Tuesday, 24 September 2019

Will the Supreme Court decision help or harm Boris?

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A Supreme Court decision is final in the United Kingdom. There is no point in saying the decision is wrong though it pretty plainly is. Lady Hale, in her summary of the decision, scarcely mentioned any precedents, made no close legal argument but did say:
"The courts have exercised a supervisory jurisdiction over the lawfulness of acts of the Government for centuries. As long ago as 1611, the court held that "the King [who was then the government] hath no prerogative but that which the law of the land allows him".
She also spoke about parliamentary supremacy as the principle which made the prorogation illegal, but it is the Crown in Parliament that is supreme, not the two Houses of Parliament.

What is extraordinary is that all eleven judges agreed to this startling decision. In legal terms the decision cannot be questioned but in political and historical terms it is a power grab by the judges.

Will this harm the Government? I think it may well help them.


It will be the Conservative government against judges and MPs.

We can expect a Conservative election manifesto read out by the Queen when Parliament is prorogued and summoned. The motion on the Queen's Speech will be lost and what then? Presumably Jeremy Corbyn will be asked to try to form a government and I expect he will succeed. And what then?

After that my crystal ball becomes dark.

Voters are seeing a legal coup by MPs and judges against a Government trying to implement a referendum decision. It is a fight between the establishment and the anarchists who want to follow the will of the people. The extension of the power of Europe, the state and judges are all entwined.

Christopher Caldwell talks interestingly about judge-made law taking over from laws made by elected MPs.

'These shifts in Britain’s constitutional culture have become obvious during the rolling European migration crisis of recent decades. The more courts took control of immigration policy, the harder immigration was to stop. As home secretary under David Cameron, May promised to limit Britain’s galloping population growth to “tens of thousands a year, not hundreds of thousands.” But net migration has been running at around a quarter-million ever since, rising as high as 333,000 in 2015. Last year, according to Migration Watch U.K., net migration was 258,000. That means 74,000 Europeans added to 232,000 non-Europeans who arrived, and 48,000 Britons who left. May was just a talker when it came to immigration policy, but no politician in three decades had done any better. Once the judiciary rules politics, all politicians are just talkers. Understand that, and you are most of the way to understanding Brexit.

'The transfer of competences from legislatures to courts is a superb thing for the rich, because of the way the constitution interacts with occupational sociology. Where the judiciary is drawn from the legal profession, and where the legal profession is credentialed by expensive and elite professional schools, judicialization always means a transfer of power from the country at large to the richest sliver of it. This is true no matter what glorious-sounding pretext is found to justify the shift—racial harmony, European peace, a fair shake for women. In a global age, judicial review is a tool that powerful people expect to find in a constitution, in the same way one might expect to find a hair dryer in a hotel room.'
Boris is a liar and a bounder. Is he a cad, which is worse? I think not. He is the only hope we have now of escaping the EU and the globalist quagmire.

The analogies between Donald Trump and Brexit are much exaggerated but there are a certain number of points in common. Steve Bannon when he said 

'Did you think they'd let you have your country back without a fight?'

could have been talking about Brexit.


I’d love us to leave Nato and forget about being the US poodle too – but we need Trump too much for now.



5 comments:

  1. Her Majesty’s constitutional powers to advise and warn her Prime Minister, or even in extremis to refuse his or her advice, are now subject to the judgments of the Supreme Court. If the Queen wills it, the Supreme Court can unwill it. If the Queen does not will it, the Supreme Court can oblige her to will it.

    This is a seismic constitutional shift in the United Kingdom, if not an unglorious revolution.

    We are now ruled by 11 Justices of the Supreme Court – unelected, unaccountable and unimpeachable.

    https://archbishopcranmer.com/united-kingdom-no-longer-constitutional-monarchy/

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  2. Well, that's a shame, because anyone who has ever needed Trump usually ends up getting screwed.

    Boris overreached and the court probably overreached too. Three years of constant argument have raised tempers and distorted judgment.

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    1. Well this is no time to make enemies with the US. I am sure you agree.

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    2. Yes, it is a bit like the huge anger that took over in 1914 when we were on the verge of civil law over Ireland, with leading Tories being the traitors that time. Suffragettes and strikes did nit help nor Princip.

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    3. Trump just got into trouble of his own today. I get the feeling he will be distracted.

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