Tag: parliamentary accountability
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Mike Gordon: The Prime Minister, the Parties, and the Ministerial Code
The current Prime Minister’s long running battle with the Seven Principles of Public Life continues to gather pace. Boris Johnson’s actions relating to the pandemic ‘partygate’ scandal have arguably violated each of the principles established by the Nolan Committee in 1995: selflessness, integrity, objectivity, accountability, openness, honesty and leadership. The Prime Minister’s full house of…
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Davor Jancic: The UK-EU Trade Deal: Five Important Implications for the UK Parliament
The announcement of the UK-EU Trade and Cooperation Agreement (TCA) on Christmas Eve 2020 may have come as a surprise given endless media reports about the negotiators’ intransigence and the imminent threat of a cliff edge. Add to this the Covid-19 pandemic and some ten months and just nine formal rounds of negotiations make it…
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Jake Hinks: The Coronavirus Act 2020: An Example of ‘Excessive Executive Dominance’
In this post, I consider executive dominance, firstly, outlining ‘natural’ executive dominance, before differentiating this from ‘excessive’ executive dominance. I use the Coronavirus Act 2020 to demonstrate the latter, exploring some of the factors that amount to excessive executive dominance. I conclude by reflecting on the consequences of my novel concept ‘excessive executive dominance’. Natural…
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Mike Gordon: Dominic Cummings and the Accountability of Special Advisers
It is far from new for the conduct of Dominic Cummings to be a matter of political controversy. The man who is Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s current chief adviser was the Campaign Director of Vote Leave during the 2016 Brexit referendum, an organisation which was subsequently investigated by the Electoral Commission and fined for breaking…
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Jelena Gligorijević: Government Accountability for the Lawfulness of Lockdown: New Zealand Parliamentary Scrutiny and Privileged Legal Advice
The New Zealand Government recently lifted its “Level 4” COVID-19 restrictions. Significant restrictions, including coercive powers restricting basic liberties, remain active. Parliament’s Epidemic Response Committee is now planning to issue summonses for the production of legal advice given to the Government for these extraordinary measures. This advice is covered by legal professional privilege, which can…
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Adam Perry: Enforcing Principles, Enforcing Conventions
Did the UK Supreme Court enforce a constitutional convention in Miller (No 2)? Most writers say no. I say yes. Miller (No 2) I won’t go through the case in detail. For my purposes three points matter. First, the UKSC says that there is a constitutional ‘principle of Parliamentary accountability’. It gives three examples of…
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Tanzil Chowdhury: Miller (No 2), the Principle-isation of Ministerial Accountability and Military Deployments
Has the court in Miller (No 2) done the very thing it said it wouldn’t do in Miller (No 1)? Has it given legal enforceability to the constitutional convention of ministerial accountability? Several authors appear to suggest that is has (here, here and here). Indeed, conventions were given rather peculiar judicial treatment in Miller (No…
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Roger Masterman and Se-shauna Wheatle: Miller/Cherry and Constitutional Principle
In an essay published in Elliott, Varuhas and Wilson Stark (eds), The Unity of Public Law? Doctrinal, Theoretical and Comparative Perspectives, we examined Lord Neuberger’s use of constitutional principle-based reasoning in R (Evans) v Attorney General. In that decision, Lord Neuberger – with whom Lords Kerr and Reed were in agreement – employed the pan-jurisdictional…
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Theodore Konstadinides, Noreen O’Meara and Riccardo Sallustio: The UK Supreme Court’s Judgment in Miller/Cherry: Reflections on Its Context and Implications
On 24 September, the UK Supreme Court unanimously ruled that the Prime Minister’s advice to prorogue Parliament was unlawful, and that the resulting Order in Council and subsequent prorogation were ‘null, void and of no effect’. The litigation on the justiciability of prorogation and the lawfulness of the Prime Ministerial advice has led to one…
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Anurag Deb: A Constitution of Principles: From Miller to Minerva Mills
Introduction In a succinct and surprisingly unanimous judgment in Miller and Cherry [2019] UKSC 41 the UK Supreme Court delivered an unprecedented rebuke to the Prime Minister in deciding that he had not shown “any reason – let alone a good reason” to advise the Queen to prorogue Parliament, ruling that the prorogation was unlawful,…