Public Law - UK constitution Flashcards
Introduction
- UK is one of three countries that does not have a codified constitution (Israel, New Zealand and UK)
Barnett Definition
“In law terms a constitution is a set of rules that governs an organisation”
HoL Select Committee Definition
“… the set of laws rules and practices that create the basic institutions of the state.”
Bolingbroke definition
“Derived from certain fixed principles of reason, fixed objects of public good and community hath agreed to be governed.”
Thomas Paine Definition
“A constitution is a thing antecedent (should come first) to a government”
Classifying constitutions
- Written or Unwritten
- Concrete or Abstract
- Flexible or rigid
- Separate powers or fused powers
- Federal or Unitary
- Supreme or Subordinate
- Republican or Monarchical
Bill of Rights 1689
- Document is not called ‘the constitution’
- Despite being similar to a constitution, it is not a comprehensive document
Magna Carta 1215
A coming together to agree how we should be governed, one could question if it was representative or the public or if it was just to benefit those with power
European Union (withdrawal) Act 2018
- Shapes the way we are governed
- EU laws no longer being applicable in the UK
Magna Carta: Common Good
- Declared that no free man should be convicted without due process
Also contained provision of preventing taxation by the king without the consent of the Great Council of the Realm (current HoL).
Bill of Rights: Common Good
- Represent a limit on power for the Monarch, transferring some to Parliament
- Should be governed by representatives (despite them not being democratically elected back then)
Human Rights Act: Common Good
- Attempts to protect certain rights/civil liberties
- Guaranteed by the ECHR
Constitutional Reform Act: Common Good
- Established the Supreme Court
- Replaced the appellate jurisdiction of the HoL
