Since the referendum, there has been a lively debate about the process for invoking Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty. Can Article 50 be invoked by the Prerogative, as Mark Elliott and Kenneth Armstrong have suggested? Will it require Parliamentary consent, as Nick Barber, Tom Hickman and Jeff King, Scott Styles, and Ewan Smith have argued? Will Parliamentary scrutiny suffice, as Adam Tucker suggests?
This post argues that the exercise of the prerogative without Parliamentary consent – as the Government appears increasingly set to do – runs the risk of triggering a full-blown constitutional crisis. This makes it imperative, both as a matter of constitutional law and established constitutional practice, that parliamentary consent is obtained before the process is invoked.
While most existing commentary has focused on the potential for an argument based on Section 2 (1) of the European Communities Act 1972 others, including Charles Flint QC…
View original post 1,783 more words
Utopia, you are standing in it! 
Recent Comments