Tag: Crown
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Francesca Jackson: Should the Monarch Pay Inheritance Tax?
The recent protests by farmers over changes to the rules on inheritance tax have raised questions over who, if anyone, should be exempt from paying it – including exemptions which benefit King Charles, as an episode of Newsnight has recently highlighted. In the UK inheritance tax is currently paid at a rate of 40% on…
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Isabel Taylor: Not So Arcane After All: Archives and the Battle for ‘Ancient Freedoms’ in the Stuart Permanent State of Emergency
In popular consciousness, archivists (when noticed at all, and not confused with Indiana Jones) are usually otherworldly, whey-faced individuals poring shortsightedly over mediaeval tomes, their institutional domains obscure, dusty spaces with little connection to the ‘real world.’ The central role of archives as repositories for important legal records is thereby often overlooked, but this function…
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David Torrance: A Tale of Two Accessions: 1952 and 2022
No two Accessions are the same. That of King Edward VII in 1901 was characterised by widespread confusion regarding custom and practice, for Queen Victoria’s succession to the Throne had long ago faded from the public consciousness. This time, the ‘official mind’ was better prepared and the major difference between the Accession of King Charles…
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David Kershaw: Revolutionary Amnesia and the Delegated Nature of Prerogative Power
“Left” in the Hands of the Crown The extent to which an exercise of prerogative power can be subject to judicial review, as well as the nature of such review, are umbilically connected to the nature and source of prerogative power. But what is the nature of the prerogative powers exercised by the Crown today—how…
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David Howarth: Westminster versus Whitehall: Two Incompatible Views of the Constitution
Lawyers like to make as much sense as possible of the material in front of them, transforming it, if they can, from a jumble of decisions and remarks into a coherent whole. For constitutional lawyers that habit of mind is both a blessing and a curse. It is a blessing because it causes lawyers to…
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John Finnis: Royal Assent – A Reply to Mark Elliott
I agree with Mark Elliott in finding my April 1 argument about prorogation and assent astonishing and monstrous, once the argument’s important premises have been omitted, as he has omitted them. And it is left even more objectionable when he has attributed to it a premise, two assumptions, and a goal each far from my…
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Jeff King: Can Royal Assent to a Bill Be Withheld If So Advised by Ministers?
An article in the Sunday Times by Professor Richard Ekins and Sir Stephen Laws QC advised that the Monarch could withhold Royal Assent to a bill passed if advised to do so by ministers. Robert Craig has also argued for that position in a blog post, making clear why in his view that is the…
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Robert Craig: Executive Versus Legislature in the UK – A Response to Mark Elliott and Tom Poole
For constitutional lawyers, the Brexit Santa Claus has shimmied down the chimney once again. This post is a response to Mark Elliott who recently commented on an article by John Finnis in the Telegraph. It also briefly addresses some of the points in a piece in the London Review of Books by Tom Poole published…
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Robert Hazell: The Royal baby, the Rules of Succession, and the Realms
In anticipation of the birth of the Royal baby, Parliament passed the Succession to the Crown Act in April 2013. It provides that in future the eldest child will be next in line of succession, whether it is a girl or a boy. The law will not come into force in time for the Royal…