Tag: Parliamentary sovereignty
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Simon Lee: Dicey Sentiments
Everybody in Miller loves Dicey, judging by the publication of counsel’s arguments ahead of next week’s Supreme Court hearing. But it was not always thus and simply quoting more and more of Albert Venn Dicey’s 1885 tome, in any of its editions, on Parliamentary sovereignty is not enough. The challenge in Miller is not what…
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Luke McDonagh: What Future for the Rule of Law and Human Rights in the New Populist Environment?
Introductions When I teach UK constitutional law to my students we often discuss the relationship between UK parliamentary sovereignty and the rule of law, and the tensions that inevitably occur in a liberal democratic society between the ruling executive/legislature and the judiciary. One thing that is readily apparent is that these tensions – which have…
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Sionaidh Douglas-Scott: Miller: Why the Government Should Still Lose in the Supreme Court (Even with New Arguments)
In the landmark legal decision in Miller v Secretary of State for Exiting the EU, the High Court ruled that the government cannot use the royal prerogative to trigger Article 50 EU Treaty, and so leave the EU, without Parliament’s authority. Since that ruling was given, a flurry of commentary on it has appeared. Some…
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Timothy Endicott: ‘This Ancient, Secretive Royal Prerogative’
That was Gina Miller’s evocative phrase for the power of the Crown when she was interviewed on Radio 4 before the hearing in her case, R (on the application of Miller) v Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union [2016] EWHC 2768. An ancient secretive royal prerogative sounds like the personal privilege of a despot…
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Albert Weale: The Constitution of Democracy and the Pretensions of the Plebiscite
When the UK’s High Court rendered its decision on whether the government could trigger Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty under the royal prerogative to initiate the UK leaving the European Union, it released a storm of abuse against the judiciary in the press and among cabinet ministers. ‘Enemies of the people’ snorted the Daily…
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David Feldman: Brexit, the Royal Prerogative, and Parliamentary Sovereignty
The issues in Miller In R. (Miller) v. Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union [2016] EWHC 2768 (Admin) judges had to decide, as a matter of law, on the constitutionally correct procedure for deciding whether and when to notify the President of the European Council that the UK intends to leave the EU,…
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Mark Elliott and Hayley J. Hooper: Critical reflections on the High Court’s judgment in R (Miller) v Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union
The judgment of the High Court in R (Miller) v Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union [2016] EWHC 2768 (Admin), decided on 3 November 2016, has been subjected to astonishing and wholly misguided criticism by politicians and the press. Let us be clear, then, at the outset of this post that we entertain no…
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Jean Leclair: Brexit and the Unwritten Constitutional Principle of Democracy: A Canadian Perspective
Much has been written on whether a prior approval by the UK Parliament is required to trigger the withdrawal process from the European Union under Article 50 of the Treaty on European Union. I will not presume to comment on the technical legal issues raised by this debate. Instead, I wish to highlight how the…
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Simon Renton: An Unintended Consequence of Article 50?
The issue of “Sovereignty” sits at the heart of Santos and M v Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union (CO/3281/2016 and CO/3809/2016) (the “Article 50 case”). In the Island of Palmas case (International Law by Vaughan Lowe at page 138 (2007)) the arbitrator described the concept of Sovereignty in the following terms: “Sovereignty…
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Mark Elliott and Stephen Tierney: House of Lords Constitution Committee Reports on Wales Bill
The House of Lords Constitution Committee today publishes its report on the Wales Bill. The history of the Bill is a somewhat chequered one, a Draft Bill published in October 2015 having been subjected to excoriating criticism by (among others) the Assembly’s Legislative and Constitutional Affairs Committee. The centrepiece of the Bill is intended to…