From the BBC:
“Supreme Court: Suspending
Parliament was unlawful, judges rule”
Boris Johnson's decision to
suspend Parliament was unlawful, the Supreme Court has ruled. Mr Johnson suspended - or prorogued -
Parliament for five weeks earlier this month, but judges said it was wrong to
stop MPs carrying out duties in the run-up to Brexit on 31 October. Supreme
Court president Lady Hale said "the effect on the fundamentals of
democracy was extreme." The PM said he "profoundly disagreed"
with the ruling but would "respect" it. A raft of MPs have now called
for the prime minister to resign and some say they will attempt to force him
out if he does not go of his accord. Mr Johnson insisted he wanted to outline
his government's policies in a Queen's Speech on 14 October, and to do that,
Parliament must be prorogued and a new session started. But critics said he was
trying to stop MPs scrutinising his Brexit plans and the suspension was far
longer than necessary.
Could a Queen's Speech still go
ahead?
During a speech in New York, the
PM said he "refused to be deterred" from getting on with "an
exciting and dynamic domestic agenda", and to do that he would need a
Queen's Speech. The court ruling does not prevent him from proroguing again in
order to hold one, as long as it does not stop Parliament carrying out its
duties "without reasonable justification". A No 10 source said the Supreme Court had
"made a serious mistake in extending its reach to these political
matters", and had "made it clear that its reasons [were] connected to
the Parliamentary disputes over, and timetable for" Brexit. But Lady Hale
emphasised in the ruling that the case was "not about when and on what
terms" the UK left the EU - it was about the decision to suspend
Parliament. Delivering the justices'
conclusions, she said: "The decision to advise Her Majesty to prorogue
Parliament was unlawful because it had the effect of frustrating or preventing
the ability of Parliament to carry out its constitutional functions without
reasonable justification." Lady Hale
said the unanimous decision of the 11 justices meant Parliament had effectively
not been prorogued - the decision was null and of no effect. Speaker of the
Commons John Bercow said MPs needed to return "in light of the explicit
judgement", and he had "instructed the House of Commons authorities
to prepare... for the resumption of business" from 11:30 BST on Wednesday.
He said prime minister's questions would
not go ahead, but there would be "full scope" for urgent questions,
ministerial statements and applications for emergency debates.
Where does this leave Boris Johnson?
Short of the inscrutable Lady
Hale, with the giant diamond spider on her lapel, declaring Boris Johnson to be
Pinocchio, this judgement is just about as bad for the government as it gets. Mr
Johnson is, as is abundantly clear, prepared to run a general election campaign
that pits Parliament against the people. And so what, according to that view of
the world, if that includes the judges as part of the establishment standing in
his way? But there is a difference between being ruthless and reckless. And the scope and strength of this judgement
cannot just be dismissed as some pesky judges sticking their noses in. Reacting
to the ruling, Mr Johnson said it was an "unusual judgement", adding:
"The prerogative of prorogation has been used for centuries without this
kind of challenge. "There are a lot
of people who basically want to stop this country from coming out of the EU and
we have a Parliament that is unable to be prorogued and doesn't want to have an
election. I think it is time we took things forward." The PM said getting
a deal was "not made much easier with these sort of things in Parliament
or the courts", but insisted the UK would still leave on 31 October. Speaker
John Bercow says the Commons will sit on Wednesday Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn was due to close
the Labour Party conference in Brighton with a speech on Wednesday, but brought
it forward to Tuesday afternoon so he could return to Westminster. He told
cheering delegates: "Tomorrow Parliament will return. The government will
be held to account for what it has done. Boris Johnson has been found to have
misled the country. This unelected prime minister should now resign." Lawyers for the government had argued the
decision to prorogue was one for Parliament, not the courts. But the justices
disagreed, unanimously deciding it was "justiciable", and there was
"no doubt that the courts have jurisdiction to decide upon the existence
and limits of a prerogative power". The court also criticised the length of the
suspension, with Lady Hale saying it was "impossible for us to conclude,
on the evidence which has been put before us, that there was any reason - let
alone a good reason - to advise Her Majesty to prorogue Parliament for five
weeks". The damage is done Wow! This is legal,
constitutional and political dynamite. It
is worth just taking a breath and considering that a prime minister of the
United Kingdom has been found by the highest court in the land to have acted
unlawfully in shutting down the sovereign body in our constitution, Parliament,
at a time of national crisis. The court
may have fallen short of saying Boris Johnson had an improper motive of
stymieing or frustrating parliamentary scrutiny, but the damage is done, he has
been found to have acted unlawfully and stopped Parliament from doing its job
without any legal justification. And the
court has quashed both his advice to the Queen and the Order in Council which
officially suspended parliament. That
means Parliament was never prorogued and so we assume that MPs are free to
re-enter the Commons. This is the most
dramatic example yet of independent judges, through the mechanism of judicial
review, stopping the government in its tracks because what it has done is
unlawful. Be you ever so mighty, the law
is above you - even if you are the prime minister. Unprecedented, extraordinary, ground breaking
- it is difficult to overestimate the constitutional and political significance
of today's ruling.
What was the court considering?
Gina Miller led campaigners against the
suspension of Parliament The ruling was
made after a three-day hearing at the Supreme Court last week which dealt with
two appeals - one from campaigner and businesswoman Gina Miller, the second
from the government. Mrs Miller was appealing against the English High Court's
decision that the prorogation was "purely political" and not a matter
for the courts. The government was
appealing against the ruling by Scotland's Court of Session that the
prorogation was "unlawful" and had been used to "stymie"
Parliament. The court ruled in favour of
Mrs Miller's appeal and against the government's.
How did those involved in the
case react?
The SNP's Joanna Cherry said the
PM's position was "untenable" Speaking
outside the court, Mrs Miller said the ruling "speaks volumes". "This prime minister must open the doors
of Parliament tomorrow. MPs must get back and be brave and bold in holding this
unscrupulous government to account," she added. The SNP's Joanna Cherry,
who led the Scottish case, called for Mr Johnson to resign as a result of the
ruling. "The highest court in the
United Kingdom has unanimously found that his advice to prorogue this
Parliament, his advice given to Her Majesty the Queen, was unlawful," she
said. "His position is untenable and he should have the guts, for once, to
do the decent thing and resign." Former
Prime Minister Sir John Major - one of the sponsors of the prorogation appeal -
said it gave him "no pleasure to be pitted against a government and prime
minister of my own party". "No prime minister must ever treat the
monarch or Parliament in this way again."
What about other politicians?
Mr Johnson was backed by US
President Donald Trump at a joint press conference at the United Nations in New
York. "I'll tell you, I know him
well, he's not going anywhere," said Mr Trump, after a US reporter quizzed
the prime minister on whether he was going to resign. But reaction at home was far more negative.
Scotland's First Minister, the SNP's Nicola Sturgeon, said the ruling was the
most significant constitutional judgement in her lifetime, and it would be
"unthinkable" for Mr Johnson to remain in office. Wales' First
Minister, Labour's Mark Drakeford, said the court's decision had been a
"victory for the rule of law" and the PM had "tried to play fast
and loose with our constitution". In Northern Ireland, the leader of the
DUP, Arlene Foster, said the ruling must be respected, while Sinn Fein's vice
president, Michelle O'Neill, said Mr Johnson should resign. Other figures have
taken to Twitter to support the court's decision, including former Tory
minister Amber Rudd, who resigned her post - and the party whip - over the
government's approach to Brexit. The
leader of The Brexit Party, Nigel Farage, said Mr Johnson must, "as a
matter of honour", offer his resignation to MPs in Parliament on
Wednesday. The decision to prorogue Parliament had been a "disaster",
he added, and there must be a general election "before very long because
Parliament and the government have ceased to function". Former Attorney
General Dominic Grieve, who has been an outspoken critic of the suspension,
said he was "not surprised" by the judgement because of the
"gross misbehaviour by the prime minister". He told the BBC's Victoria Derbyshire
programme he was "delighted" the Supreme Court had "stopped this
unconstitutional act in its tracks". Dominic Grieve said it was
"perfectly obvious that the reason for suspending Parliament was
bogus" But Tory MP Andrew Bridgen said the court's decision was "the
worst possible outcome for our democracy" and "an absolute
disgrace". He told the same programme: "What we've got is a
Parliament that's completely out of step with sentiment of the country." Fellow Tory MP and chairman of the pro-Brexit
European Research Group Steve Baker said the ruling was an "earthquake
moment". He described the Commons as a "rotten Parliament"
facing a "crisis", and called for a general election so a government
with a majority could move forward.
What happened before Parliament
was suspended?
Prorogation is a power that rests with the
Queen, carried out by her on the advice of the prime minister. And at the end
of August - shortly before MPs returned from their summer recess - Mr Johnson
called Her Majesty to advise she suspend Parliament between 9 September until
14 October. MPs had been expecting to be
in recess for some of these weeks for their party conferences. But unlike
prorogation, a recess must be agreed by a vote, and a number of MPs said they
would have voted against it to ensure they could scrutinise Mr Johnson's Brexit
plans. The decision to prorogue prompted
an uproar from the Commons, especially from MPs who had planned to take control
of Parliament to force through a law to block a no-deal Brexit after Mr Johnson
said the UK would leave the EU with or without a deal on the Halloween
deadline. Despite only sitting for a
week, they did manage to pass that law ahead of prorogation and it received
royal assent on 9 September.
^ The Brexit drama continues in
the UK. This is better than anything that the British television or film
industry could make. You know you’re time is limited when you get the “stamp of
approval” from Trump like Johnson did today. ^
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