Questions

1. What are the main features of the UK constitution?
2. What makes the UK constitution flexible?
3. What are the benefits of a flexible constitution? What are the risks?
4. Summarise the sources of the UK constitution.
5. How did Laws LJ define constitutional statutes in the Thoburn case?
6. Explain what constitutional conventions are and how they operate.
7. What is dualism and what is its significance?
8. Outline three arguments for codifying the UK constitution.
9. Outline three arguments against codifying the UK constitution.

Answers

1. It is uncodified, flexible, traditionally unitary (but now debatably a union state), monarchical, parliamentary. It is also based on a bedrock of important constitutional doctrines and principles.
2. It is adaptable and can be easily altered because it is not codified. Statutes that change the constitution are passed in the same way as ordinary law; no special parliamentary procedure is required.
3. It is easy to change and responsive to new issues, does not easily became outdated and can reflect changes in social views. Parliament’s sovereignty means that an Act of Parliament can introduce constitutional changes which can later be reversed or altered. But there is a need to trust government and Parliament not to initiate arbitrary change. Entrenched constitutions stand the test of time and enshrine and protect constitutional rights.
4. Statutes and judicial decisions relating to the constitution, constitutional conventions, international treaties, royal prerogative, the law and custom of Parliament, authoritative works.
5. A constitutional statute is one which ‘(a) conditions the legal relationship between citizen and State in some general, overarching manner, or (b) enlarges or diminishes the scope of what we would now regard as fundamental constitutional rights’.
6. Rules of political practice, binding on and regarded as binding by the people who operate the constitution. They regulate how institutions within the constitution work, create new roles and practices, and control and limit discretionary power.
7. Dualism sees international law and a state’s domestic law as two separate, distinct legal systems so an international law rule must be expressly adopted as part of its domestic law before it can be effectively enforced in the state’s courts.
8. Codifying a constitution achieves clarity, transparency, and accessibility, entrenches and protects fundamental rights and powers, educates people on the ground rules of the state, clearly delineates limits on governmental powers.
9. Arguments against codifying the UK constitution: it is pragmatic and responsive, its traditional flexibility would be lost, there are issues of what it should and should not include, the issue of parliamentary sovereignty, the ‘if it ain’t broke, why fix it’ argument, and the issue of transferring political questions to the judges.