The cult of Lady Hale

[Blackleaf]

The first female president of the Supreme Court has been all but sanctified on social media following her delivery yesterday of the verdict all Brexit-haters were hoping for – that the government had acted unlawfully when it prorogued parliament...

The cult of Lady Hale

The gushing over this judge shows us what that judgement yesterday was really all about.

ELLA WHELAN
COLUMNIST
25th September 2019
Spiked

‘Revenge of the girly swots’ has been trending on Twitter. Reclaiming Boris Johnson’s swipe at David Cameron, anti-Brexit MPs and political commentators are celebrating the three ‘girly swot’ heroines of yesterday’s Supreme Court decision: Lady Hale, Gina Miller and Joanna Cherry MP.

Hale in particular. The first female president of the Supreme Court has been all but sanctified on social media following her delivery yesterday of the verdict all Brexit-haters were hoping for – that the government had acted unlawfully when it prorogued parliament. Supporters were even praising Hale’s choice of a diamond-encrusted spider brooch, which she wore as she read the judgement, likening her to a character from Game of Thrones.

Known as the ‘Beyoncé of the legal profession’, due to her popularity among young lawyers and students, Hale has a reputation for breaking convention – she has refused to wear ‘silly’ judicial wigs and holds strident feminist views. There’s even a children’s book coming out about her, written by Afua Hirsch and Henny Beaumont. But following the Supreme Court’s ruling, she is being talked about as if she were a modern-day Che Guevara. There are spider-brooch themed t-shirts being sold in their thousands.

Remainers yesterday insisted that the Supreme Court’s ruling had nothing to do with politics. But their gushing over Lady Hale made clear that the ruling was not, for them, just a cold and clinical examination of law. ‘So much love for Lady Hale’, tweeted Liberal Democrat leader Jo Swinson. Anna Soubry, Ian Blackford, Caroline Lucas and other extreme anti-Brexit campaigners bowled out of the Supreme Court following the ruling, punching the air. When they say this has nothing to do with Brexit they are, frankly, lying.

Alongside the adoration for Hale is the continued fawning over Gina Miller, the rich anti-Brexit businesswoman who took the government to court. When interviewed on BBC News following the judgement, Miller was asked about the ‘personal cost’ she had sacrificed in her fight for ‘democracy’. No questions were asked about her role in the politicisation of the judiciary and the frustration of the Brexit vote. Commentators are calling for there to be a statue of her erected in Parliament Square. Others say she should be made a dame.

Meanwhile, Joanna Cherry, the lawyer and SNP MP behind the prorogation case that won in the Scottish courts, was also praised as another ‘brave’ woman taking on the establishment. ITV’s political editor Robert Peston tweeted about them all together: ‘A trio of extraordinary women have today changed the course of British politics in a fundamental way: Gina Miller, Joanna Cherry and Lady Hale. Wherever you stand on Brexit or Johnson, you’ve got to be impressed.’

But this all begs the question: impressed by what? That three women – two of whom are unelected – are wielding their considerable legal, political and financial sway over democratic matters? That they have all played a role in an unprecedented dragging of the law into politics? Should their genitals dazzle us to the extent that we ignore the substance of what happened yesterday?

We know what’s going on here. The gushing praise for Hale, Miller and Cherry is an attempt to gloss over the fact that the judiciary has intervened in the Brexit debate, at the behest of rich and powerful people. Boris Johnson’s undemocratic prorogation of parliament was wrong. But the actions of these three women, and the influential people cheering them on, have done far more damage to our political and legal system. The ruling yesterday has already dampened trust in our supposedly independent judiciary.

The attempt to put a feminist spin on this is sickening. It’s the clearest example yet of how identity politics can be used to deflect criticism from truly powerful people. For, as Peston suggests, who could be critical of these three successful women? Well, many people, actually. However Remainers want to dress it up, the judgement yesterday was a blow to democracy, and the creepy new cult of Lady Hale makes that all the more clear.

https://www.spiked-online.com/2019/09/25/the-cult-of-lady-hale/

 

[Serryah]

So it's basically the 11-0 passage of the judgment - which is huge when you think about it because NO judges disagreed - is being blamed on Hale, because she's a woman?


Really can't stand that BoJo lost that case, can you?

 

[Blackleaf]

Really can't stand that BoJo lost that case, can you?

Nope.

At least one court doesn't know the law and made the wrong judgement. That's the Supreme Court, in my opinion. Eleven Remainers making a biased decision against Mr Johnson. No surprises there.

Still, as long we as we get Brexit - you know, that thing the people voted for - that's all that matters.

 

[Blackleaf]

Coffee House

Has the Supreme Court handed Boris Johnson a Brexit escape route?

Alexander Pelling-Bruce

Alexander Pelling-Bruce
26 September 2019
The Spectator

The Supreme Court’s judgement is the latest constitutional perversion after the Benn act. But ironically it may assist the Government in achieving its objective of Britain leaving the EU by 31 October, without having to seek an extension to the Article 50 process.

In paragraph 34, the Supreme Court states that its ‘proper function’ under our constitution is to give effect to the separation of powers (which justifies court intervention in relation to prorogation). Then, in what appears to be an innocuous sentence in paragraph 55, it says that it is to be “remember[ed] always that the actual task of governing is for the executive and not for Parliament or the courts.”
Yet the Benn Act manifestly contradicts this principle. It dictates how the Government must conduct negotiations with a foreign body, the EU, to the extent of obliging the Prime Minister to write specifically worded letters and accept whatever extension it offers when certain conditions are not met. In the situation when the conditions are not met (i.e. if the House of Commons has not voted for a deal or approved exit without a deal), the Prime Minister then has no choice but to act as instructed, whether he wants to or not. At that point, in what sense is he governing? The Prime Minister becomes a mere puppet of Parliament, which to all intents and purposes is the governing body.

The judgement also outlines another fundamental constitutional principle: Parliamentary accountability. In paragraph 46 it says:

“Ministers are accountable to Parliament through such mechanisms as their duty to answer Parliamentary scrutiny of the delegated legislation which ministers make. By these means, the policies of the executive are subjected to consideration by the representatives of the electorate, the executive is required to report, explain, and defend its actions, and citizens are protected from the arbitrary exercise of executive power.”
​

But if the legislature takes on the functions of the executive, without taking office, then to whom is it accountable for its policies? To whom does it report, explain, and defend its actions to? Itself? Which of its members speaks on its behalf?

To show the absurdity of the current situation, suppose the Brexit select committee wanted to summon someone to scrutinise the effects of an extension to Article 50 to 31 January 2020 (or beyond). Who would it call? Perhaps it ought to call Hilary Benn, whose name is attributed to the Act that mandates the policy. But Hilary Benn happens to be the chairman of the committee. The Benn Act then arguably destroys the very principle of parliamentary accountability, which the Supreme Court cited as a cornerstone of the British constitution.

If the Benn Act is unconstitutional, the next question to ask is whether the Court has the ability to rule that it violates constitutional norms and provide a legal remedy.

Again, the answer lies in the present judgment. In discussing the justiciability of prerogative powers, paragraph 35 says that:

“The [first] issue is whether a prerogative power exists, and if it does exist, its extent. The second is whether, granted that a prerogative power exists, and that it has been exercised within its limits, the exercise of the power is open to legal challenge on some other basis.”
​

But there is no reason why this should not extend to virtually any claimed power – the courts can decide if the power exists, and if it does, what is its extent. This is one of the normal functions of a court. Why shouldn’t the power of parliament to enact laws be examined too and subject to scrutiny and analysis by the courts and its limits determined?

The counter argument to this is that the Benn Act is a proceeding of Parliament so is protected from court scrutiny by Article IX of the Bill of Rights 1689 (which the Court ruled does not cover prorogation). Yet it could be argued that this Article, which is a significant part of our constitution, cannot be used as an instrument itself to destroy the constitution. By way of comparison, judges ruled that the Statute of Frauds 1677 itself could not be pleaded as a defence against accusation of fraud.

If you maintain that Article IX is absolute, then it would mean that Parliament could legislate to abolish judicial review, open justice, the courts or even Parliament itself. This would do unlimited damage and destruction to the constitution, all without the courts having any say.

Before this judgment, I believed the principle of parliamentary sovereignty meant that parliament could do this. Now I am not so sure; the Court has taken it upon itself, under the common law, to be the guardian of certain constitutional principles. It could be argued then that while it has a constitutional duty to supervise the exercise of prerogative power, it also has a duty to supervise the power of parliament.

The sovereign was – before this ruling, at least – the ultimate limit on the use of prerogative power in the absence of statute. The Court in its judgment at paragraph 30 states that it expresses no view on the matter of whether the Queen was obliged to accept the advice to prorogue. Yet it then contradicts this by claiming that the Prime Minister was “the only person with power…to have regard to all relevant interests, including the interests of Parliament”.

This reduces the monarch to a nodding dog, who simply acquiesces to wherever her ministers drive the nation and its institutions. The Court has usurped the role of the constitutional monarch and invented a novel role for itself, essentially transforming Britain into a democratic republic. If it rules against prorogation today, then is it to challenge the Royal Assent, by which bills become law, tomorrow? What if the Government were, in an exceptional case, to advise the Queen to refuse such assent?

Before the Cooper-Letwin Act and the Benn Act, the House of Commons and the House of Lords were the checks on the unconstitutional power of the Crown in Parliament. The Government should now test whether the Court will apply with consistency the reasoning that it used to justify its new constitutional powers in relation to prorogation.

If the matter of prorogation is now justiciable because the Court can protect Parliamentary sovereignty and accountability as part of the fundamental separation of powers, then why should the Court not also intervene when that principle is violated by a Parliament which presumes to usurp the executive by taking upon itself the actual task of governing?

The way is now open for Boris Johnson to refuse to comply with the Benn Act on the legitimate ground that the Act is unconstitutional and that the courts (and ultimately the Supreme Court) will agree; and even if the Court won’t go so far as declaring it an actual nullity, then at least they will refuse to enforce it.

Alexander Pelling-Bruce is a political researcher

https://blogs.spectator.co.uk/2019/...t-handed-boris-johnson-a-brexit-escape-route/

 

[Serryah]

Nope.

At least one court doesn't know the law and made the wrong judgement. That's the Supreme Court, in my opinion. Eleven Remainers making a biased decision against Mr Johnson. No surprises there.

Still, as long we as we get Brexit - you know, that thing the people voted for - that's all that matters.

Again.


11-0.


If there was ANY doubt about what BoJo did being illegal, it would have been in the vote.


It wasn't.


And just because you didn't get your way, you cry like a little baby that "They're Remainers!" Had there been one dissenting vote, or they had all decided for BoJo, you'd be "Justice and Rule of Law is Awesome!"

 

[Blackleaf]

Again.


11-0.


If there was ANY doubt about what BoJo did being illegal, it would have been in the vote.


It wasn't.


And just because you didn't get your way, you cry like a little baby that "They're Remainers!" Had there been one dissenting vote, or they had all decided for BoJo, you'd be "Justice and Rule of Law is Awesome!"

Another court found it perfectly legal.

Which court is wrong and doesn't know the law? Because both can't be right.

Which court does Boris ignore?

 

[Blackleaf]

RICHARD LITTLEJOHN: Why don't we drag John Bercow in front of the Supreme Court?

By Richard Littlejohn for the Daily Mail
27 September 2019

In the 40-odd years I’ve been writing about politics, I can’t remember Parliament ever sitting in September

What you have to get through your thick heads, you easily led, Leave-voting morons, is that this ruling wasn’t about Brexit.

Goodness me, no. Perish the thought. We have the unimpeachable assurance of no less a figure than Lady Hale, President of the Supreme Court.

Handing down the unanimous decision of all 11 justices, she was keen to emphasise: ‘These cases are not about when and on what terms the United Kingdom is to leave the European Union.’

We are most grateful for the clarification, m’lady. Otherwise we may have got the wrong impression.

Bercow has spent the last three years bending the rules, conniving with Remain ultras to turn the relationship between MPs and the executive on its head.

Boris Johnson (pictured addressing US business leaders at Hudson Yards in New York with Liz Truss) has damned the Supreme Court's humiliating judgment on his decision to prorogue Parliament and said he disagrees with the ruling. He will fly back from New York tonight to face the music in the Commons

Watching the self-styled Remain Alliance bouncing up and down on the steps of the court afterwards, we could have been forgiven for concluding this judgment had everything to do with Brexit.

The Usual Suspects were all there: Soubry Loo, that Green madwoman, the porky pub bore from the SNP, Chucky Umunna — celebrating like the crew of the Starship Enterprise on shore leave.

If this wasn’t about Brexit, what were they doing there?

If this wasn’t about Brexit, why did arch-Remainer Gina Miller bring her case in the first place?

Why, otherwise, were they so violently opposed to Boris Johnson suspending Parliament for five weeks?

Lady Hale delivers the verdict of the Supreme Court as they ruled that Boris broke the law when he shut down Parliament. Jacob Rees-Mogg has accused judges of mounting a 'constitutional coup'

It’s not as if any of them have ever objected before to having more than a month off.

In the 40-odd years I’ve been writing about politics, I can’t remember Parliament ever sitting in September.

The House would break up in the summer and not reconvene until after the party conference season in October.

So what was the big deal? MPs are being ‘silenced’, they screamed. If only. They never shut up. No, the real reason they were feigning outrage is that Boris would have denied them a few extra days to frustrate Brexit.

Not that the submissions before the court reflected that. The plaintiffs insisted they were simply interested in defending parliamentary sovereignty.

Boris Johnson (pictured meeting Donald Trump in New York tonight) made no effort to hide his anger at the bombshell verdict from the Supreme Court, which found his decision to prorogue the Commons for five weeks was 'unlawful, void and of no effect'

The only reason Gina Miller is so keen on Parliament is that her best chance of blocking Brexit altogether lies with the overwhelming number of Remainer MPs determined to overturn the result of the 2016 referendum.

This is the wealthy businesswoman who said that when she realised Britain had voted Leave she felt physically sick.

That shouldn’t give her and her rich backers, many of whom live abroad, carte blanche to use the courts in a shameless attempt to block a democratic vote by 17.4 million people. Not once but twice.

What we’re seeing here is rich man’s justice, in which cases can only be brought by those with the deepest pockets. They can afford the best lawyers and finance legal action right up to the Supreme Court.

Risibly, they claim to be ‘defending democracy’ — the same dishonest excuse trotted out by fanatical Remainers in the Commons, including the nominally independent Speaker, who was unable to contain his smug delight at yesterday’s ruling.

Speaking at Labour conference this evening, Mr Corbyn insisted he will not table a confidence vote or support a motion for an early poll until after October 19 - when a rebel law passed by Remainers obliges Mr Johnson to beg the EU for a Brexit extension

Yet I wonder how many of John Bercow’s recent machinations would stand up in a court of law. Boris has been found guilty of playing fast and loose with parliamentary precedent.

But Bercow has spent the last three years bending the rules, conniving with Remain ultras to turn the relationship between MPs and the executive on its head.

Where’s the precedent for MPs seizing the order of parliamentary business from the Government?

Where, for that matter, is the precedent for Parliament deliberately refusing to implement the result of a referendum for which they voted and promised to honour?

Where is the precedent for those who have seized control of the House then effectively taking the Prime Minister hostage and passing a hasty law to prevent him negotiating properly on a major constitutional and foreign policy issue?

Where is the precedent for emasculating a Prime Minister but refusing to allow him to call a general election?

John Bercow (pictured on College Green today) has seized power and will reopen Parliament tomorrow after the Supreme Court humiliated Boris Johnson, who appeared undimmed as he spoke to business leaders in New York

Has Bercow not been abusing his power, making up the rules as he goes along?

Have MPs not acted in contravention of long-established parliamentary tradition?

Can you imagine the outcry if a wealthy Leave supporter —financed, say, by rich Republicans in the U.S. — decided to do a Gina Miller and challenge the behaviour of Bercow and Remain MPs in court?

And you can also imagine the howls if judges ruled that Bercow and his cohorts had acted illegally and ordered them to vote through a No Deal Brexit without further delay.

So someone explain to me what’s the difference between that unlikely scenario and not just Boris Johnson but the referendum result itself being dragged through the courts.

Arch-remainer Gina Miller, who helped defeat Mr Johnson, hugged her lawyer Lord Pannick QC in the courtroom as her victory over the Brexiteer Prime Minister was confirmed

Remainers have tried every grubby trick in the book to stop Brexit. But when Boris pulls a stroke of his own, they squeal ‘foul’ like spoilt children and run to the law.

You’ll find the full details of yesterday’s judgment elsewhere. But all you need to know is that the court found Johnson’s decision to prorogue Parliament to be unlawful.

In a ruling which went way beyond the wildest expectations of Remainers, Lady Hale added: ‘The effect upon the fundamentals of our democracy was extreme. No justification for taking action with such an extreme effect has been put before the court.’

Well, that’s her learned opinion. But perhaps the reason is because this should never have come before the courts in the first place. The High Court in London had earlier ruled that this was a purely ‘political’ matter, not one for judges to decide.

Lady Hale said the ‘quite exceptional circumstances’ of Brexit meant Mr Johnson’s decision had an ‘extreme’ effect on the ‘fundamentals of our democracy’

That was also the advice given to the Government by Attorney General Geoffrey Cox, although a Scottish court thought differently.

Lady Hale may say that the Supreme Court’s decision was nothing to do with Brexit. But the case was brought for nakedly political reasons and places unelected judges above elected politicians, including the Prime Minister.

What the political class still don’t get is that Leave wasn’t just about freeing us from the shackles of an anti-democratic, bureaucratic foreign superstate.

We were rejecting the whole rotten Establishment edifice — up to and including the self-regarding, self-important judicial class.

Inside the Bubble this is being presented as a victory for parliamentary sovereignty, for justice and for democracy.

Outside, where most of us live, we can see it for exactly what it really is: a disgraceful, but well-executed Remain stitch-up.

They’re trying to drum into our thick heads that they know best and our votes are worthless.

It isn’t justice, and it’s definitely not democracy.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/ar...JOHN-dont-drag-John-Bercow-Supreme-Court.html

 

[Serryah]

Another court found it perfectly legal.

Which court is wrong and doesn't know the law? Because both can't be right.

Which court does Boris ignore?

Wow...


You don't understand how your court system works?

It was brought to lower courts. Lower courts agreed it was fine. Those against it did not agree and sought the supreme court. THEY are the ultimate deciders. In the end, their verdicts overturn lower court rulings.


They voted, 11-0, in favor of it being illegal.


Lower courts rulings are now void.

 

[Tecumsehsbones]

Maybe they should make Blackshirt their highest legal authority, what with his extensive knowledge of the law and all.

 

[Serryah]

Maybe they should make Blackshirt their highest legal authority, what with his extensive knowledge of the law and all.

Thankfully he's not smart enough to go that far.

 

[Blackleaf]

Wow...


You don't understand how your court system works?

It was brought to lower courts. Lower courts agreed it was fine. Those against it did not agree and sought the supreme court. THEY are the ultimate deciders. In the end, their verdicts overturn lower court rulings.


They voted, 11-0, in favor of it being illegal.


Lower courts rulings are now void.

So the High Court doesn't know the law.

 

[Blackleaf]

Maybe they should make Blackshirt their highest legal authority, what with his extensive knowledge of the law and all.

Well I probably know more about the law than one or more of these courts, since one or more of them don't know the law and make the wrong judgement.

And I've noticed you and your mates keep skipping over that inconvenient truth whenever I mention it.

 

[Blackleaf]

It is interesting to compare the Supreme Court's ruling with the Baldrick-free judgment on exactly the same case given by the old-fashioned High Court on September 11.

That court – three very clever English judges – said simply that the prorogation of Parliament was a political affair and none of their business. This is what any English court would have said at any time in the past two centuries of parliamentary democracy.

John Finnis, Professor Emeritus of Law and Legal Philosophy at Oxford, is even more devastating. He says the judges dangerously evaded Britain's most fundamental constitutional statute, the 1689 Bill of Rights.

This declares: 'Proceedings in Parliament ought not to be impeached or questioned in any Court or Place out of Parliament.'

Gloating liberals may soon regret the power now being wielded by Supreme Court judges, writes PETER HITCHENS

By Peter Hitchens for The Mail on Sunday
29 September 2019

We were warned from the start that the new 'Supreme Court' would be a menace, by people who well understood what was going on.

But as usual nobody did anything to stop it. Britain's slow-motion Left-wing revolution just carried on, rolling over old and trusted rules and institutions, and crushing them into dust.

Last week the court made a swift and cat-like grab for power, its sharp claws flashing as it swiped at Downing Street.

The decision, absurdly, was unanimous. Unanimity is surely for sheep, not for independent minds. The Supreme Court judges are pictured above

This, unlike so many of the things wrongly said to be 'historic', was a truly huge change in the way we are governed.

Lord Hennessy, the liberals' favourite liberal, exulted that Tuesday was the day when 'the constitution really did shift'.

He argued that 'the architecture of the British constitution will never be the same again' because 'the Supreme Court's reach… now penetrates the most intimate relationship in the British state, that between the head of government, the prime minister, and the head of state, Her Majesty the Queen.'

Lord Sumption, perhaps the cleverest lawyer in the country, said the decision was 'revolutionary'. He is right.

By the time the ruling was given, it was obvious there was no threat to Parliament. It had already defended itself robustly, without any aid from Brenda Hale (above) and her team of SuperJudges

This deep change has been brewing for a long time.

As one very senior judge has admitted, this country's grandest lawyers, ambitious to extend their reach, have recently developed methods that might be called the Baldrick Strategy – cunning and subtle ways of inventing laws out of nothing.

If not swiftly and firmly curbed, the Court can now use equally vague and feeble pretexts to start striking down any government action it does not like, urged on by wealthy individuals or corporations who share its liberal world view.

This was foolishly applauded by many on the Left.

They did not grasp that, however much they might enjoy watching Al 'Boris' Johnson looking silly, this was a direct blow at Parliament and at accountable power, things some of them still believe in.

I should note at this point that I am not a supporter of Mr Johnson. I disapproved of his suspension of Parliament.

I also agreed with the High Court when it backed Gina Miller, on Parliament's right to legislate on the activation of Article 50 of the EU treaty, back in 2016. I am not partisan on this issue. Anything but.

Proper Leftists should be careful what they wish for. What a pity that great English radical, Tony Benn, was not there to remind them of the questions we need to ask of anyone who has power: 'What power have you got? Where did you get it from? In whose interests do you use it? To whom are you accountable? And finally, how do we get rid of you?'

You would think from the squeals emitted by the 'Supreme' Court on Tuesday that Mr Johnson had surrounded Parliament with tanks, arrested the Speaker and declared that he would from now on rule in person. A protester is pictured above

They are excellent questions and, as we shall see, the 'Supreme Court' cannot answer the final three which are most crucial. Who do they serve? We do not know. Who is above them? It remains to be seen. How do we remove them? There is no obvious way.

Just before this strange, unBritish chamber of sorrows was launched ten years ago, its future President, Lord Neuberger, spilled the beans in a BBC interview. He said there was a real risk of 'judges arrogating to themselves greater power than they have at the moment'. This was a reasonable prophecy.

The old court of final appeal, a committee of senior Law Lords, never called itself 'Supreme'. It understood that the Crown in Parliament is the only supreme thing in our constitution.

Unlike the Blairites who invented the new court, it did not think Britain was the same as the USA.

It also did not sit in the grandiose white stone palace which the 'Supreme Court ' now occupies, a lovely, ornate listed building controversially converted to suit the new court, at a cost to the taxpayer of almost £60 million.

What did those who flattered and pampered this roomful of lawyers expect to happen?

If not swiftly and firmly curbed, the Court can now use equally vague and feeble pretexts to start striking down any government action it does not like, urged on by wealthy individuals or corporations who share its liberal world view

When a newly qualified policeman puts on his new uniform, perhaps with boots and baseball cap, and is given handcuffs and tasers and club, it changes his behaviour.

If you call a group of confident, well-rewarded men and women 'supreme', when they are already used to wielding unquestioned power, and then give them a majestic headquarters just across the square from Parliament itself, you will change their behaviour. You will change it for the worse.

Lord Neuberger correctly worried back in 2009 that there was no way of telling where this would end.

He said then 'the danger is that you muck around with a constitution like the British Constitution at your peril because you do not know what the consequences of any change will be.'

To be fair to Lord Neuberger, he said at the time that he feared these developments. Lord Falconer, the Blairite crony and all-purpose radical lawyer who had pushed the changes through Parliament, was delighted by them.

He happily predicted 'the Supreme Court will be bolder in vindicating both the freedoms of individuals and, coupled with that, being willing to take on the executive.'

By bolder, he meant, more aggressive, and of course more revolutionary, just as he was.

And the sorts of 'freedoms' he had in mind would be the freedoms beloved by Blairites, the vague and flexible 'human rights' which have made it so very hard to enforce old-fashioned commonsense law in recent years.

More recently, the same Lord Neuberger was talking to students at the Cambridge Union, and explained to them the huge powers of the United States Supreme Court to give orders to Congress and the President.

He then told them: 'We can't do that.' But he didn't quite mean it, for he continued: 'We get round that, the Judges get round that, by what Baldrick might call a 'cunning and subtle plan' of being able to 'interpret' statutes, and sometimes we interpret them quite, um, imaginatively, so as to, as we see it, 'comply with the rule of law.' '

No better description has been given of the Baldrick-style verdict of Lady Hale's court last Tuesday. It is full of 'imaginative interpretation'.

Less politely, you could say that it makes up a whole new law out of nothing. It claims to do this to defend Parliament from the Executive. But in fact it is only able to do it because it has scented just how weak the current Government is.

It is interesting to compare it with the Baldrick-free judgment on exactly the same case given by the old-fashioned High Court on September 11.

That court – three very clever English judges – said simply that the prorogation of Parliament was a political affair and none of their business. This is what any English court would have said at any time in the past two centuries of parliamentary democracy.

John Finnis, Professor Emeritus of Law and Legal Philosophy at Oxford, is even more devastating. He says the judges dangerously evaded Britain's most fundamental constitutional statute, the 1689 Bill of Rights.

This declares: 'Proceedings in Parliament ought not to be impeached or questioned in any Court or Place out of Parliament.'

In other words, the courts are simply forbidden from interfering with Parliament.

The court got round this by claiming the prorogation itself was somehow not a 'proceeding in Parliament'.

As one very senior judge has admitted, this country's grandest lawyers, ambitious to extend their reach, have recently developed methods that might be called the Baldrick Strategy – cunning and subtle ways of inventing laws out of nothing

But the same 'Supreme Court' ruled in 2014 that the granting of Royal Assent to a Bill, a very similar action to prorogation, was a proceeding in Parliament, saying 'the Queen in Parliament is sovereign and its procedures cannot be questioned in the courts of the United Kingdom.'

The High Court gave a history of prorogation over the last century, which showed that the Johnson suspension was not hugely exceptional in modern times.

It adds up to just ten working days, once you have subtracted from it the three weeks normally taken off by Parliament at this time of year.

Parliament was prorogued for three whole months in the summer of 1930, from August 1 to 28 October. In 1901 it was prorogued for even longer, from August 17 until November 5.

The now-sainted Clement Attlee, Labour's post-war reforming Premier, suspended Parliament to make radical reforms of the constitution. John Major is accused of suspending it to avoid embarrassment over a possible scandal.

No law or rule requires Parliament to sit in constant session, the judges rightly noted.

But you would think from the squeals emitted by the 'Supreme' Court on Tuesday that Mr Johnson had surrounded Parliament with tanks, arrested the Speaker and declared that he would from now on rule in person.

They showed a total loss of proportion when they airily dismissed as 'scant' the two giant obstacles to anyone who tries to rule this country without Parliament.

These are the need to raise taxes, which cannot be done without Parliament, and the Armed Forces Act, which must be renewed every year to keep a standing Army in being.

Far from being 'scant' they are a huge iron wall against tyranny which cannot be breached.

There is more evidence of a collective rush of blood to the head in the judicial chamber. Towards the end of their judgment, they say Mr Johnson's suspension of Parliament 'had such an extreme effect upon the fundamentals of our democracy'.

What are they on about? Ten days of vacation, during which Parliament in fact has little or nothing to do, does not have an 'extreme effect upon the fundamentals of our democracy'.

Any reader of the judgment who has taken it seriously up till paragraph 58 must surely realise at this point that it has jumped the rails of reality.

The decision, absurdly, was unanimous. Unanimity is surely for sheep, not for independent minds.

Given that the three judges of the High Court had taken the opposite view, could the 'Supreme' court not manage a single dissenter?

By the time the ruling was given, it was obvious there was no threat to Parliament. It had already defended itself robustly, without any aid from Brenda Hale and her team of SuperJudges.

The fundamentals are quite unthreatened. Look what happened. In the short time available, despite the Prime Minister's supposedly despotic decision to extend their holidays, an uncowed Parliament gave Mr Johnson two big black eyes – stopping him from holding an Election and banning him from taking us out of the EU without a deal.

When they eventually struggled back from their supposedly tyrannical suspension, bravely rescued by Judge Brenda from Mr Johnson's non-existent Stormtroopers, MPs instantly punched the Premier on the nose by refusing him even a few days off for the Tory conference, an act of spite.

It is not Mr Johnson who is doing the pushing around. If anyone needs rescuing by the courts, it is him.

If they thought a few days of prorogation were bad, let us see what they think of the Rule of Lawyers which now faces us and them. Judges at the Supreme Court are pictured above

But the new legal elite see themselves as heroes against a wicked Government. If you think these politicised judges are not at all full of themselves and vain, you might be interested to know that Lady Hale's interesting life, and supposed struggle against brutal misogynist discrimination, will shortly be celebrated in a children's book, Judge Brenda, Equal To Everything.

Advance publicity suggests that it will not be a critical study. It is, in fact, hard to find a critical study of this highly significant woman.
We still know remarkably little about her and her fellow judges. The Hale Court is now at least as significant as the Cabinet, but its members are for the most part a mystery to us. Two things could reasonably happen now.

A miracle could occur and we could get a serious patriotic Government with a big majority, which would disband the court and nullify this ruling, returning things to where they were before the Blairite vandalism created this dangerous tribunal.

Or public and politicians alike could demand to know, before they are appointed, what sort of people will sit in this new almighty Star Chamber. The US Supreme Court's Justices all undergo severe and searching hearings before Senators of both parties. If they are conservatives and male, they can nowadays pretty much expect to be accused of being sexual predators, or otherwise attacked.

But these hearings do at least ensure that the elected part of the US government has some idea of the people who have such awesome power over them, and who will take huge decisions for years to come.

If we cannot get rid of them, then we must know who they are and what they believe in. And if Parliament is not ready to curb this new overmighty subject, in one way or another, it can expect to be less and less powerful in the years to come.

If they thought a few days of prorogation were bad, let us see what they think of the Rule of Lawyers which now faces us and them.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/...preme-Court-judges-writes-PETER-HITCHENS.html

 

[Blackleaf]

Coffee House

The Supreme Court’s decision is a constitutional outrage

Charles Day
24th September 2019
The Spectator

In ruling that the prorogation of Parliament was legal, the High Court (above) was implementing the law that existed in this land before the Supreme Court changed it

Forty years of membership of the EU has taught us a lot. Many of us have learned a new language; most of us have learned new recipes for our supper; and our Judges have learned how to seize power from democratic institutions.

For there has always been a fundamental cultural clash between us and most EU states – that of law. The UK (though Scotland is slightly different) is a common law country – like Australia, India, Canada, New Zealand and the USA. Most EU states are civil law countries. There are many differences, but the most striking one to ordinary people is the difference in how lawyers are treated. In common law countries, lawyers are the butt of most jokes. We are not well liked, and that has always struck me as fair – the people are sovereign, we merely look after their laws.

In civil law systems lawyers are treated with respect. The judges are revered. They are at the head of their constitution. Before Tony Blair’s experiment of a Supreme Court, our Law Lords lived in the cramped corridor at the top of Parliament and shared a secretary.

They had no clerks to serve them, no luxuriant carpet to delight them and they knew our place was to stay out of politics. It is difficult to see how the new experiment, more alike to our continental cousins, is an improvement.

Today’s decision has shocked and outraged many. Good. In Britain we generally adopt an attitude of ‘if it ain’t broke don’t fix it’. So it is exceedingly useful for an aspect of our system to declare, quite publicly, just how broken it is. The constitution has been broken for some time yet we ignored the signs – the debacle that is the Lord Chancellor’s ‘abolition’ and the non-entity that is Lords Speaker, the ‘Supreme’ Court, the Fixed-Term Parliaments Act, the endless constitutional outrages of the last three years. But above all, the rise of Judicial Review.

In theory, Judicial Review is a good thing. In theory it is a way of forcing bad bureaucrats to do their job. The Australians, with remarkable prescience, worried Judicial Review might be used inappropriately, so they constrained it by act of parliament. We didn’t. I think we clearly should have done. Because Judicial Review has been used, incrementally, to erode and alter the constitution of our country – without most of us noticing and without any of us being asked. There was a convention that the common law (judge made law) only changed little bits of the law. As of today that convention is dead.

It is because of the incremental changes made by Judicial Review since the 90s that the Supreme Court can declare this:

‘Time and again, in a series of cases since the 17th century, the courts have protected Parliamentary sovereignty from threats posed to it by the use of prerogative powers, and in doing so have demonstrated that prerogative powers are limited by the principle of Parliamentary sovereignty…’

What that means is that prorogation can be limited by statute and the courts would enforce that statute. I doubt anyone disputes that.

What it does not mean, yet what has happened, is that in the absence of such a statute, the ‘Supreme’ Court can step in and invent one. So lawyers and judges have, step by step, decided to give themselves more and more power.

No one expected them to do what they did today. No one expected it to be unanimous – which perhaps hurts the most. Most of us expected them to say the matter was for Parliament, not for them. As indeed Lady Hale might have noticed from the very scant list of examples she gave in paragraph 44 of her judgment – all examples of constraining prorogation are statutory.

It was a point made in open court when Lord Pannick was questioned, just after the embarrassing issue with the bundles. No example of the court controlling prorogation of parliament can be found in this country – or in any common law country. Until today.

The 11 justices have taken it upon themselves to assume the power of Parliament and by common law, make a statute. That is a far bigger constitutional outrage than Boris sending parliament on holiday over conference season. It is and should be a nationwide klaxon that the experiment of a ‘Supreme’ Court is a failure. They seem conversely oblivious that the actual conclusion to their actions is to carry on the farce of the longest sitting parliament for 400 years and to give all power in the land to the Speaker and rogue MPs – who are unconstrained by manifesto promises, a Queen’s Speech or by fear of an election (because they refuse one). No mention was made of how parliament has ceased to function.

Brexit has exposed huge cracks in our constitution which urgently need fixing. At the very least, we should copy the Australians and constrain Judicial Review by statute – make it a tool to help ordinary people again. Then we need to decide, openly and publicly, whether we want our old constitution back (the one that worked), or whether, even if we like this new one of all powerful judges and speakers – whether it would be better to do it by statute rather than by common law. That way we might all know the constitution of our land in advance and not have to wait for 11 judges to invent it

https://blogs.spectator.co.uk/2019/09/the-supreme-courts-decision-is-a-constitutional-outrage/

 

[Serryah]

Well I probably know more about the law than one or more of these courts, since one or more of them don't know the law and make the wrong judgement.

And I've noticed you and your mates keep skipping over that inconvenient truth whenever I mention it.

So why didn't you, in all your years of learning, experience and practice of law, volunteer to advice the Remainers on how to win in the Supreme Court? That way you could have been sure to see their decision go your way?

 

[Blackleaf]

So why didn't you, in all your years of learning, experience and practice of law, volunteer to advice the Remainers on how to win in the Supreme Court? That way you could have been sure to see their decision go your way?

Now don't be silly. Eleven Remainers in the Supreme Court were always going to go against the constitution and invent a new law to say the prorogation was unlawful, whether they take my advice or not.

 

[Tecumsehsbones]

Well I probably know more about the law than one or more of these courts, since one or more of them don't know the law and make the wrong judgement.
And I've noticed you and your mates keep skipping over that inconvenient truth whenever I mention it.

Yeah, no doubt the history, reasoning, and philosophy of the law since 1250 A.D. was extensively covered in your forklift training.

 

[Blackleaf]

Yeah, no doubt the history, reasoning, and philosophy of the law since 1250 A.D. was extensively covered in your forklift training.

I study it myself. I'm intelligent enough to do that.

 

[Tecumsehsbones]

I study it myself. I'm intelligent enough to do that.

Makes a body wonder why you ain't qualified.

Nah, not really.

 

[Blackleaf]

For example, by reading the above article I taught myself that, according to the 1689 Bill of Rights, a cornerstone of the British constitution: 'Proceedings in Parliament ought not to be impeached or questioned in any Court or Place out of Parliament.'

Therefore the Supreme Court's decision is wrong and unconstitutional.