Please enable JavaScript.
Coggle requires JavaScript to display documents.
Main sources of the UK Constitution - Coggle Diagram
Main sources of the UK Constitution
Statute law
Acts of Parliament that have the effect of establishing constitutional principles, which is the
highest legal authority in the UK, taking over any other sources in the UK constitution
examples of this are the
Human Rights Act 1998
,
Parliament Act 1949
(establishing limitations to the powers of the House of Lords) and
Scotland and Wales Act of 1998
(devolving power to those countries)
As Parliament is sovereign and can amend or repeal any statute, all statutes look alike and have the same status, in most other countries, a constitutional statute is differentiated from other laws and are superior to them
Constitutional conventions
An unwritten rule that is considered binding on all members of the political community - conventions should be challenged in law but have incredible moral force so are rarely distributed
Many powers of the Prime Minister are governed by such conventions (it is a convention that the Prime Minister exercises the King's power to appoint and dismiss ministers, to conduct foreign policy and to grant honours like peerages and knighthoods) - also known as the Royal prerogative
Its also a convention that the House of Lords should not block any legislation that appeared in the governing party's most recent election manifesto (known as the Salisbury Convention)
Authoritative works
works written by experts in history describing how a political system is run (this is not legally binding but taken as a significant guide)
the most important experts (constitutional theorists) include Blackstone (
parliamentary sovereignty
) and A.V. Dicey (
rule of law
), while the laws on how to form a coalition are now an authoritative constitutional work (having been drawn up by the then Cabinet Secretary Gus O'Donnell, in 2010 )
An important principle outlined - sovereignty of parliament - can be linked to another concept, which is parliamentary government (the principle that the authority of the government is drawn from Parliament and not the people)
The rule of law is a more recent development, originating in the second part of the nineteenth century. The rule of law establishes the law of equal rights for citizens and that government is itself bound by legal limitations
Common law
Judges, who declare and enforce common law, treat it as any rule of conduct that is well established and acknowledged by most people
An Anglo-Saxon principle, referring to the development of laws through historical usage and tradition.
An important application of common law has concerned the protection of basic rights and freedoms from encroachment by government and/or Parliament. The rights of people and free movement and gathering for public demonstrations are considered
'ancient freedoms'
guarded by the courts; alongside the principle that the Crown could not detain citizens without trial
Common law principles have been replaced by statutes and by the European Convention on Human Rights - which became law in 2000 - as the Human Rights Act (however, when there is no relevant statute, the common law is invoked in courts by citizens with a grievance against government)
Treaties
The UK Constitution is also comprised of international treaties and agreements that become binding on UK politics (the most famous of these is the European Convention on Human Rights, which was signed by the British government in 1956)
The British government agreed to be bound by the terms of the European Convention and subject to the European Court of Human Rights. Subjecting the British government to international law and agreements that it is compelled to honour (it was not brought into UK law until the passage of the Human Rights Act in 1998)
The relationship between the UK and the EU was defined through treaties. Such as the
Maastricht Treaty in 1992
and the
Lisbon Treaty of 2009
(Parliament allowed some of its sovereignty to be passed to the EU, and the new treaties negotiated post-Brexit with have the relationship of the UK and the EU redefined)
The UK agreed to be bound by international agreements relating to Climate change, the UN, the World Bank, the World Health Organisation and NATO
Parliament is sovereign
Ultimate power and the source of all political power, as enforced by the legal system and the state
(working definition of legal sovereignty)
meaning that someone that is granted sovereignty within a constitution cannot be overruled by someone else (
a codified constitution is also legally sovereign
)
if anyone challenges or abuses constitutional power, they are limited or sanctioned by the legal system
Power should not be confused with legal sovereignty
(power can be added, reduced or removed by someone with sovereignty)
Parliament is sovereign because it has the legal right to end devolution in Scotland (it can be very damaging to its reputation so it cannot be exercised) Parliament also have the legal right to reject triggering Article 50 but to do this, it had to bow to the will of the people - known as
'popular sovereignty'
The rule of law is paramount
this ensures that the constitution is based on the law and everyone is bound to those same laws
this leads to a society where everyone is treated equally and receives the same consequences if they break such laws