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AC 1.1 - Coggle Diagram
AC 1.1
The Parliamentary stages of a Bill
First reading - government introduces the bill into the commons (or occasionally the Lords) where it receives a first reading. This is just a formal announcement of the Bill and it is followed by a vote to allow it to move to the next stage
Second reading - Main principles considered and debated by the whole House of Commons and vote is taken. As the government hs support of the MPs they will usually win this vote to move onto the committee stage
The committee stage - Bill examined in detail, by a small committee of MPs from different parties. Committee will report back to the whole house and often propose amendments to the Bill
The report stage - gives MPs an opportunity to consider the committee's report and to debate and vote on any amedments they want to make. For major builds, the debate may be spread overall several days
Third reading - Final chance for the Commons to debate the Bill's contents. No amendments are allowed at this stage - the House votes either to pass the Bill or reject it
The Lords - Bill goes to the House of Lords, where it goes through the same stages as in the Commons. If the Lords have amended the bill, it must return to the common ao MPs can decide whether to accept or reject the Lords amendments. The House of Commons has the final say because it is made up of the people's elected representatives
Royal Assent - Once passed by both houses, it goes to the monarch for signing, known as the Royal Assent. This is the monarch's agreement to make the Bill into an act of parliament or law and is a formality. The new law will come into force immediately, unless the Act specifies that it will only apply from some later date
Parliament
UK is a parliamentary democarcy
Most of the country's laws are made up of passing Acts of Parliament
Made up of 3 parts
The Monarch
Currently King Charles
Has only formal role in law-making
The Queen or King simply gives the Royal Assent (means their formal agreement to a new law)
House of Commons
Most important part of Parliament because it is made up of the elected representative people
There are 650 members of the parliament (MPs)
Each one is elected at a general election to represent a constituency
House of Lords
Members are called peers
There are about 800
Still contains some hereditary peers
Most are life peers, as well as Church of England Bishops and Archibishops
Government
Formed by the political party that has a majority of the 650 MPs
Prime minister is leader of the majority party
Most proposals for new laws come from the government (bills)
When requesting a new legislation:
1) Green paper - before putting a Bill before Parliament, the Government usually publishes a Green Paper. This is an initial report to provoke public discussion of the subject
2) White paper - After the Green paper consultation, the government publishes a White Paper; a document setting out their detailed plans for the legislation. It often includes a draft version of the Bill they intend to put before Parliament
Examples of criminal statutes:
The Criminal Justice Act 2003 -
Introduced a change in the double jeopardy rule, following Ann Ming's successful campaign and the recommendations of the Macpherson Report on the murder of Stephen Lawrence
The charge enables the killer of Ann Ming's daughter to be convicted
One of Stephen Lawrence killer's was tried for a second time and convicted
The Dangerous Dogs Act 1991 -
Most legislate involves detailed scrutiny
However this act was rushed through Parliament in a few weeks due to media led moral panic
It has been criticised as 'it blames the breed, not the deed'
Judicial process of law making
Judges can make laws two. This is done through two processes:
Judicial precedent
A source of law-making where the past decisions of the judges create law for future judges to follow
Precedent happens in similar cases - creates certainty, consistency and fairness in the legal system
The court hierarchy - a decision taken by a case in higher court automatically created an original and binding precedent for all lower courts - one that they have to follow
Magistrates --> Crown --> Court of Appeal --> Supreme Court
Donaghue V Stevenson -
drunk a bottle of ginger beer with decomposed snail
got ill
sued the manufacturer
won case due to negligence
Daniels V White -
throat burn when drinking lemonade
lemonade found to have corrosive acid in it
when suing, they looked at Donaghue V Stevenson case for precedent
won case due to negligence
Exceptions to precedent
Distinguishing - a precedent form an earlier case is only binding on a present case if the legal principle involved is the same and if the facts are similar in both cases
'Distinguishing' means that the judge finds the facts in the present case are different enough fro the earlier on not allow him/her to reach a iffiest decision and not have to follow the present of the earlier case
Overruling - where a court is higher up the hierarchy states that the legal decision in an earlier case is wrong and overturns it. eg. the supreme court can overtun lower courts decision when it hears an appeal
Statutory interpretation
As well as making the law by creating presidents for others to follow, judges can make law by the way they interpret statues of Acts of Parliament
A statue is a written law and so judges need to interpret the meanings of its words and apply them to the case they are judging
In all legislation there is the potential for words and phrases to create uncertainty which can only be resolved by judicial interpretation. That process inevitable involves the judiciary in the process of creating the law
They have various rules - the rules of statutory interpretation - to help them do this, and have the ability to interpret in the way they see fit
The mischief rule allows the court to enforce what he statute was intended to achieve , rather than what the words actually say eg. Licensing Act 1982, Corkery V Carpenter
Whitely V Chappel (1868) -
The defendant was charged with an offence of impersonating any person entitled to vote
The defendant had pretended to be a person who was on the register of voters, but had died
The court held that the defendant was not guilty since a dead person is not entities to vote
Corkery V Carpenter (1951)
The Licensing Act (1872) makes it an offence to be drunk in charge of a 'carriage' on the highway
In the Corkery V Carpenter, Corkery was found guilty even though he was in charge of a bicycle not a carriage
The court argued that the Act's purpose was to prevent people from using any form of transport on the public highway when drunk - not carriages