is important to remember that such an instrument, beyond the legal measures it might contain, can also assume a strong nation-building character. It is also pertinent to recall that the Charter emerged at a natural moment of constitutional change in 1982, whereas it is not clear that 1998 or indeed today represent propitious moments to mobilise widespread self-reflection by British citizens concerning their constitutional identity/ies. It is also vital to note that any debate about a bill of rights cannot be meaningfully separated from parallel debates about the multinational nature of the UK and changes in the devolved settlements. For example, how would such a bill or rights reflect the multiple national identities and the possibly varying priorities given to different values across the UK? Indeed, would such a bill be able to locate and reflect a set of pan-British values, how could such a process be undertaken and how could consensus be reached? Thirty years on, the Charter is clearly popular across the Canadian state, but the process by which it was constitutionally endorsed without Quebec’s consent demonstrates both how difficult it can be to frame a bill of rights for a multinational state, and how, if done badly, such a process can do more to harm than to foster nation-building within a demotically complex state.

Stephen Tierney is Professor of Constitutional Theory at the University of Edinburgh

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by | May 17, 2012 · 10:59 am

Reminder of UKCLG-sponsored meeting on Monday 21 May 2012, 6 pm

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