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Supreme court - Coggle Diagram

- - - - The johnson government was widely criticised for politicising the position of the judiciary
        
        After Gina Miller 2 Johnson accused the supreme court of pronouncing "political questions" and threatened to bring in a american style system to have "some form of accountability"
        
        The creature called Suella braverman who was at the time the attorney general accused the supreme court of "encroaching" and said it was getting in the way of parliamentary sovereignty
        
        In 2022 a cross party committee of mps found that the johnson government had been very combative of the supreme court
        
        This inquiry discovered a number of things.
        
        94 percent of judges said that they where worried about the impact of politicians soft power on the judiciary and many faced threats of reform if they did not decide in the governments favour.
        
        They said that minister should not weigh in on supreme court decisions
        
        allegedly the judiciary had been influenced to make more palatable decisions for the government multiple times since 2010
  - - - Eg in reiley vs secretary of state for work and pensions (2013) the supreme court ruled that the government had acted ultra vires when introducing "welfare to work"
        
        To avoid paying a 130 million compensation bill the government passed a retrospective legislation in 2013
      - Furthermore many governments have tried to limit the power of judicial review in recent years.
        
        In 2015 the coalition government made it harder for pressure groups to bring judicial review cases forward
        
        in 2022 the johnson government introduced the judicial review act which granted more limited remedies available to judges when they found that a public body had acted ultra vires and also made it harder to use certain types of judicial review.
        
        judicial review declined during the johnson years-the number of successful cases declined by half to just 2.1 percent while the total number of judicial review cases full by 18 percent suggesting that it is no longer very effective check on the executive.
    - - Between 2016 and 2020 only 4.6 percent of judicial review cases where successful
- - - - However they can still be influential
        
        in reiley vs secretary of state for work and pensions the court of appeal issued a formal declaration of incompatibility against the retrospective legislation brought in by the government-ruling it a breech of the right to a fair trial which is in the HRA
        
        The government could of ignored this but it decided to respect the courts ruling-and in 2019 the government asked parliament to amend the 2013 legislation to make it compatible with the HRA
  - - - In 2018 it ruled that Northern ireland's abortion restrictions where incompatible with the HRA and as the NI government was suspended at the time the uk government was pressured to change the law which it did in 2019.
      - Scotland
        
        In 2018 the supreme court struck down the uk withdrawal from the EU (legal continuity) (scotland) bill also simply known as the scottish bill as it was considered beyond the scottish parliaments devolved competence.
        
        In november 2022 the supreme court ruled against nicola sturgeon who claimed that as she had a majority in the scottish assembly she had the right to call a referendum on independence.the government disagreed and said that it was a right reserved for the uk government
        
        After lengthy deliberation the court agreed that a referendum could not take place unless westminster agreed.
- - - - joint landmark constitutional law case that Found that johnson's attempt to prorogue parliament by giving advice to the queen to prorogue it was unlawful
        
        Parliament is usually prorogued at the end of each "session" paving the way for the queens speech where the governments new legislative programmes are set out.
        
        (proroguing is usually only for a few days)
        
        However the government asked for parliament to be prorogued for 5 weeks during a key time during brexit negotiations as back benches where attempting to get a extension to the negotiations to reduce the chance of a no deal brexit
        
        The GOV was taken to the supreme court by Gina Miller
        
        the supreme court took special account of two constitutional principle parliamentary sovereignty and executive accountability to Parliament and ruled that the longer parliament was prorogued the more these principles came under threat.
        
        the court said that reasonable justification had to be provided to prorogue parliament for that long and as no such reasonable justification had been provided the proroguing of parliament by boris johnson was illegal.
      - Overall limited the power of royal prerogative.
    - - case decided by the uk supreme court that ruled that the british government could not withdraw from the european union by formal notification to the council of the european union without a act of parliament giving it that power.
        
        as it was parliament which passed the act to join the european union in 1972 then it was parliaments right to legislate to leave it as well.
        
        Therefore parliament must consent to the government opening negotiations to withdraw from the European union
      - The Gina Miller clarified some key constitutional principles
        
        The supreme court can determine when the government can use royal prerogative
        
        The government must consult parliament if it wishes to abolish rights that where bestowed by parliament
        
        Claims by the government that they had the right to start negotiations to leave the EU due to the referendum where illegal as the referendum was legally non binding
        
        It upheld the supremacy of parliament against claims that the result of a referendum could empower the government to ignore parliament.